> What if companies had to pay for the time you spend commuting? They'd have an incentive to hire people as close as possible, and support local policies that make it easier to live closer to work.

I don't know. I worry that would immediately become a major form of discrimination -- it would inherently put anyone who was poor/middle-class or anyone with any sort of family/children at a huge employment disadvantage. Large companies would only ever hire already-hyper-wealthy individuals for their main positions (since they are the only people who are ever allowed to live in dense urban places). I'm imagining employers in Seattle saying "We like this guy, but he doesn't live in Pioneer Square where our office is, so that will be a pain, we should pass on him"

Many people already have to deal with that discrimination somewhat in terms of employers only being in major cities. Having that hyper-charged down to just major cities wealthiest neighborhoods seems like an even worse situation.