How would a company hire local anyway, by rejecting candidates who live to far away? What if they promise to move, but don't end up doing it?
> Work with cities to reduce congestion?
The only real working way to do that is to ask them to introduce a congestion charge, which I am all for.
But getting 50% off of your Navigo, which is a monthly pass allowing you unlimited use of Paris and greater Paris public transports. Which is about 75 euros. So when your are subsidised by your company with respect to public transport, you have unlimited access to all public transport in and around Paris for 38 euros. Which is nuts because the Parisian public transport network is crazy (metros, trams, buses, transiliens, RERs).
When I was working as a consultant at Alten, in theory my gas could have been reimbursed (based on distance travelled and car horsepower), but I never tried since I used public transport during all my time there.
There's also a push to apply it to bicycles, but it's not widely implemented so far.
But it doesn't apply to car commuting.
oh no, the poor poor companies ;((((((
I hear things are pretty bad in the bay area and other metropolises that have high rent and low wage. Something should be done but I'm not sure this is it.
Works really well where it was pioneered (in Singapore) and also seems to do an OK job in London.
I suspect the Brits ain't as ruthless in applying orthodox economics in general, so they don't solve their problems nearly as well including their congestion problems.
The congestion charges in Singapore and London weren't popular when they were introduced either. So not sure what rejection elsewhere tells us?
I commute a bit over an hour. Because I cannot afford to live close to my job and rent a place for me and child.
It would cost me triple my current rent.
Alas they can but they won’t and they’ll fight you in court so they don’t have to.
But yes enormous, corporate conglomerates should pay.
[0] - https://www.visualcapitalist.com/average-commute-u-s-states-... [1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/273439/number-of-employe...
If there's a traffic jam, that's the employers problem.
For 'going somewhere else after work', it wouldn't be officially allowed - you are still working till you arrive home. Obviously some workplaces could perhaps allow flexibility as a benefit.
Germany has a system a bit like what you are describing, only that it's the government giving you tax rebates for long commutes. It's not a good idea.
Ponder the opposite: why not subsidize short commutes instead and give people assistance to pay the higher rent closer to the place of work? That would be much greener, too.
Just to be clear, that would be silly as well. Let workers and employers negotiate what they want to compensate and how much.
Distribute the proceeds equally amongst all citizens. And in effect, anyone who commutes less than the average person gets a net positive payment. (Or technically: anyone who uses less carbon or causes less congestion than the average person.. Someone who commutes 100km by bicycle would still get a net payment. That's fine.)
But yes, these you are right, there's a danger that landholders (landlords and owner occupiers) capture the gains, even in my proposed scheme.
You deal with that via a land value tax.
From the point of view of economics, those ideas are orthodoxy. Good luck getting them past any political process anywhere in the world, though.
My other weird idea is to have first and second class transit, where the only difference is the price. I got the idea from the trains in Europe. The first class transit would attract people who want to feel like they are getting some exclusive service, and would help fund and support the system overall.
As someone who grew up on an island I think this is a very, very, bad idea. When distance has a high cost the price of everything skyrockets.
It hasn't dramatically reduced commute time for those people IMO.
"The European Union Court of Justice has ruled that time spent traveling to and from your job counts as work, and that your employer has to pay you for it. But don’t get too excited–this only counts if you have no fixed office or place of work. The new law is designed to protect workers who travel to remote sites, straight from their home. If you commute to the same office cubicle every day, nothing changes."
https://www.fastcompany.com/3063893/the-eu-says-that-some-co...
https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/3555-mapping-social-reprodu...
The labour share has been roughly at 60% +/- 10% for ages.
Even getting 100% will be at most a doubling of labour's income. That's nifty, comparable to moving from Mississippi to Connecticut. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_GDP_per...)
But it's one-off. The difference between countries are bigger. And so are the difference over time.
And of course, jumping to 100% while keeping total GDP per capita constant is not really possible.
If they paid directly I think it would result in a two (or more) tiered transport network, great for people in some jobs/companies but terrible for most.