This is true. I choose to live within walking distance of my office, and it has vastly improved my life - prior to this job, I commuted 2.5 hours a day, and that was awful.
These choices of course have complex tradeoffs, but you don't have to commute, it is a choice.
I feel like the trade off isn't that complex. Walking to work is a luxury of having a well paying job in the city.
I have to live near disabled family members so I can help take care of them. It's either work at Walmart, commute or work remotely. I've done the latter for years, but before the pandemic, most non-remote-first employers' attitudes towards remote working was either simply "no", or there was the expectation that you were to spend a year or more working in the office before asking your employer to make a special case for you to work remotely.