"Most workers value flexibility, but tech employees are willing to give up 25% of their pay to get it. An analysis of the real-life job decisions of nearly 1,400 people by Harvard Business School's Zoe Cullen found that tech workers were willing to sacrifice one-quarter of their total compensation to avoid commuting to the office five days a week. The study suggests that remote work is three to five times more valuable than previous studies had indicated."
"Based on the average annual pay of $239,000 for common industry positions, like software engineer, product manager, and data scientist, workers would be willing to forgo almost $60,000 to work remotely. In the paper "Home Sweet Home: How Much Do Employees Value Remote Work?", published through the National Bureau of Economic Research in January 2025, Cullen collaborated with Bobak Pakzad-Hurson, assistant professor at Brown University, and Ricardo Perez-Truglia, professor at the University of California, Los Angeles."
An analysis of nearly 1,400 real job decisions shows tech workers willing to sacrifice roughly one-quarter of total compensation to avoid commuting to the office five days per week. Remote work value appears three to five times higher than prior estimates derived from hypothetical scenarios. Data were collected between May 2023 and December 2024 and included offers from major employers such as Google, Apple, and Meta. The average annual pay for common tech roles was $239,000, implying a willingness to forgo almost $60,000 to work remotely. Previous estimates of 5–10% suggest remote work may act as a luxury good for high earners.
Read at Harvard Business School
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]