Suppose there are two employees: Alice and Bob, who do the same job at the same factory. Alice has a 10 minute (20RT) commute, Bob commutes 35 minutes(70RT).
If you’re the owner of the factory, would you compensate them for their commutes? How would you do it?
I would think free time is still more valuable in most cases.
Never had an employer that cares about what I do with my free time nor how optimized it is.
The question is what a person might offer as an employer, not what benefit a person might like to have as an employee.