[vidarh]

Hence calling them suckers. Doing the commute is fine, but not taking it into account is potentially seeking yourself short(even if you end up feeling forced to take an offer you feel doesn't take it into account - at least then you're aware).

[sokoloff]

Who are these people who are competent enough to hold an engineering position but do so without taking the facts of a commute into account?

[vidarh]

Given the low proportion of people I've extended employment offers to over the years who even try to negotiate terms or drill down into employment terms that might affect the value, I'd assume it applies to most engineers.

At some point I got a week more holiday than every other employee in the UK at my employer at the time because I was the only hire who had questioned a contract clause and gotten them to confirm my preferred interpretation of a woefully misleading clause in writing before signing, and when they later wanted to stick to the technicalities of how it was written I was able to just forward them an email from the COO confirming that in my case they'd agreed to my interpretation.

Most people seem to only pay attention to the headline amount, and then grumble about the consequences after the fact.