Remote work has two financial effects: it eliminates commute costs (money) and commute time (hours). Both improve your effective hourly rate.
A 30-minute each-way commute on 5 days/week = 5 hours/week of unpaid job-related time. Over 50 working weeks, that's 250 hours/year. On a $75,000 salary working 47 real hours/week, eliminating 5 commute hours raises your true hourly rate from roughly $26/hr to $29/hr — roughly a 10% improvement without any change in salary.
Average US commuter spends $2,000-4,000/year on commuting (gas, transit, parking, car maintenance from extra mileage). That's $1-2/hr added directly to your effective rate when it disappears. Remote workers also typically spend less on work clothing and lunches.
Remote work creates new costs: home office equipment, higher home energy bills, faster internet. Roughly $500-1,500/year for most workers — meaningful but much less than what most commuters spend.
A $75,000 salaried employee with a 30-minute commute going fully remote typically sees their true hourly rate increase by $3-5/hr — equivalent to a $6,000-10,000 salary raise in take-home impact.
Run both scenarios in the calculator to see the real difference.