The International Workplace Group study has shown employees can save up to $30,332 per year in the U.S, and £13,188 in the UK, by working closer to home in the heart of their local communities.

The research found that an employee’s daily average expenditure when working from their head office totalled $48.40 (totalling $10,067 a year for workers spending four days a week at their HQ). The items most commonly purchased include lunch (74%), snacks (60%) and coffee (50%).

Working locally can significantly reduce daily commute-related spend, empowering workers to save for other financial priorities. More than three-quarters (76%) said hybrid working had reduced their monthly costs, which considered factors including the cost of public transportation fare, fuel, parking, and daily incidental costs such as morning coffee and meals.

Conducted by International Workplace Group, the world’s leading supplier of hybrid working solutions with brands including Regus and Spaces, and consultancy Development Economics, the study combined research of more than 2,000 office workers with publicly available transport data, analysing multiple hybrid scenarios, with a focus applied on the popular hybrid setup of working locally four days per week.

The study revealed that employees who commute long distances daily are incurring significantly higher costs, while also missing out on the numerous work/life balance benefits of working locally. Workers are now able to better understand the savings they could make by moving to more local working, by using this new International Workplace Group online calculator https://www.iwghybridcalculator.com/

These significant savings could be particularly transformative for younger workers looking to pay down debt or save for financial goals, such as a downpayment on a home. A 24-year-old Gen Z worker living in a popular commuter town in Red Bank, New Jersey, for example, could expect to save up to $388,320 throughout their working life on their commute alone, by working locally four days per week.

Workers across the board are seeing significant cost savings with working locally. Four in five (84%) say reduced commuting has put them in a better position to meet their financial goals. Two in five (38%) report they are adding their savings to a rainy-day fund, while nearly the same are using savings for vacations (37%), and more than one in three (35%) are putting their savings toward paying off credit card debts in full.  
 
Cutting down on daily long commutes is proving to have numerous benefits beyond just cost savings. 84% say spending less time commuting has positively impacted their work-life balance with 40% using the extra time to relax or take part in hobbies, and a significant proportion spending their previous commute time on activities that support their physical (38%) or mental health (34%).
 
Academics such as Professor Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University anticipate that up to 30-40% of workers will work in the hybrid model long-term.** As businesses permanently shift to hybrid working, additional research from International Workplace Group and Arup has found that the number of office workers in commuter towns could increase by up to 60%.* As more workers embrace this trend, it’s no surprise that two thirds (60%) express a desire to work within 15-minutes of where they live.

 
Mark Dixon, Chief Executive of IWG plc, said: “Before long, the concept of a long daily commute will be relegated to the annals of history. The idea that every morning, office workers will wake early, jump into polluting cars or overcrowded trains, and travel many miles to their place of work will, very soon, be a crazy thing people only did in the past.
 
“Our research with Development Economics highlights the significant savings hybrid workers can now invest in other aspects of their lives, whether that’s helping them get into the housing market or save toward other financial goals and milestones.”

 

IWG