Does the IRS reprieve those who have to commute for work?

Question

Consider someone who for either family or affordability reasons is unable to live in San Francisco, where they make their living.

Their daily commute is long. The cost of the commute is nontrivial, relative to the net salary.

Does the IRS offer any kind of reprieve? Are transportation or lodging costs deductible in any way?

Update

In case your thinking goes "Why should that be the case? They are making the choice to live far", it's worthwhile to mention here, ever so briefly, that such an incentive to commute would in the long run ammeliorate transportation networks (for example, trains run more often, paid by ticket revenue), which would encourage more people to avoid driving (even if the car is self-driven). And then those who continue to drive also will be happier, because they'll be able to breeze on the highways.

Answer 1

When I have a question about my income taxes, the first place I look is generally the Giant Book of Income Tax Information, Publication 17 (officially called "Your Federal Income Tax"). This looks to be covered in Chapter 26 on "Car Expenses and Other Employee Business Expenses". It's possible that there's something in there that applies to you if you need to temporarily commute to a place that isn't your normal workplace for a legitimate business reason or other business-related travel. But for your normal commute from your home to your normal workplace it has this to say:

Commuting expenses. You cannot deduct the costs of taking a bus, trolley, subway, or taxi, or of driving a car between your home and your main or regular place of work. These costs are personal commuting expenses. You cannot deduct commuting expenses no matter how far your home is from your regular place of work. You cannot deduct commuting expenses even if you work during the commuting trip.

Answer 2

No. Regular W2 employees cannot deduct housing or transportation costs related to their employment.

However, in the US, many employers offer Parking and/or Transit FSA programs which are usually collectively referred to a Commuter Benefits FSA programs, this is particularly common among larger employers with locations in major metropolitan cities. Under Commuter benefits FSAs employees can defer up to $255 per month from their gross pay, tax-free, for parking and/or transit expenses. Eligible expenses include things like bus and train passes or parking at a train or bus station.

These are money-in/money-out arrangements so expenses can only be claimed against contributions that have been made, unlike a Health FSA. Though, like a health FSA, contributions are subject to use-it or lose-it provisions.

These programs must be sponsored by the employer for an employee to take advantage of them though. Some jurisdictions mandate that employers above a certain threshold must offer commuter benefits.

Answer 3

You cannot deduct expenses directly. However, your employer may participate in programs to allow you to make a pretax deduction capped at $255 per month to pay for certain commuting expenses. For personal car commuters the main category is to pay for parking.

IRS guidelines

Qualified Transportation Benefits

This exclusion applies to the following benefits.

A ride in a commuter highway vehicle between the employee's home and work place.

A transit pass.

Qualified parking.

Qualified bicycle commuting reimbursement.

You may provide an employee with any one or more of the first three benefits at the same time. However, the exclusion for qualified bicycle commuting reimbursement isn't available in any month the employee receives any of the other qualified transportation benefits.

Answer 4

You cannot deduct commute expenses. Regarding your specific example, something to consider is that if the standard of living is higher in San Francisco, presumably the wages are higher too. Therefore, you must make a choice to trade "time and some money for commuting costs" for "even more money" in the form of higher wages.

For example, if you can make $50K working 2 hours away from SF, or $80K working in SF, and it costs you $5K extra per year in commute costs, you still come out ahead by $25K (minus taxes). If it ends up costing $20K more to live in SF (due to higher rent/mortgage/food/etc), some people choose to trade 4 extra hours of commuting time to put that extra $20K in their pocket. It's sort of like having an extra part time job, except you get paid to read/watch tv/sleep on the job (assuming you can take a train to work).

Answer 5

Short answer, yes. But this is not done through the deductions on Schedule A.

This can happen if the employer creates a Flexible Spending Account (FSA) for its employees. This can be created for certain approved uses like medical and transportation expenses (a separate account for each category). You can contribute amounts within certain limits to these accounts (e.g. $255 a month for transportation), with pre-tax income, deduct the contributions, and then withdraw these funds to cover your transportation or medical expenses. They work like a (deductible) IRA, except that these are "spending" and not "retirement" accounts. Basically, the employer fulfills the role of "IRA" (FSA, actually) trustee, and does the supporting paperwork.