A new program in Washington, D.C. is attempting to bribe people to move from the suburbs to downtown. Will it work? [city managers in the suburbs sure as hell hope not]

How much cash would you take to move very close to your work? For the purposes of this exercise, think that your work is in one of the more, shall we say, unsavory parts of Washington, D.C. and you live in a nice, quaint suburb in Virginia. Would you accept $12,000? Washington, D.C.’s Office Of Planning (OP) thinks you might–so the organization is launching a pilot program that will match employer contributions of up to $6,000 to convince people to move closer to their work or public transit.

The initiative, appropriately dubbed the Live Near Your Work program, has a total of $200,000 to hand out to people who are willing to move within two miles of their work, within a half mile of a Metro station, or within a quarter mile of a “high-quality” bus corridor. The OP’s reasoning seems simple enough–people who live closer to their work spend less money and time commuting, employers get the benefit of reduced parking costs and “better on time and work performance”, and the city gets revitalized neighborhoods and a wider tax base. And theoretically, the region sees less traffic congestion and air pollution.

Keyword: Metro

One reader tells us that it’ll take way more than $12,000 to get them closer to the Metro station.

h/t Mike Garrett