(Christian Science Monitor) — Several years ago, Lisa Hammond quit her job as an assistant manager at the Wal-Mart inWichita, Kan., took a 60 percent pay cut to work for a call center, and came out ahead. How? She worked from home. This way, she saved on commuting and day-care costs, which had swallowed about half of her approximately $2,000-a-month take-home pay from Wal-Mart. Today, and two work-at-home jobs later, she earns more as a work-at-home field representative for the United States Census Bureau than she did at Wal-Mart – while still avoiding commuting and day-care costs. ”I’m spoiled now. I wouldn’t want to go back to working in an office,” says Ms. Hammond, a married mother of three. Amid traffic jams, high gas prices, family needs, and a yen for more flexibility, what 21st-century worker hasn’t thought about skipping the office scene and telecommuting instead? But taking a pay cut to do it? To some, the benefits outweigh the lost income. A survey by New York-based Dice Holdings released earlier this year found that 35 percent of technology professionals would take up to 10 percent less pay to telecommute full time.
