Sorry I meant in the sense that the income is treated the same plus the benefits of additional deductions. You don’t typically get additional deductions or reimbursements for a normal commute job (for instance gas, maintenance, licensing, etc) that you might see for say…well my wife is a good example as a veterinarian. She’s fully reimbursed for CE, licensing, and other items required for her job.
You’re not wrong, even including what was available it still wasn’t anywhere near enough to make itemized deduction a reasonable option. I mentioned the plumbing mostly because I thought it was funny that it was actually included in the list of valid deductible expenses for maintaining a home office.