wahoonc

Interesting Blog Post popped up on my Google Reader. You have to spend 2 hours a day working to pay for your car, only 3.5 minutes to pay for your bike. So even allowing for my 30 bikes (which didn't cost $1500 each) I still come out ahead of the game

Aaron

contango 

It's really a meaningless generalisation because working for a new Ferrari will take a lot longer than working for an old beat-up Ford.

I paid £5500 (about $10k) for my car and that was 12 years ago. So assuming it currently has no value at all (which isn't all that far from the truth) it worked out less than £500/year in depreciation, or about £10 ($16) per week. It certainly doesn't take me 10 hours of working to make that $16.

wahoonc

Another interesting tidbit...

Aaron

wahoonc

I am guessing that they use averages and there are always going to be people that are above and below that amount. You also forgot to allow for operating expenses. I can also see where the numbers could be a whole lot worse if you were working a low wage job. In the US typical pay at retail or fast food is less than half of the number they were using for wages.

Aaron

contango 

Sure, but when you can spend $5000 on a car that goes, and you can spend $10000 on a gleaming new bike, it does render the whole thing a lesson in averages at best. So from the perspective of an average person buying an average car or an average bike (whatever an "average car" or "average bike" actually is) it can work. But if you want/need a car and don't have a lot of cash you buy a beater, if you want/need a car and use $100 bills to light the fire you get a Lamborghini.

A lot of folks spend a lot on a car that they then can't afford, and I must admit I liked your second post about the total time spent either working for or driving the car. Around London most journeys under about 5 miles or so are just as quick on two wheels as on four. If you're travelling in the rush hour the bike is way quicker than the car.

Cyclist0383

How much time do you have to waste waiting for three buses to take you to the store in the middle of winter when roads are too rutted with ice to ride on?

wahoonc

Studded tires? When I was working in Iowa City, IA USA a few years back the buses would not run if there was a certain amount of snow, until the roads had been cleared. I had a borrowed bike with studded tires and had zero problems getting around. I don't know if you get the US news or not, but a month or so ago the city of Portland, OR USA was all but shut down due to ice and snow, the only thing moving with any regularity was foot traffic and cyclists.

Aaron

wahoonc

FWIW I spend a lot less than the $1500 they put forward as an ideal commuter bike. My first commuter bike, which I still have some 30 years later, cost me a grand total of $25usd in 1982. It was my main mode of transportation for close to 7 years. If you work an entry level job, even a basic car is going to cost you more than 2 hours a day of your pay. And of course most people are always looking to buy a "better" car, so they get caught in the trap.

Aaron

Cyclist0383

Nope, the roads here are too bad for studded tires. Many don't get clearled, but the buses always run. Personally I just drive to the store as I'm not going to wait hours for transfers and lug 35kg of product home. I do take the bus to work when the roads are too bad for cycling, though.

BTW, how would you haul 35kg of food, water, and dog food on studded tires?

Point being, just because you are smug that you don't have a car doesn't mean it will work for everyone.

wahoonc

I would haul the food, water and dog food the same way I would with regular tires. I puzzle the buying water part of the equation though. I use filters and drink city water, saves money and water hauling.


And FWIW I own and use cars, just trying to add information so people can make informed decisions. I drove close to 50,000 miles (80,000km) last year for work, however I try to limit my car use to necessary use only. Typically, once I get where I am going I park the car and walk, cycle or use mass transit to get where I need to go. I choose hotels that are centrally located, or located near the things I need to limit driving.

Aaron

Cyclist0383

Sounds like what we do.:-)

But I still question the blog post's math. $50 seems like very little for a serious commuter (brake pads, chains, and tires all get changed on my bike at least yearly). Plus the cost of lube, tubes and patches not to mention the extra food you are going to eat.

Also, car ownership doesn't need to be expensive. I just looked at my insurance today, and at current exchange rates it's less than thirteen US cents a day.

P.S. As for water we have a well that's not safe for drinking, and a proper filtration system will cost thousands of dollars.

wahoonc

Not sure where they get their $50 from, however on my old Raleigh Sports which I rode some 30,000 miles I only changed the chain twice, tires were good for a year to a year and a half and I was running very cheap tires. I have a newer city bike that I have put about 5,000 miles on in the past 3 years and it hasn't needed any maintenance out side of an occasional cleaning. However it has kevlar belted tires, full fenders, roller brakes, IGH and a chain case. But even at $150 a year for maintenance you are going to still come out way ahead. The biggest problem in the US is the short trips and lack of safe cycling infrastructure of any sort. Everything is seems to be designed for and around automobile use, whether you want it or not.

I can relate to the water issue. We have wells on our property, two are bad enough that they can barely be used for watering the gardens, due to petrochemical contamination (they are still trying to determine the source). Fortunately we were hooked up to a county water system 15 years ago so other than the chlorine and some sediment we are fine, basic activated charcoal filters take care of it.

Insurance is a crap shoot in the US in our state there are minimums which wouldn't come close to covering the costs of a bad accident, so we carry higher limits. Also the area I live in has a younger than average population so the base rates are even higher. Our average for 2 vehicles is almost $5 a day, and one of those vehicles is a low use vehicle.


Aaron

Smallwheels

A couple of years ago I bought a water distiller. It is cheaper to use that than buying gallon jugs. That solved my water carrying problem.

I like the argument about how the time to earn the money for the car must be calculated into the speed of the vehicle. It sounds great until you think about it. People can't cut the hours they spend at work to make up for the necessary time to use a bicycle to travel to places far away or even around town.

wahoonc

No but they can surely manage their time better when away from work, and from what I have seen in my office (when I am there) there is a gross lack of efficiency anyway, too much time seems to be spent dealing with "emergencies" that some of us see coming, but because of our positions (wrong department) our suggestions and comments fall on deaf ears. Planning is the key, last minute decisions need not apply.

Aaron

contango 

It's the trouble with the transition in mindset from "just in case" to "just in time". Just in time is fine, until you hit a glitch in the supply chain in which case it turns into "too late" with no slack at all.

wahoonc

Which unfortunately is the way most businesses are run today. I was having this conversation with my local grocery store manager after they "missed" a produce truck, they get trucks 5 times a week. Two produce, one meat/dairy and two dry goods trucks. If they didn't get them the store would be completely out of stock in less than 6 days. They routinely run out of things the day the trucks come in, I probably have a better back stock at my house than the store does...

Aaron

DX-MAN

It SOUNDS to me like you're justifying "free time" as not only irreplaceable, but invaluable; every minute of every day is not worth money in your (or anyone's) pocket. Whether you get paid for your time or not, THAT TIME IS GONE FOREVER.

Riding instead of driving is a choice, and that choice is made with the extra time involved already factored in before the choice is made. And, hey -- time spent on the bike isn't WASTED time, it's QUALITY time!

gerv 

I just figured out the ownership cost of a 2007 Toyota Corolla at the Edmunds site.

Seems like it does average about $5,000 a year... every dollar of it after-tax, so I can easily believe there are many people in the US who work 1 hour to cover the expense of a car. The average US wage is around $41,000 according to this site. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/COLA/AWI.html

Not sure what that works out to after tax, but by my math, it should work out to slightly less thatn 2 hours per day.

That's kind of scary when you consider it.

Newspaperguy

For most urban trips of 10 kilometres or less, a bike is faster than a car. A bike can get through crowded city streets a lot more quickly than a car, so there's no time loss, nor is there extra time to factor in. (For rural trips, a car will be a lot faster.)

Transportation costs for non-car travel will drop dramatically. This does not necessarily mean time savings, but it will leave one with more available money than before.

If the extra money is put into a retirement savings plan, it may be enough to allow for an earlier retirement, given enough time.

Zaneluke

It takes me 15 minutes to drive to work, 35 minutes to bike.
If i biked to work all the time I would be spending 40 minutes a day on the bike versus in the car.
880 minutes a month = 15 hours
15 hours of work a month more than pays for a car.

Newspaperguy

Let's do the rest of the math.

Assuming you're filling your tank twice a month at a cost of $40 a fill-up, you're spending $80 a month on fuel. Your vehicle insurance, based on some quick data I could find based on your state, will be around $167 a month. We'll add $60 a month to cover the costs of repairs and maintenance. This is $720 a year. If you car is reliable and relatively new, you'll spend less; if it's older or prone to minor problems, you'll spend more.

Adding this all up, you're spending $267 a month. (If you're making payments on the car, those need to be included. If you have to pay for parking at home or at work, that needs to be included.)

Would you ride your bike 15 hours a month to save $267? If you did this 12 months of the year, you'd save $3,204.

gerv 

The annual savings adds up quickly. It would be a nice thing to realize once you discovered you didn't really need a car. I imagine many here probably can't come to that realization.

But for those who can live without, it would be a nice annual nest egg.

Anewbike

It's definitely going to vary from bike to bike and car to car, but I feel like you can have an incredible, custom bike for the price of even the worst car.

Just sayin'.

Anewbike

If you love your job, and only medium enjoy riding a bike, this is a great deal. But there is a quality of life factor that's not really included. (just realized this is a thread about money though. #mefail)

Lao

Plus if you have an office job you probably need those 15 hours to exercise anyways so you don't really gain time by driving.