How many % of your income do you spend on transportation?

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by 320touring

I can afford to write off the £513 purchase price in one year.. based on lots of daft friends and colleagues paying almost that a month for a car

its the fuel that Mullers us Europeans though! I'd probably save £1500-2000 PA at US petrol prices

Depends on your mileage and what car you want to buy. Guys who earn less than I do at work still buy cars which cost 2-5x to insure and would never do more than 25MPG (imp). And then wonder why they don't have any money.

EDIT - It seems a lot less than I thought it would be, maybe because the spend (petrol fillups, servicing, insurance) seems to go in large blocks.

[jakobnev]

Originally Posted by Thymeclock

Let's not pretend that there is no political influence involved here.

Politics aside, this poll is about how much competent people spend on transportation when they are actually trying to cut costs. (Unlike the people in those stories who are obviously neither.)

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by jakobnev

Politics aside, this poll is about how much competent people spend on transportation when they are actually trying to cut costs. (Unlike the people in those stories who are obviously neither.)

Interesting that the poll doesn't take into account how much people spend on paying for public transportation. That too, can be an expensive expenditure impacting one's income.

The assumption is that wasteful spending = automotive ownership and use.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Thymeclock

Interesting that the poll doesn't take into account how much people spend on paying for public transportation.

Separate the poll, which is just us on this forum, from the linked calculator, which is something else entirely. And which is over-simplified in any case. It leaves out taxes & registration, assumes your fuel consumption is constant throughout the year, doesn't allow for amortization of cars purchased for cash...

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Separate the poll, which is just us on this forum, from the linked calculator, which is something else entirely. And which is over-simplified in any case. It leaves out taxes & registration, assumes your fuel consumption is constant throughout the year, doesn't allow for amortization of cars purchased for cash...

Is "transportation" only about motor vehicles?

Polls are usually run so that someone (or some entity) can gather information that will be used to benefit them or their cause in some way.

Everyone has transportation expenses, be it that of a car, or a horse, or a rickshaw, or public transportation, or a bicycle, or roller skates, or a wheelchair, or shoes (for those who only walk everywhere) or whatever - but everyone still has a 'transportation expense' - whatever it may be.

So what is the purpose of this poll? I understand that the originators of it had a motive for promoting it and running it - and framing it such that it is very narrow in scope, so as to suit their purpose.

What is the motive here? Is this a case of 'trickle down' polling?

[sid]

Mine is in the 26 to 30 % range. But that includes all transportation (planes, trains, bicycles, etc.). That also assumes the cost of my vehicle is divided equally over the expected 10 year life before I get another.

I also have incredibly low living expenses compared to most people (no mortgage, car loans, cable, cell phone, trash service, electric bill, do almost all my own maintenance and home improvement, build a lot of my own stuff out of others' trash, grow a lot of my own food). So even though my total transportation expenses are less than most people's, my living expenses are much, much lower, making transportation a relatively high percentage.

People who are claiming less than $1000 a year can't be including all transportation expenses. Vehicle insurance alone is almost that, and my insurance is very low cost for my area since I am low risk (college grad, less than 7000 miles a year, no accidents, no tickets, age 55 or over).

[Frank Lee]

People who are claiming less than $1000 a year can't be including all transportation expenses.

Oh yes they can!

Purchase price: 0 (for several of them; far and away the most expensive was $19k in 1994, paid note off in a few months for minimal finance costs. I'd say that one is fully amortized out)
License tabs: $47/year (each, plus several with collector plates @ $0/year. I don't always put tabs on every vehicle, every year)
Insurance: $200/year (usually one active policy, sometimes a couple are active at once for a limited period of time)
Maint. & Repair: <$100/year (Lots of free after rebate oil, junkyard parts, mail order parts, $0 mechanic/stealership payments)
Fuel: assume 15 gal/mo @ $3.65 = $55/mo = $660/year. Assuming cuz it's divided up tween several vehicles and varies greatly for any particular segment of time for me)
So if I've not forgotten something, this totals $1007.

Bicycles = free or so close to free it doesn't count.

No air fares lately. No bus, no taxi, no limo, no train. Shoes? Gotta have those anyway.

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Separate the poll, which is just us on this forum, from the linked calculator, which is something else entirely. And which is over-simplified in any case. It leaves out taxes & registration, assumes your fuel consumption is constant throughout the year, doesn't allow for amortization of cars purchased for cash...

If anything I was pessimistic as I included the total cash cost of my car divided over the 5 year projected owning period and assumed a zero value at the end. I also included annual tax which is only £20 a year and overestimated my insurance cost at £200, it came down to £180.

[Ryland]

Originally Posted by sid

People who are claiming less than $1000 a year can't be including all transportation expenses. Vehicle insurance alone is almost that.

I'm in the same boat as Frank, my insurance for both of my cars together is $442 per year and that includes full coverage on my civic vx (Insurance just for that car is $356 per year) that I bought for $1,100 for three years ago but I have full coverage insurance so if the car gets totaled I get more then I paid for it, it's rust free and has no issues so it should last me another 8 to 10 years and the only work I have had done to it was me installing a new muffler with a life time warranty, a new radio and a new o2 sensor, oil changes are once a year and new plugs and wiper blades are every other year averaging out to $100 or less in upkeep per year.
Registration is cheap, around $75 per year, my electric car has collector plates on it, same with my motorcycles so those are good forever, gasoline to drive 8,000 miles per year comes to $530, electricity to power my electric car that I drive sometimes in the summer is another $25 per year, so I am just up over $1,100 for vehicle ownership for two cars and two motorcycles but if I limited my use to just my one main car I could keep it under $1,000 year.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Thymeclock

So what is the purpose of this poll?

I don't know. Why don't you ask the person who made the poll, jacobnev?