My reaction to the article was much the same. The article makes an argument I've made myself several times.
But the author's examples and 'calculations' are just this side of garbage.
But the author's examples and 'calculations' are just this side of garbage.
You spend one third to one fourth of your life sleeping. Just idling away time. Wait - a 10 minute shower everyday as well? And 10 minutes for breakfast? And a 30 minute lunch? You're wasting a lot of time. Better get your productivity a notch up.
;-)
Linking to his blog post in this way is tantamount to implying that the commenters on this thread are "complainypants", which I find quite rude. If that wasn't his intention, then he certainly could have done a much better job communicating it.
(This is my last post on this topic.)
But after about 10 minutes I realized that the author wasn't making a financial argument from the numbers, he was making an emotional argument with hand-waved numbers for garnish. And that, despite my interest in the issue and agreement with his conclusion, it simply wasn't worth that kind of time.
[1] e.g. $200/20,000 miles for car costs beyond oil/gas/tires is laughably low; ignoring parking/toll costs in the no-commute/used-car case; considering lost time in the commuting case but not lost-personal time in the no-commute case; assuming financing in the commuting case and savings for a used car in the no-commute case; ... generally just considering worst-case for the commuting case and best-case for the no-commute case in almost all things