Personal Finance Advisor gives 10 straightforward reasons to "ditch your car"
Saving money often has the side effect of being what many would consider green. Not the money being green thing, either... as Personal Finance Advice points out here, ditching your car can save emissions and put extra cash in your pocket. Here are the top ten reasons to ditch your car, according to M Butler via Treehugger via Hugg.
- No car payment
- No car insurance:
- No pain when gas prices increase
- No car repair bills
- Better health
- Environmentally friendly
- No gym membership
- Better organization
- Better organization
- A much healthier bank account
See, it's mostly about saving money for this person, which is why the list was first found on the Personal Finance Advice page. But, as it could be construed as a green choice, it made its way onto Hugg and then Treehugger. Capice?
[Source: Personal Finance Advice via Hugg via Treehugger]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
1985 Gripen 2:17PM (5/10/2007)
Maybe he can come over to my house and "advise" my wife on how to get to work without a car. If he wants her to take public transportation, we've already looked into it.
We live in the City of L.A. My wife works 16 miles away also in the City of L.A. Her drive each morning is around 1 hour and another hour to get home (traffic). To take public transportation she would have to take three public city buses and walk a bit in heels. Two and a half hours EACH WAY. So her commute would be five hours a day. She'd have a 2.5 hour commute home after working for 8 hours and commuting to work for another 2-1/2. Yeah, that's realistic...
She could ride her bicycle over the Santa Monica Mountains and risk getting killed in heavy city traffic I guess. That's got to be much better than driving, right?
I'm always astounded how people just assume everyone is in the same situation and people are just lazy and wasteful to not be more "green".
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Phil L. 2:34PM (5/10/2007)
Neat idea - but short on real-world application for most people.
I find it interesting that the person interviewed has a 2-year-old child - but didn't discuss how she transports the child. I guess that falls under the "have a friend drive or call a taxi".
I've got three kids within 18 months of age of each other (twins plus one), and they're all still in car seats. We were early adopters of the LATCH safety car seat system. At the time, there precious few vehicles on the market with 3 LATCH positions (there still aren't very many today, particularly if you don't want an SUV). Have fun finding a taxi - or even a good friend - that can handle this.
I also suspect it doesn't often snow where she lives.
These items aside, a compelling argument for those who can do it!
Meanwhile, I'm waiting for my affordable, practical local-commuter EV (sorry, no Tesla budget and NEVs don't cut it on roads in my area) and a versatile, affordable diesel minivan...
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JoSCh 4:11PM (5/10/2007)
Stunning that through 2 blog posts "Better organization" being listed twice wasn't caught. And because of that the list only contains 9 reasons. The missing reason from the article is "less stress".
Oh, and YOU'RE WELCOME!
Nick Burns.
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Phil L. 7:03PM (5/10/2007)
Actually, I noticed the "better organized" goof, but didn't bother noting it.
Though Mr. Murphy and cruel irony would require that the goof in this list would be "better organized".
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Kevin T 12:46PM (5/11/2007)
I live in Phoenix, and to get to work (7.5 miles) it would take me more than 90 minutes by bus, not to mention walking a 1/2 mile to the bus stop in temperatures of over 100 degrees.
2 days a week, today included, I drive to my Chiropractor (16+ miles), and then back home (16 miles). The buses in the Phoenix Metro area provide even worse service between the local cities than they do within Phoenix.
Basically put, if I lived near DC or in europse, I'd use public transportation, but for much of the US there's either inadequate public transportation or none.
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JoSCh 3:26PM (5/11/2007)
I wasn't referring to you Mr. Phil L, I was referring to the poster Jeremy Korzeniewski and Lloyd Alterthe from Treehugger. They are the journalists, they should be better. We can make mistakes, we're uncompensated anonymous peanut gallery folk, but these guys get something out of it and put their name on it.
It makes the grassroots green movement look bush league, as do the conspiracy theorists. Which is why corporations will take it over and polish it and sell it back to us.
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