posted
Lets take a look at it from a standpoint of what people actually do:
Many people who can make their own PCs, buy, despite the sum of the prices of the parts almost certainly being lower than the price of the purchased computer. Either these people are on the whole very stupid about money, or they're acting intelligently or there's a significant disparity between the value of the purchased PC and the cost of the an assembled PC that is not captured in the prices of the parts.
One of my assumptions is that people are usually not that stupid, particularly when hundreds of dollars are in question. Do you think they are that stupid, or do you have another explanation?
But if you want to compare the systems under the assumption that people are already okay with their monitors (which I think is frequently not true, if someone's buying a workstation class machine), that's fine, it just moves the calculation more towards being in favor of macs.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
Assembling a computer yourself in Canada ordering online will save you up on average 500$ in parts and labour compared to buying from Futureshop.
My friend whose dad assembles high end industrial computers for his company (and sells some on the side), for 2000$ he could assemble a beast of a machine while the equivilent machine in Futureshop or BestBuy would be 3000-3500$.
Everyone of my class mates in my Computer Science program all agree that assembling a computer yourself or even paying 100$ for someone else to assemble it for you is still significantly cheaper then buying something prebuilt from a store.
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First, those price difference estimates are probably approximately twice the real difference (or more) if you buy carefully. Yes, there are systems out there costing a ton that are way overpriced, but you can usually find a prebuilt system with near-identical internals for a lot less. Second, your friends have some important qualities that make them more likely to spend time and effort on assembling parts and being willing to gamble on service needs not covered by individual parts warranties: pondwater for salaries and lots of free time.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
the manufactorers warranty in Canada is really the only relevent warranty. the main computer stores when they "fix" a computer all they do is swap the malfunctioning part. They'll charge you 30$ if they determine its a software error and suggest formating it and not do anything to fix it.
All warranty really does is that they'll for free swap the part, which you can do anyways if each item having its individual manufacturers warranty.
The way it works in Canada is that the only time you'll find a decent prebuilt system being cheaper then assembling it yourself is when its 1000$ or less OR its a liquidation sale as in the store is trying really hard to dump old stock.
Also, for example Dell can give you an okay looking system for say 700$ but I would never recommend it because Dell doesn't allow you to change, upgrade, or so much as open the case on your computer without voided the warranty.
Then there's also the matter that some name brand stores do everything they can to screw their customers ie, MDG computers.
On average, it is cheaper and more reliable to build a computer yourself if you know what you are doing or get someone else who you trust for a small fee to assemble it for you, from say ordering parts from CanadaComputers.com or Tigerdirect.com you might find the odd computer that is a nice deal but for maybe 100$ more you might find something thats 20% cheaper elsewhere.
Also I think its kinda silly dont you think to geuss at the habits of my friends/peers? About 70% of my class I know holds the consensus that assembling a computer is cheaper, the other 30% being only because I'm a loner and I don't talk to the other 30%.
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posted
As I said, of course they think it is cheaper, because if they have jobs they don't pay very well, and either way they have lots of free time. For them, it is cheaper. For people with decent salaries and/or less free time, assembling it is not cheaper.
And lots of people, myself, included, know how to assemble computers. That doesn't mean we think it makes sense to do it when we need a new computer.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
That makes no sense at all, what does having a salary have to do with whether or not assembling is cheaper vs buying some prepackaged? And what does free time have to do with it? Building your own computer takes 30 minutes tops plus an hour or so to install windows.
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My time is worth at least $25 an hour. If you work at 7-Eleven, time you spend goofing off costs you less viz-a-viz time you spend working. Therefore, when you have less income, things that are time intensive are less expensive than they are when you have more income.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
As for free time, imagine you had a family, perhaps in addition to a full time job with along commute, and the choice was spending time with your loved one(s) or building the computer. Do you see how that makes the time of someone more valuable than if they have large amounts of free time?
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Had a PC for 14 years. Spent countless hours on cleaning and maintenance. Had to re-load windows more than 5 times. Ran much slower.
My macbook hasn't had the slightest hiccup, even when I was trying to screw with it to see if I could fix it. They just work.
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
You know, normally I'd take the opportunity to explain how Macs don't actually work any better, but instead there is this little reality distortion field that surrounds the Macs which causes you to either ignore or forget about the little hiccups that happen all the time on them...but I just spent 4 hours trying to get an OS X Server working properly. I'm going to throw it out the window in a few days, just so you know.
Posts: 3003 | Registered: Oct 2004
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You know, every time I hear someone say this about a Mac, my brain hears it as "and I know nothing at all about computers." Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Occasionally it bears out. With several projectors I've seen multiple people try to use multiple times, the computers that have 'just worked' (plug in the monitor cable, wait) have all been macs and linux boxes, while the windows boxes often did not.
Some other projectors also just worked for anyone. I've never run into a projector that wasn't well-handled by macs.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
"but I would never recommend it because Dell doesn't allow you to change, upgrade, or so much as open the case on your computer without voided the warranty."
This is completely false. And not just for Dell.
Posts: 1945 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
oooouch, Tom. Granted, I probably don't know as much as you, but I did take A+ certification classes, 4 semesters of networking, one programming class, and I made about 500 bucks fixing other people's PCs in my dorm room.
And I'm just being honest with MY experience--that out of all of the people I've met with a mac, not a single one has had complaints--and since getting my Mac, I haven't had a single hiccup. It's not denial, it's the truth.
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Launchywiggin: And I'm just being honest with MY experience--that out of all of the people I've met with a mac, not a single one has had complaints--and since getting my Mac, I haven't had a single hiccup. It's not denial, it's the truth.
I'm tellin ya, it's the reality distortion field.
I'm not going to say much about Macs as workstations, cause yeah, they're great for browsing the internet, word processing, and other typical workstation things (I personally can't stand the limitations inherent in running a Mac. Or the Way the OS operates. Or the fact that I've basically had to do the equivalent of reaching around my left elbow to scratch my butt to get simple things like a wireless USB dongle that was supposedly Mac compatible working. Or the fact that almost every Mac fanboy I have ever talked to seriously needs to be shot into outer space without a rocket ship. Or the mist of pretentiousness that surrounds the darned things. Yeah. I'm biased...but I have my reasons )
But OS X Server...holy piece of garbage, Batman. We currently have two Mac servers in operation, both installed by Mac guys. Neither one has been able to adequately perform the operations required of an actual server. One of them crashed about once a day, taking down our Internet connection until we eventually turned off the RAID capabilities, basically crippling the server and killing our backup capabilities. The other one completely dies as a file server for any Windows computers on the network. People are merrily working along until...Oops! The network share is no longer accessible.
Neither of these "just work." They just suck. Plain and simple.
posted
I don't appreciate your tone or condescension, Boris. I'm not a mac fanboy, I'm just happy to never have to deal with the problems of PC again. And I'm sure you're making some very valid observations about servers, but most users don't really have to deal with those, do they?
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
In Canada Dell voids the warranty if you so much as look at their PC's sideways.
Next no matter how busy you are it is impossible for a computer you build yourself to suddenly become more expensive based on your time spent assembling it, it takes only 30 minutes to assemble a machine and even then if you absolutely have no time a friend charging you 100$ to assemble it is still cheaper then buying anything prebuilt from a store. This is pretty much incontrovertible, you may once in a while find a liquidation sale, but the point stands is that generally building your own PC (which you cant do with a Mac) is still on average cheaper then buying the same machine from a store, regardless if a friend builds it for you, even factoring in the time to drive to get all the parts, it is still cheaper and more reliable and then to add insult to injury a PC is also generally half the cost of a Mac with the exact same specs.
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quote:Originally posted by Launchywiggin: I don't appreciate your tone or condescension, Boris. I'm not a mac fanboy, I'm just happy to never have to deal with the problems of PC again. And I'm sure you're making some very valid observations about servers, but most users don't really have to deal with those, do they?
I wasn't calling you a fanboy I was venting at the people out there who think Macs are the saviors of the universe, when they aren't anything really special, technically speaking.
As for most people not having to deal with servers...ummm...A very very large percentage of the world's working force deals with servers every day. Most of those run Windows. They "just work" in fact, so well that most people don't even realize what's going on. But these Mac servers, the latter one I mentioned in particular, are so incredibly inefficient and incapable of performing their primary rolls that is literally eats up hours of lost productivity each day. So yes, the average user (and every one of the 16 people who work at this place and have to deal with this problem are average users) does have to deal with server problems. And those problems can cost a LOT of money. My experiences with Macs have been less that awe inspiring. It's great that they work for you. They really really don't work for me (and the first person who says, "Macs can run Windows" as a reason for me to buy a Mac needs to get a swift bonk on the head. If I want to run Windows, I'll by a freakin PC. It's not exactly a Mac if it's running Windows now is it).
Anyway. Sorry if my ranting and raving offends. I just get tired of hearing how amazing Apple stuff is when it's really very not special when you look at it all from a seriously technical standpoint (IE, take away the flashy flashy). People need to realize. It is a computer. It will do what you need it to, as long as what you need it to do fits into its limitations (and yes, there are limitations). I don't like those limitations, so I use a PC. I don't want my computer thinking it's better than me
Anyway... *goes back to fantasizing about taking a Macbook with Windows installed 5 years back in time to show it to militant Mac fanboys who will then run around screaming things like, "It can't be! NO!" then showing them the Intel sticker and watching them curl up into a twisted ball of twitching...okay. My imagination is a little morbid today. Sowwy You may now return to your regularly scheduled onanism thread.
Posts: 3003 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Sadly for you Boris, Macs don't have Intel stickers on them. And that's why that fantasy of yours will never come true.
Posts: 187 | Registered: Jan 2005
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quote:That makes no sense at all, what does having a salary have to do with whether or not assembling is cheaper vs buying some prepackaged? And what does free time have to do with it? Building your own computer takes 30 minutes tops plus an hour or so to install windows.
It took me longer than that - about 10 hours total to get it to the point it would have been had I ordered a whole PC. And I guarantee I'm far faster than the vast majority, even if I am far slower than really good technicians.
I wouldn't have bothered just for the cost savings on the parts I installed, but I couldn't find anyone who would build just the PC I wanted. It was the savings on the parts I didn't want that convinced me.
And even then it wasn't "worth" it except for the fact that I enjoyed it some.
Further, your half-hour estimate doesn't include extra time to order various parts rather than a whole PC. I can't even see how you unpack everything in less than 20 minutes.
quote:That makes no sense at all, what does having a salary have to do with whether or not assembling is cheaper vs buying some prepackaged?
quote:Next no matter how busy you are it is impossible for a computer you build yourself to suddenly become more expensive based on your time spent assembling it
Take microeconomics and pay extra special attention when you discuss opportunity cost.
quote:even then if you absolutely have no time a friend charging you 100$ to assemble it is still cheaper then buying anything prebuilt from a store
This isn't a worthwhile use of time for any of my friends that know how to assemble computers.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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You know, every time I hear someone say this about a Mac, my brain hears it as "and I know nothing at all about computers."
If I don't have to know anything about computers, and the Mac option works better for me than the PC option...this is a REALLY good thing.
Not everyone needs to be a guru. Hardware and software options that support functionality-- that do what they need to do without needing an expert to configure them, massage them, SERVE them...
Why's the OTHER guy always got to be the defensive one?
It's not me, is it? It's him, right?
Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
When I was trying to figure out what parts I wanted for a new computer the peer who offered to build it for me (and consequently buy the parts from microbytes) said he would ony charge me 100$ for it. A Duo core computer with about 2 GB of Kingston ram using my old pcs HD and Video card for roughly 800$ 900$ for his services, only reason why I didnt was that I got a laptop instead since I needed it for school and one cant log a desktop from one class to another.
10 hours to assemble a computer? that seems quite the stretch, I'm, sorry but I've seen computers in my class disassembled to all the bare parts and reassembled in less then 2 hours only installing windows takes longer, and even then nowadays Vista installs pretty damn fast.
quote:Take microeconomics and pay extra special attention when you discuss opportunity cost.
This follows the same line of reasoning that taking an extra year of studies is equivalent of losing 45,000$ from not working that year which I do not believe to be the case.
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That number might well be right. You might not make $45k that year, but you'd also be one year behind on promotions and the like. Of course, then there's whatever gain in wages you see from taking an extra year, which can be evaluated fairly accurately. Personally, I think the extra year would probably be worth it for me for non-monetary reasons, but the monetary tradeoff could be about right at $45k (or it might not, I haven't seen the study).
Do you have any factual reason for not believing there to be a tradeoff? Do you think that no matter what you do you haven't lost the opportunity to do something else with the time you spent?
And of course, the people in your government who direct your national economy, and the CEOs of companies you deal with, and numerous others, all or almost all understand and 'believe in' the idea of opportunity costs. Overall that seems to work out rather well for them.
Whatever you believe to be the case, there are tradeoffs. For instance, if instead of working you play video games, you have earned less money. Whether or not that is worth it to you depends on how much that time spent video gaming is worth to you, and how much that money is worth to you -- if you have no other source of money, that money is probably worth a lot.
You know, every time I hear someone say this about a Mac, my brain hears it as "and I know nothing at all about computers."
Sure, that is often the case. But there are plenty of people who really do know what they are talking about.
The only OS X kernel panics (the equivalent of a blue screen of death on windows) I've ever had were during an abortive attempt to set up OpenAFS. Obviously, the crashes were not due to any flaw in OS X. A bad kernel-space driver will bring down most any OS.
Other than that, the only applications I've ever had crash were third-party development builds (eg. Quicksilver betas, Camino nightly builds, etc.)
Most surprising, however, is that my iMac recently survived a power flicker that caused all the PCs in the house to reboot. Our computers are on identical surge protectors, and while our clocks and PCs were reset, my iMac literally didn't skip a beat in the music it was playing.
But that's only the opinion of one person. You'll probably care more about the fact that my math department has switched all the faculty over to Macs. A few profs have also kept their solaris or linux workstations, but the only windows machines left are in the undergrad tutorial center.
Now, do you still have doubts that real, competent people find Macs to be very reliable?
Posts: 145 | Registered: Apr 2007
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posted
$800? That sounds remarkably high, even in Canadian dollars. I think you were in danger of being ripped off.
I mean, newegg's selling 2 1-Gig sticks of Kingston RAM for under 100USD, barebones cases + motherboards that support Core 2 Duos for under 200USD, and core 2 duos from under/around 200USD. You wouldn't have any problem putting together a system, given the video card and HD, for under 500USD, which is pretty close to the total in CAD nowadays.
And of course, Dell has a pre-built system with a good Core 2 Duo processor, 2 gigs of RAM (you have to choose it, and Dell's RAM is pretty good), a good quality 19" LCD, 320 GB HD, DVD-writer, and Windows Vista for 800 USD. That's 300 USD for a 19" LCD, a 320 GB HD, a DVD-Writer, and assembly (edit: and the operating system). And its cheaper than your friend was going to charge you, and you'd still be able to put your vid card and HD in for even more capacity.
Perhaps you and your friends are not quite as up on the prices of items as you think.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote:Now, do you still have doubts that real, competent people find Macs to be very reliable?
Oh, no. But there's a huge difference between "it just works" and "Macs are very reliable, depending on the software you install on them." Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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1) The difference between "Mac" computers and their PC alternatives is exaggerated
Perhaps this is partially due to advertising by Apple and Microsoft, but it is the case that Apple is becoming less distinctive. It is my broad understanding that Macs are moving from PowerPC CPUs to Intel, that OS X is essentially a UNIX OS, Apple is working on a version of Safari for Windows, and many Microsoft applications are available for Apple.
I'm just not seeing a huge difference. Certainly not one worth arguing about.
2) The discussion of opportunity cost is a bit off-topic
There are professions where one can make their own hours, lawyers, real estate, self-employment. However for most people who hold jobs with regular hours, one cannot choose between working more for more money or assembling a computer. You can only really work your 35/40 hours and what you do in your own time does not change your "revenue."
Thats why I have many friends that make a lot of money but still say, do their own oil changes, gardening, manage their investments, etc. It may not be entirely cost effective in the sense that they could have made more money doing their jobs than say "wasting" an hour trying to fix their own plumbing, but they never really had that choice in the first place.
Now, moving away from dollar terms, you can say that there is a subjective "emotional" (for lack of a better term) cost in terms of spending time with your family, relaxing, etc. However, some people actually enjoy working on their computer. (or for that matter, doing an oil change, shopping, or working on their car)
Some other people may consider that a waste of time but then not give a second thought to mowing their own lawn instead of paying a high school student to do it.
Its all a bit subjective depending on what one values outside of their job and thus there is no correct answer for everyone, but many different correct answers, one for each person.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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posted
Opportunity cost doesn't disappear, and whether or not someone can schedule their own hours doesn't mean their opportunity cost is independent of their salary; for someone who has more money, the amount paid extra for assembly improves in comparison to assembling it themselves, even if they couldn't have worked that hour.
To take an extreme example, imagine you make one million dollars a year. You can either take the time to assemble a computer, or pay a little extra to have it pre-built. Which do you do? (this is assuming you don't find assembling the computer valuable in and of itself, which seems to be true for most people) The same tradeoff applies on a smaller scale for people making $60k vs $30k.
Essentially, earning more money can make your leisure time more valuable to you.
Note that I've always been careful to mention that not all differences are monetary. Money does factor into how people evaluate situations, though. And I agree that some people take pleasure out of assembling a system, making that quite possibly a better deal than buying pre-built. More power to them. However, we're speaking in the general.
And ultimately, the presence of the high opportunity cost of assembling a computer is pretty much proven by human behavior. Even among those savvy enough to build a computer, most buy pre-built.
edit: and I pretty much agree with 1, that's been what I've been saying about the distinction. Also, most of the discussion of opportunity costs is more to help Blayne (edit again: and possibly others) understand the situation (and possibly other situations) than to prove a point.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
I have assembled a computer because I found it entertaining and personally rewarding. It sure as hell did not take me a half hour. It took at least a couple of hours, for me.
On the other hand, while I cannot go in to work at any hour I please, I can tutor during my off hours. When I used to tutor, I charged $60 an hour.
My point was not to say that building a computer is not worth it, but to partially explain fugu's point. There is a validity to it: I chose to assemble a machine because I wanted to and found it rewarding for its own merits, and not because I was seriously saving money.
FWIW, last year, when my father needed a new computer, I was all gung-ho for us to "build" one ourselves. I started to research the best prices on parts, and then found a Dell for less than it would have cost me to do so. Some of you might remember the thread, in fact.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
I never was big on economics, so perhaps I would find further elaboration useful as well.
It is my basic understanding that opportunity cost is normally measured in terms of monetary cost, that is how much does one choice cost when compared relatively to an alternative choice.
So I could understand for say a self-employed individual, assembling a computer for (as an example) six hours may save only only $10/hour if it would cost $60 for the shop to do it. This would be compared to say the alternative choice of doing their job which might be worth more than $10 an hour.
However, if you have a regular job (wth regular hours), your alternative choice is not normally to go back to doing your job. It might be to spend time with your family, but you do not get paid for that. Now, you could argue that you could save *more* money by doing something else, say rotating the tires on your own car, but that is entirely another discussion.
So going to your example of someone making one million dollars, it does not seem that opportunity cost is a major concern (if they have normal hours). If they were doing a normal job, their opportunity cost is still not between doing their job and assembling a computer. It is still between unpaid chores/free time and the computer *
The big concern that *does* change is just the relative difference in cost between their expendable income and the expendable income for someone making only 30K. Arguably thats the bigger factor in whether one chooses to buy pre-built or not.
* Arguably, if one made that much money, one could spend their own time managing their own finances in a way to save more money than doing "any" chore themselves, but thats very complicated to measure as well.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:Originally posted by xtownaga: Sadly for you Boris, Macs don't have Intel stickers on them. And that's why that fantasy of yours will never come true.
Gee...and here I thought it was because time travel was impossible...methinks we've found one of the aforementioned fanboys...
Posts: 3003 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Opportunity cost (like all costs) is usually easiest to measure monetarily, and easiest to (approximately) compare across individuals. If not possible to do directly, this is often done indirectly, by looking at how much a person is willing to pay to gain some marginal amount of extra spare time/reduce hassle. In fact, using computer assembly choices among those who know how to do it would probably be a decent way to gain a new estimate for the marginal value of leisure time.
This does not mean you don't pay a marginal cost when your alternative isn't something you get paid for.
You aren't paid money to spend time with your family, but you do lose something you value when you don't spend time with your family. How much you value the time you lose (however we choose to measure it) is the opportunity cost, assuming that was what you would do. Opportunity cost is, specifically, the value of the next best opportunity you preclude by doing something else instead.
I suspect that family time is one of the bigger opportunity costs people are not willing to give up in order to assemble their own systems over buying a pre-built one, whether that decision is conscious or not.
Yes, people are giving up the same sort of thing (assuming, likely incorrectly, that the person making one million dollars works normal hours), but that doesn't mean they value that time the same. Just like I value the water I get from a drinking fountain a lot less than someone dying of thirst in the desert would value the same amount of water. The value of something to you is not solely dependent on the type and quantity of that thing, but on numerous possible factors, many of them personal. Your later statement starts to hint at the possibility: the amount of money someone earns changes the value of their leisure time.
Statements like "it does not seem that opportunity cost is a major concern (if they have normal hours)" reflects a serious misunderstanding of opportunity cost. Opportunity cost does not mean salary you give up in order to do something; that is only one possible opportunity cost.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote:I wasn't calling you a fanboy I was venting at the people out there who think Macs are the saviors of the universe, when they aren't anything really special, technically speaking.
To be fair, every system seems to have their dedicated group of kool-aid drinking, fanboy, cult members, whether it be PC, Linux, Apple, Nintendo, Pepsi, etc., and they all seem to exhibit the same behaviors.
Posts: 1256 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:This follows the same line of reasoning that taking an extra year of studies is equivalent of losing 45,000$ from not working that year which I do not believe to be the case.
No, it's not equivalent to "losing" 45,000. But you do give up money to go to school - both in salary and tuition - and anyone trying to decide if they should go to school should take that money into account.
I'm unlikely to ever recoup the costs of law school, both in salary opportunity missed and direct costs incurred. I did it anyway, though, because becoming a lawyer was worth more to me than the costs. Had I not calculated the likely costs of the decision to abandon my business and go to law school, I would not have even been able to consider whether the costs were worth it to me.
Quite simply, if you could earn $45k if you weren't in school, then going to school costs you at least $45k in earnings this year. This is not really disputable.
What are disputable are some of the conclusions some people might draw based on that fact, such as "therefore it's not worth going to school."
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:Originally posted by xtownaga: Sadly for you Boris, Macs don't have Intel stickers on them. And that's why that fantasy of yours will never come true.
Gee...and here I thought it was because time travel was impossible...methinks we've found one of the aforementioned fanboys...
My iMac at work doesn't have an Intel sticker, even though it does have an Intel processor. Apple seems to have putting any kind of decal or logo on their computers other than the Apple logo.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:This follows the same line of reasoning that taking an extra year of studies is equivalent of losing 45,000$ from not working that year which I do not believe to be the case.
No, it's not equivalent to "losing" 45,000.
Actually, it's somewhat worse than that. My first year out of grad school, I earned $22,000. Cor began one year before me, at the same rate (the scale amount, at that time and that school, for a first year teacher). Now, she started a year before me because she's older than I am, but let's imagine instead that it was because I chose to take a fifth year of college. My first year, I was not merely $22,000 behind her. Each of us received experience raises averaging about 4% a year. So based on that, my first year she made around $22,880 while I made just $22,000, putting me actually $22,880 behind her. Each year after that, I fell a little bit further behind, as I got raises on a smaller amount. So my second year, I would have made $22,880 to her $23,795, putting me $2200 + $880 + $915 = $23,795 behind over the course of my career. Basically, for every year we both work, I am behind by an amount equal to the salary she earns in her last year, assuming this pattern holds. (An accurate enough assumption for an academic exercise.) The only way I catch up with her is by retiring a year later. If we were both the same age, though, that means I retire at 68 while she retires at 67, though.
Now, college and professional school are still worth it, because the earning potential of a high school graduate is currently, what, $16000 a year? Versus about $35000 for a college graduate?
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
Only if you count paying for groceries or buying a car as "losing" money.
I count it as spending money - that is, exchanging money (or the opportunity to earn money) for something else of value.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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It could be argued, though, that if you enter the workforce later for frivolous reasons, you may be wasting money, in the sense of paying more for something than it is worth.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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