This is Optimal Finance Daily, the true cost of commuting, part one by Mr. Money Mustache of

Mr. Money Mustash.com. It was a beautiful evening in my neighborhood, and I was enjoying one of my

giant homebrews on a deck chair I had placed in the middle of the street as part of a nearby block's annual

street party. I was talking to a couple I had just met, and the topic turned to the beauty of the

neighborhood. Wow, I didn't even realize this area was here, the guy said. It's beautiful and old,

and the trees are giant, and all of the families hang out

together outside as if it were still 1950. Yeah, said his wife, we should really move here.

Then the discussion turned to the comparatively affordable housing and the other benefits of living

in my particular town. By the end of it, these people were verbally working out the details of a potential move

within just a few months.

Except their plan was absurd.

Because these two full-time professional workers currently happen to live and work in Broomfield,

a city that's about 19 miles and 40 minutes of

high traffic driving away from here. They brushed off the potential commute, saying,

oh, 40 minutes, that's not too bad. Yes, actually, it is too bad. But this misconception about what's a reasonable commute is probably the

biggest thing that's keeping most people in the U.S. and Canada poor. Let's take a typical

day's drive for this self-destructive couple. Adding 38 miles of round-trip driving at the IRS's

estimate of total driving cost of 51 cents per mile,

there's $19 per day of direct driving and car ownership costs.

It's possible to drive for less, but these people happen to have fairly new cars bought on credit,

so they're wasting the full amount.

Next is the actual human time wasted. At 80 minutes per day, the self-imposed driving would be adding the equivalent

...