[Trombone-l] Expenses

[Jeff Albert]

I have a roughly 70 mile roundtrip.  My Saturn gets about 30 mpg, so i do
better on gas costs, but I have a $2 toll involved in my commute.  So at $3
a gallon, I am at about $10 just to get to New Orleans and back.  I park for
free more often than not, although when I have to pay to park it is usually
$10-15.  If I am playing somewhere where I have to pay to park, I am
probably making $175 or more, so I don't sweat the parking too often.

I would LOVE to live somewhere with reliable public transit.  Even if I had
to drive 10 or 15 miles and park at the train station, it would be an
improvement.  Public transit in new orleans is essentially non-exsistent,
and it was that way before Katrina.

Jeff

On 6/29/06, Bill Dinwiddie <billdin at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> Not very philosophical or artistic, but nevertheless deserving of some
> discussion, I offer the following thread:
>
> I talked to a guy at my local gas station today who told me that he had
> just
> paid $2.59 a gallon for regular unleaded in rural Tennessee. I just got
> through paying $3.10 for the same product here in Elk Grove, a Chicago
> suburb. I never used to think too much about expenses such as gas and
> parking, when it comes to getting to the gig. After all, I have to get
> there, and it's pretty hard to beat the automobile for all around
> convenience. Gigging would be very difficult for someone who lives in the
> suburbs, as I do, if I had to take a train or a cab to every gig. But
> recently, I have been doing a little calculating.
>
> My average trip to the Loop (where 95% of my gigs are) is 54 miles (27
> miles
> X 2). My car (a 7 year old Chevy Tahoe) gets about 13 miles to the gallon
> (terrible mileage, but I own 100% of it, and it's running pretty good). My
> wife's car gets about 20 mpg.  I "borrow" her car whenever possible. So,
> if
> I split the difference, I get 16.5 mpg.
>
> If gas is $3.10 per gallon, it is costing me 54 divided by 16.5 times 3.10
> ,
> or $10.14 in gas to get to the average gig. Parking can cost as little as
> $0.00 (though it is getting really hard to find free spaces downtown these
> days) or as much as $25.00 or $30.00. If I said that I average about
> $10.00
> per gig for parking I would probably be pretty close (I will not disclose
> my
> secret parking lot at this time...or ever). So that means I am spending
> about $20.00 to get to, and park at each gig these days. I am not going to
> get into other expenses such as insurance, car repair, horn repair,
> uniform
> maintenance, Superslick costs, or the like, because this is already
> depressing enough. In very rough numbers, that means I am laying out about
> 10% of what I make on a 3 hour job in expenses. Of course, on longer jobs
> the percentage is less.
>
> So what does all this mean? I'm not sure. Of course, everyone has to get
> to
> work somehow, and everyone has expenses that they are not reimbursed for.
> I
> guess what I am wondering is: what is the common experience of other
> musicians? Are my numbers pretty similar to yours? Does anyone care?
> Should
> I stop whining and just bite the bullet? Should I lose the Tahoe and buy a
> car that gets 40 mpg for $15 to $20,000 and spend 5 years paying it off?
> Walk to work? I would be interested in hearing others' opinions and
> comments.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Bill Dinwiddie
> billdin at comcast.net
>
>
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