Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: This week, we're gonna be talking about money and how
Speaker 1: it intersects with the topic of time. Time and money
Speaker 1: are both limited resources. They can often be exchanged for
Speaker 1: each other. When you work, you're generally exchanging time for money.
Speaker 1: You can also pay money to free up time, both
Speaker 1: at work and at home. Because time and money can
Speaker 1: be exchanged for each other, I think it's helpful to
Speaker 1: have a reasonable sense of what your time is worth,
Speaker 1: though this isn't as straightforward a calculation as it might seem.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is about how to think about the value
Speaker 1: of time holistically. When you ask people what their time
Speaker 1: is worth, they probably calculate about what they earn per hour.
Speaker 1: Someone who earns eighty tho dollars a year working about
Speaker 1: two thousand hours a year so standard full time job
Speaker 1: is therefore earning forty an hour. So that person might
Speaker 1: say that his or her time is worth forty an hour.
Speaker 1: If something costs less than forty an hour to chuck,
Speaker 1: it might be wise to outsource more than that. Probably not,
Speaker 1: but it's not really that simple. For instance, much work
Speaker 1: that people do is hard to put a price on.
Speaker 1: Let's say that a family features one way journal and
Speaker 1: one partner who stays home to raise the kids and
Speaker 1: take care of the home. By the normal calculation, the
Speaker 1: non wage earning parties time is worth nothing. But most
Speaker 1: people don't actually believe that. If that were the case,
Speaker 1: it wouldn't make sense to pay money for anything that
Speaker 1: the non wage earning party could do by him or herself.
Speaker 1: But in such families, to stay at home parent usually
Speaker 1: doesn't sew all the families clothes or turn their own
Speaker 1: butter or things like that. We recognize that this person
Speaker 1: has other valuable things that he or she is doing.
Speaker 1: Time is still worth something in the absence of wages. Now,
Speaker 1: my turn your own butter example is for specious. But
Speaker 1: what I'm getting at here is that the question of
Speaker 1: time and money and outsourcing is often as much about
Speaker 1: what we perceive as normal as it is about what
Speaker 1: people could earn per hour. A lot of people view
Speaker 1: hiring a cleaning service as indulgent, but we all outsource something.
Speaker 1: We don't grow our own wheat, we don't drive our
Speaker 1: own letters to Wisconsin or wherever it is they're going
Speaker 1: we outsource that to the post office. Really what we
Speaker 1: choose to pay to get off our plates as a
Speaker 1: matter of degree, norms and preferences, and what seems efficient.
Speaker 1: So if that in mind, I think the question of
Speaker 1: when to exchange money for time should be less about
Speaker 1: exact income per hour and more about what we enjoy
Speaker 1: and what we don't, and what we can uniquely do
Speaker 1: and what others can do just as well or sometimes better.
Speaker 1: Money is a tool, and like any other tool, it
Speaker 1: can be used within reason to do useful things. Given
Speaker 1: that time is ultimately limited, it might be worth paying
Speaker 1: more than forty dollars an hour to offload something in
Speaker 1: our eighty thou dollars a year worker truly hates. On
Speaker 1: the other hand, if she loves doing something, it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter if you could pay a mere five dollars an
Speaker 1: hour to get rid of it. We should generally try
Speaker 1: to boost the amount of happiness in our hours, even
Speaker 1: if the economic calculation doesn't support it in a most
Speaker 1: straightforward way. I see this all the time and the
Speaker 1: choices people make. For instance, when I've looked at the
Speaker 1: schedules of incredibly busy people, I've often suggested freeing up
Speaker 1: space by getting groceries delivered. If you live in an
Speaker 1: area served by the major grocery delivery services, this is
Speaker 1: often incredibly cheap. I mean, you might pay less than
Speaker 1: ten dollars for the delivery plus a tip. Given that
Speaker 1: it takes time to drive to the store, produce the aisles,
Speaker 1: pay for your groceries, load them in the car, and
Speaker 1: transport them home. Almost everyone's time is worth more than that. Indeed,
Speaker 1: if you're like me, you might save money with delivery,
Speaker 1: since I know I'm less prone to impulse purchases online
Speaker 1: than I am when I'm smelling those lovely bakery items.
Speaker 1: But a lot of people really resist this suggestion. And
Speaker 1: when I explore this, I realized that many people truly
Speaker 1: love grocery shopping. They love seeing the cool foods displayed,
Speaker 1: they love smelling those bakery items. They love feeling guilt
Speaker 1: free about spending money because hey, everyone has to eat.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's a chance to get one on one time
Speaker 1: with a kid that you take to the store, or
Speaker 1: it's something that a couple does together fantasizing about great
Speaker 1: meals to come. Maybe in its excuse for one party
Speaker 1: to get a little solo time on the weekend while
Speaker 1: still doing something productive. If this is the case, then
Speaker 1: this can be a great way to spend time. On
Speaker 1: the other hand, I often hear from people, and probably
Speaker 1: not the same people as the grocery lovers, but still
Speaker 1: plenty of people that making dinner on weekday nights is
Speaker 1: incredibly stressful for them. I mean, you're tired after work,
Speaker 1: and everyone's cranky because they're hungry. You just want it done.
Speaker 1: There are lots of ways to solve this problem with cash,
Speaker 1: from having a standing order for delivery from reasonably healthy
Speaker 1: restaurants to a meal delivery service, or even hiring someone
Speaker 1: to come make inner twice a week with enough for
Speaker 1: leftovers on the other nights. But people kind of resist
Speaker 1: that suggestion to particularly the last one, I think, because
Speaker 1: they assume you'd need to be a billionaire or something
Speaker 1: to hire a chef. The economics are far more reasonable
Speaker 1: than that, But even if it is pricier than doing
Speaker 1: it yourself, it might be worth it if the result
Speaker 1: is more peace after work, fewer fights about whose turn
Speaker 1: it is to make dinner, and better dinner table discussions
Speaker 1: because no one is seething with resentment. In any case,
Speaker 1: if you are truly hard up life involves very tough choices.
Speaker 1: I get that. But if you've gotten to the point
Speaker 1: where you have some disposable cash, then thinking of money
Speaker 1: as a tool can help with seeing the value of time.
Speaker 1: If you are to devote a little bit of money
Speaker 1: to solving some particular pain point in your schedule, what
Speaker 1: would that be? How could you make that work? What
Speaker 1: would you do with the time instead? If you've got
Speaker 1: an answer to that question, this could be smart. Whether
Speaker 1: the straight up calculation happens to be or not. What
Speaker 1: have you paid to get off your plate? Please let
Speaker 1: me know it. Before Breakfast podcast at I heeart media
Speaker 1: dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening,
Speaker 1: and here's to making the most of our time. Hey everybody,
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you. You can send me
Speaker 1: your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before Breakfast pod
Speaker 1: that's b E the number four then Breakfast p o D.
Speaker 1: You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: podcast at iHeart media dot com. That Before Breakfast is
Speaker 1: spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much, I
Speaker 1: look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast is a
Speaker 1: production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts from my
Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.