Yes it is true you have to spend money to make money. This is even true when you are working. In order to go to work every day you have some expense. Some people that are out of a job find it hard just to raise the money to go job hunting.
You have to pay for transportation. You may be using public transit. If you live in Toronto then it’s going to cost you $3. for a single fare. If you are job hunting and have several locations to go to, then you are better off with a day pass, which currently is $11. You may be thinking that if you are paying $6. a day to get to work and back that you would be better off buying a weekly pass. However, the price of this is $39.25, but there is another pass which is the GTA pass costing $56. For the week. So there are no saving here for the two trips per day. Now so far we have been talking about cash. The greater savings are in buying the tokens.
Then if you are taking your vehicle to work your work travel costs are going to be higher. There is the cost of the fuel, parking, vehicle insurance, and maintenance on the vehicle. When you add all of this up it is quite a bit higher than public transit. However, if you carpool with two or three others then you can reduce the costs.
Now there is the work attire. It doesn’t matter whether you work in an office or an industry. Chances are you have a selection of clothing that is just designated to work.
Let’s not forget lunches. We are say that we are going to brown bag it but more often than not we don’t. So we end up buying lunch out. Even it is at the greasy spoon or the coffee truck that is supplying your lunch time nutrition the costs add up.
So when you are thinking about your gross pay. You have to first take off all the employee deductions, then reduce it with these working costs. Now you have a pretty true picture of what is ending up in your pocket after a week’s work.
If you truly want to budget, as depressing as that may be you really need to calculate down to the nickel. Incidentally if you want to get any potential savings on your taxes then you need to be just as enthusiastic at figuring out way to cut cost there too. As a qualified and frugal accountant I would be happy to assist you with that. Just give me a call at 416-398-1700.
