upworthy

economy

Is it worth it to drive out of the way to save 10 cents a gallon?

In today's high-cost-of-living, wages-haven't-caught-up economy, finding ways to stretch your paycheck feels more important than ever. Some people are taking on second and third jobs, trying to figure out lucrative side hustles, moving to places with more affordable living expenses and making other big life changes to try to get ahead.

But you don't necessarily have to make big sweeping changes to your life to find extra cash. The phrases "Time is money" and "A penny saved is a penny earned" may sound like lip service sayings, but what if you took them literally? What if, instead of assume that saving a few cents here or a couple of bucks there isn't really significant enough to think about in the big picture, you calculated opportunities to save money in terms of an hourly wage?

gas prices, saving money on gas, frugal living, money, budgetSaving $1.50 on gas might seem like a minimal savings, but the hourly wage might change your mind.Photo credit: Canva

Here's what that means: Let's say your closest gas station has gas for $3.75/gallon, but the one a few blocks down the road has it for $3.65/gallon. If you got 15 gallons of gas, you'd save $1.50 driving two minutes out of your way to get gas at the second station—is that even worth it?

Yes it is, when you calculate that $1.50 in terms of an hourly wage you're paying yourself. For two minutes of your time, you've essentially "made" $1.50. When you translate that into an hourly wage, you've just paid yourself the equivalent of $45/hr—basically what someone making $90K a year makes.

tightwad gazette, frugal living, "The Complete Tightwad Gazette" by Amy Dacyczynm.media-amazon.com

The hourly wage idea comes from a money-saving, frugal-living tome called The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn. The book is a compilation of Dacyczyn's long-standing Tightwad Gazette newsletters, which offered not only a whole array of thrifty habits but also valuable shifts in perspective on saving money.

Dacyczyn's main example of the hourly wage calculation in the book was washing out Ziploc baggies to reuse instead of tossing and getting a new one each time. Even back in the 90s, she calculated that washing baggies yielded her $30/hr. But when you start thinking this way, you start to realize that there are tons of ways to make a good hourly wage in tiny increments.

saving money, frugality, washing plastic bags, budget, money Washing a Ziploc bag might feel like a waste, but it's not when you calculate the hourly wage. Photo credit: Canva

Here are some examples:

It may take time to make your lunch instead of eating out, but the savings can be significant. Let's say it takes 10 minutes to put together a lunch at home. A really great made-at-home lunch would cost only a few dollars, but let's go with the high end of $5 including a drink. It's easily $15 for a lunch and drink out at a restaurant, so the 10 minutes you spent saved you $10. Hourly wage for making your own lunch = $60/hr.

How about taking the time to call your phone and Internet provider and negotiate a better price? Those people can keep you on the phone for a while, but let's say they gave you their spiel for a solid hour, and you only saved $20/month for the next year after that negotiation. Hourly wage for an hour of phone and internet negotiating = $240/hr (or more)

saving money, frugal living, phone and internet services, hacks, savingsSpending an hour negotiating on the phone to lower bills might be a lucrative hourly wage equivalent.Photo credit: Canva

Canceling a subscription takes almost no time at all, but is something we might put off because it feels like we're taking something away or depriving ourselves of something we want. But streaming service subscriptions alone are eating into people's budgets like nobody's business. Even if you cancel a subscription that's only $4.99 a month, the hourly wage you "make" by canceling it is huge. Assuming it takes one minute or less to log into your account and click a few buttons to cancel, the hourly wage for canceling a $5/month subscription = $600/hr. (And that's only accounting for the first month's savings. If you figure you just saved $60 over the course of a year, assuming you stay unsubscribed, and you've made $7,200/hr for that one minute of "work." Doesn't feel like deprivation now, does it?)

saving money, frugal living, canceling streaming services, subscriptions, savingsTaking a minute to cancel a subscription? Huge hourly wage. Photo credit: Canva

Of course, not everything is worth the time it takes, so it's worth it to do the math. For instance, it might be worth it to wash your own car, or it might not be, depending on how long it takes you and how much you would normally spend on a car wash. And some people have far more time than money, so even a not-great hourly wage equivalent might still be worth it.

But try doing the calculation next time you have an opportunity to save a little money, especially if the time investment is minimal, and see how much the hourly wage equivalent is. Not only do all those little savings add up over time, but you can see how valuable those small efforts really are.

Photo by Maxim Hopman on Unsplash

The Sam Vimes "Boots" Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness explains one way the rich get richer.

Any time discussions of wealth and poverty come up, people inevitably start talking about boots. The standard phrase that usually gets thrown around is "pull yourself up by your bootstraps," which is shorthand for "work harder and don't ask for or expect help." (The fact that the phrase was originally used sarcastically because pulling oneself up by one's bootstraps is physically impossible is rarely acknowledged, but c'est la vie.)

The idea that people who build wealth are able to do so because they individually work harder than poor people is baked into the American consciousness and wrapped up in the ideal of the American dream. A different take on boots and building wealth, however, paints a more accurate picture of what it takes to get out of poverty.

 boots, poverty, economic inequalityA boots story shows why it can be so hard to climb out of poverty. Giphy by DurangoBoots

Author Terry Pratchett is no longer with us, but his writing lives on and is occasionally shared on his official social media accounts. In 2022, his Twitter page shared the "Sam Vimes 'Boots' Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness" from Pratchett's 1993 book "Men At Arms." This boots theory explains that one reason the rich are able to get richer is because they are able to spend less money.

If that sounds confusing, read on:

Pratchett wrote:

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

boots, work boots, economic inequality, rich get richer, climbing out of povertyA good pair of work boots will save you money in the long run, but only if you can afford them in the first place.Photo credit: Canva

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet."

In other words, people who have the money to spend a little more upfront often end up spending less in the long run. A $50 pair of boots that last five years essentially cost you $10 a year. But if you can only afford $10 upfront for a pair of boots that last six months, that's what you buy—and you end up paying twice as much over a five-year period.

There are so many areas in which this principle applies when you're poor. Buying in bulk saves you money over the long run, but you have to be able to afford the bulk cost up front. A reliable car that doesn't require regular repairs will cost more than a beater, but if the beater is all you can afford, that's what you're stuck with. You'll likely spend the same or more over time than if you'd bought a newer/higher quality car, but without the capital (or the credit rating) to begin with, you don't have much choice.

buying a car, used car, new car, economic inequalityMore reliable cars cost more up front.Giphy GIF by LSD

People who can afford larger down payments pay lower interest rates, saving them money both immediately and in the long run. People who can afford to buy more can spend more with credit cards, pay off the balances, build up good credit and qualify for lower interest rate loans.

There are lots of good financial decisions and strategies one can utilize if one has the ability to build up some cash. But if you are living paycheck to paycheck, you can't.

Climbing the financial ladder requires getting to the bottom rung first. Those who started off anywhere on the ladder can make all kinds of pronouncements about how to climb it—good, sound advice that really does work if you're already on the ladder. But for people living in poverty, the bottom rung is just out of reach, and the walls you have to climb to get to it are slippery. It's expensive to be poor.

poverty, wealth, climbing a ladder, getting out of povertyIt's hard to climb out of poverty when you can't reach the ladder. Photo credit: Canva

When people talk about how hard it is to climb out of poverty, this is a big part of what they mean. Ladder-climbing advice is useless if you can't actually get to the ladder. And yet, far too many people decry offering people assistance that might help them reach the ladder so they can start taking advantage of all that great financial advice. Why? Perhaps because they were born somewhere on the ladder—even if it was the bottom rung—and aren't aware that there are people for whom the ladder is out of reach. Or perhaps they're unaware of how expensive it is to be poor and how the costs of poverty keep people stuck in the pit. Hopefully, this theory will help more people understand and sympathize with the reality of being poor.

Money makes money, yes, but having money also saves you money. The more money you have, the more wealth you're able to build not only because you have extra money to save, but also because you can buy higher quality things that last, therefore spending less in the long run.

Thanks, Terry Pratchett, for the simple explanation.

This story originally appeared three years ago.

Education

11 old-timey frugal living habits younger generations need to bring back ASAP

"A penny saved is a penny earned" hits harder in economically uncertain times.

Photo by Jimmy Dean on Unsplash

Learning to cook can save a lot over eating out.

Though people can't seem to agree on what makes the American economy "good" or "bad" (with people's perceptions being heavily influenced by who sits in the White House at any given time), there's no question that economic uncertainty is on many people's minds. Middle-agers who lived through the Great Recession of 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic of the early 2020s know how fast economic stability can falter, and youngsters have started their adult lives with unaffordable housing and education as well as post-COVID inflation driving up the cost of everyday living.

With a major upheaval of the U.S. government unfolding in early 2025, uncertainty seems to be the theme of the day. When financial instability hits, it's time to take measures to mitigate it however we can, and thankfully, we can learn a thing or two from our elders who lived through the money struggles of two world wars and the Great Depression. Frugality was a way of life for our grandparents and great-grandparents, and though times have changed—a lot—many of those wise ways to save money still stand. And the good news is that many of them are good for the environment and our health as well as our wallet, so

Here are some of the easiest, best frugal living habits we can take from previous generations:

couple cooking togetherCooking can be fun and a money saver. Photo by Jimmy Dean on Unsplash

Cook from scratch

Even with the cost of groceries being higher than they were, it's almost always significantly cheaper to eat at home than it is to eat out. Learning to cook is a useful and enjoyable (for many) hobby that can also save you money, as long as you're not trying to cook something overly fancy. Cooking doesn't have to be complicated, and it's never been easier to find simple recipes. There are even sites that will come up with a menu and recipes for you based on what you already have in your pantry. Stock up on basic ingredients, keep it simple, and find some favorite meals that you can whip up quickly and easily.

Less meat, more beans

Meat is pricey—especially good quality meat—and with animal-borne diseases becoming more of a concern, animal products in general are getting more expensive. Perhaps now would be a good time to transition to more of a plant-based lifestyle, making more use of cheaper protein sources like beans. Canned beans are generally quite affordable, but dried beans are even cheaper if you don't mind taking the time to soak and cook them. If you have an Instant Pot, it's super easy to batch cook dry beans, which you can then store cooked in the freezer for quick reheating.

stainless steel bowls of spicesBulk spices are often a fraction of the price of jarred. Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash

Buy herbs and spices in bulk

Spices in jars are stupidly expensive sometimes, and you might assume that's just what they cost. But if you've never shopped in the bulk spice section at a store—even at an expensive health food store—you might be surprised by how much cheaper it is. Leafy herbs like oregano, thyme, basil, and sage weigh almost nothing, so even if they cost $20/lb, a jar's worth is often pennies to the dollar cheaper than buying them already packaged. (Just beware heavier spices, as sometimes those can be just as expensive as jarred. Definitely worth comparing, though.)

Borrow and barter

When times are tough, getting by becomes a community effort, but there's no reason we have to wait for an actual economic depression to help one another out or scratch one another's backs. We all have things that sit around not being used much of the time that others might like to borrow, from tools to books. Trading services can be an excellent way to save money in a win-win way.

hands in a gardenGrowing your own food can save a bunch in the long run. Photo by Sandie Clarke on Unsplash

Grow a garden

During the pandemic, many people started growing WWII-style "victory gardens" simply because they could, but gardening can be a great way to save on produce and herbs. If you can start early in the spring and grow from seed, even better. Though learning to keep a garden thriving can be a little trickier than it looks, the savings can be impressive. For instance, one tomato plant can harvest 10 to 20 pounds of tomatoes, so even if you spend $5 on a starter plant, you can save a ton compared to produce section prices at the store. No yard? Gardening in containers works, too.

Clean with vinegar and baking soda

It may seem like a small thing, but lots of small things like cleaning products add up. Buying vinegar in bulk and diluting it 50/50 with water makes a great basic cleaner, and baking soda in bulk can help you scour surfaces as well. Vinegar smell doesn't last long, but you can always add a little essential oil to the mix to add some scent. You might need a stronger disinfectant for certain cleaning jobs, but for a basic cleanser, vinegar gets the job done.

Reuse or reutilize containers

So many foods we buy come in jars or containers, most which get tossed or recycled. Then we go out and buy containers for storing leftovers or other things. Aesthetically, I get it. But practically and financially, reusing or reutilizing containers makes more sense, even if you just use them once or twice and then toss or recycle. Plus, if you reuse jars or containers you're not planning to keep, you can write on them with a Sharpie without feeling like you ruined it.

woman riding white bikeBike more. Photo by Murillo de Paula on Unsplash

Drive less

Americans love to drive and many of us do it far more often than we need to, spending more on gas than necessary. And even though gas prices have come down most places, it still isn't cheap. Combining trips or making a once a week "errand day" can help us cut down on driving. So can carpooling or biking or walking more.

Buy used

Thrift store shopping can save a ton of money, especially if you shop around to various thrift shops to find the ones that actually have good stuff at low prices. Clothes especially can be a much better deal used than new, and no one will ever know the difference. Furniture is also a fraction of the cost used vs. new, and often older furniture is better quality anyway. Check Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist and other online markets for used items before running to the store or buying something new online.

person wearing black and gray jacket in front of bookshelfLibraries usually have a lot more to offer than just books. Photo by matthew Feeney on Unsplash

Utilize your public library

Public libraries are treasure troves of free stuff, and not enough people take full advantage of them. Not only can you get books, but many libraries have huge collections of movies or other entertainment. Some have art collections you can check out, others have tools and household items you can borrow. There are also free book clubs, lectures, classes and other activities that can add to your social calendar without spending anything.

Make do with what you have

This might sound like a no-brainer, but many of us have gotten into the habit of buying whatever we think we need simply because it's convenient. Amazon has created some habitual buying habits that we might want to rethink if we're trying to save money. Do you really need a new jacket or is the one you have still perfectly usable? Is there still some life left in that pair of shoes? Even holding off on buying things for a month or two and making do with what you have can help you save money and see that you don't need as much as you might think.

Lots of small savings can add up, so don't assume that a few cents or a dollar here and there don't matter. Once you get into these habits, you may even find that frugal living to be a preferred way of life, regardless of your financial situation. It certainly can't hurt to try it.

This article originally appeared in March