1. Is there a mathematical formula that you can use that will help determine if a job would be too far to travel every day?
Good Answers (6)
Thomas W
National Manager CRM at Ciber New Zealand
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Janet,
this strongly depends on your personal valuation system. A simple approach would be the following:
Take the difference in salaries between your current and your new job (s). Calculate the difference in kilometers you need to commute every day and multiply that by fuel cost (c).
Take the difference s - c. If it is positive then you have an indication that it is not too far to commute. Now take the additional time in minutes (t) you need for commuting (if the new job is further away). Multiply t by what you personnally think each minute away from family costs you.
Now you have s - c - t.
Finally you could add a value for the additional fun (f) you expect at your new job.
You end up with s - c - t + f. If this is positive the new job is worth it in your coordinate system.
Rgds
Thomas
Doug H
Owner at Charter School Management Services, LLC
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There is, but I've found it irrelevant. Unless the commute is really far, the pure costs of the commute are not as important as factors such as whether or not you think you'll really like the job, whether your time is that important, whether you will be on highly congested roads, and what the long term prospects are in a job. In other words, many of the real factors are either subjective or else future oriented. I'd say that you simply need to decide if you are willing to drive that far for the job in question. If the jobs you are looking at are so close in value to you that you need to make such a calculation, that is a very rare occurrence.
Robert D
interim management, Consultancy Microsoft Dynamics NAV, IT management,freelance, mind mapping, problem diagnosis,
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How would it be possible to define a mathematical formula to calculate the value of travel time? It is like defining a score on an ethical scale. Makes no sense.
If you want to have a social life, you will need time for it.
Anyhow: how do you travel? By train: that allows you to read a book. By car: total loss of time.
You could design some scoring mechanism according to a number of criteria, with relative weights attributed to each one of them. It would just hide the fact that a decision like this can not be calculated. It depends on unquantiable factors.
Pierre D
Founder, Zimana / Marketing ● Finance ● Website Analytics ● Entrepreneurship
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Janet,
My stab at this...think interms of breakeven analysis in accounting. Take your take home pay, subtract your monthly expenses (all and your savings, except what you spend on fuel). What you have left is what is theoretically available for fuel costs.
Take you miles per gallon times your tank capacity to get your range, the amount of miles you can get on a tank.
Take the amount you would spend for a tankful, divide it into your leftover amount, and this is the number of times you can fill up (x).
Take x times the range. This is the max number of miles you can drive.
Now this is assuming you don't make any purchases beyond those listed in your expenses. This assumes no flexibility of budget.
Hope this helps,
P
Karl W
Experienced Interim Manager
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Hi Janet,
Although I’ve not come across such a formula I’m sure there probably is!
When I find myself in such positions I use a simplistic approach:
1. Deduct the travelling expenses for the commute to and from based on the AA rate for running a car, i.e. 44p per mile. If this is covered by an increase in salary or a car allowance all the better,
2. Can I coupe with the commute on a daily basis, and
3. Try the commute in rush hour on 3 occasions over a two week period and determine the average commute time.
It’s worked for me....good luck
Regards,
Karl
Linda H
District Sales Mgr, Consolidated Maintenance, Inc ♦
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Me + husband/3 kids + dog + cat = no more than 30 minutes commute each way ever again, if I can help it.
My formula?
24 hours in a day
8 hours of sleep (in the perfect world, fat chance in the real world)
That leaves 16 non-sleeping hours.
subtract an 8 or 9 hour workday, that leaves 7 or 8 hour
subtract an hour for the start and end of the day for dressing, showering, personal hygiene, and eating.
Now you're down to 5 hours of "available time". Fill that in (in my case) with kids' schedule, laundry, household stuff, paying bills, etc... and "just being a family"...
An hour of commuting each way will take up half of my available family time, and even 30 minutes takes 1/4 of that time.
Janet, you have to decide how much time you are willing to set aside from your life outside of work. If the money is too good to pass up, you have to decide what you are trading off for that money.
Good question,
Linda
