What cutbacks? Unfortunately, my cutbacks aren't in the gas area...I am over a barrell with that (an oil barrel!) I have a 25 mile commute to work, but if I move closer to work, housing is way higher and so is insurance (ever since hurricane katrina). I have to cutback on everything else. We dont' go out as much, my food budget has shrunk--even though every food item in the store has gone up in price. I shop bargains even more than I already did.
We live on a military base and here it's $3.50 a gallon. We only have to fill our car every three weeks because we make sure that we keep driving to a minimum. Hubby works 3.4 miles from the house and our car gets about 32-36 miles a gallon. But we don’t go out to eat anymore, and we keep family activities outside of the house to one day a week.
Here in st louis it's 3.50 per gallon. Diesel is over 4.00. And it's more than the price of gas. It's every single thing. From a loaf of bread to a package of washers. We don't go out to eat, no concerts, no movies (unless we rent) and no more contributions to anything. Things will only get worse. My motto now is just say no.
My theme song is Sixteen Tons by Tennesee Ernie Ford. St. Peter don't you call me cause I can't go. I owe my soul to the company store.
Back in the gravy days of 50-60 hours pay per week we were doing great. But those days are long gone. We got used to that and now we are paying the price. Our debt is our own fault and I will say it's mostly mine. I didn't want to say no to alot of stuff. You know, education, home improvments, vacations, but now I don't care. No is the standard answer unless it is a necessary home or car repair. And even then it will probably have to go on a credit card.
So yeah, this economy stinks and none of the higher ups care. It's downright depressing.
My dh bikes to work about 2 days a week during the spring and summer; I suppose he may do that a bit more with the rising cost of gas. I'm trying to combine errands into one trip - right now when I go to therapy, I also stop at the grocery store and the library at the same time...fortunately, there is a shopping area on the way home from the clinic where I can get a lot of things done, and the price of gas tends to be better there.
We'll probably find more fun things to do closer to home; fortunately, we live close to some good mountain trails for hiking...and we have enough property that we can "recreate" without driving a mile!
Sometimes I think the rising food and gas prices might be a good thing for people - take us back to the "simpler" life, with more home cookin' (which is cheaper anyhow), home grown fruits and veggies...the other night we had the wood stove going (low cost heat - we find free/cheap firewood), the house smelled good (I'd made yeast rolls for dinner) - I didn't miss going "out" on an evening like that!
We home school, so we've decided to kill two birds with a single stone.... our new home school physical education curriculum for the summer is called "pull daddy's car to work". They get extra credit for making it through yellow lights.
We're not at $4 yet... still in the low $3's on the Missouri side; Kansas side is usually 10-15 cents more... but still below $3.50.
We didn't make a plan regarding what we'd cut. We just have less discretionary dollars overall for entertainment and 'stuff'. My wife stays home with our kids so it is easier for her to cut back. I still have to drive to work everyday. We try to keep it to a tank a week.
it is $3.48 here. i don't know what we are going to do. dh has a 1 hour commute to work, so 2 hours roundtrip. and he even goes in most saturdays for a couple hours. we already drive the minimum we can i think. we go to work and church basically. i go to a store 1/2 mile from my house so that's not a really big deal and it's only twice a week maybe.
i fill up once a week and dh i think twice.
i'm not sure how to edit...... but i wanted to add, that we already cancelled TV last year so that's not an option. LOL
Do any of you have the option of flexible hours at work? Work 4 10 hour days, or something like that? My dh works 9 days in a 10 day period - has alternate Fridays off. He likes the 3 day weekends - and that saves a round trip to work. Something like that would save on gas, or telecommuting part time.
Not to get on the stay at home bandwagon here (honestly!), but that is something to think about for those of you with two incomes...would it make sense financially for one of you to stay at home (the one with the longer commute or the lower paying job, I suppose) - save the gas costs, other costs involved in working outside the home...
Right now I only drive "to town" 2 days a week because of my PT; normally I get groceries a few miles from here...church is right around the block (so to speak), which also saves gas.
It's killing us. D has a total of 134 mile commute everyday, and Noo's therapies are 60 miles round trip a couple of days a week depending on what they are working on. Housing is higher closer to D's job, but we've decided we may have to take the plunge. It seems silly for us to be throwing away hundreds of dollars a month on gas when that could be going into a home. At one time it was more feasible for us to live this far from his job and commute but those days are gone. With groceries, gas, and everything else rising we are going to have to do something. We've tried to hold out, but it's getting harder and harder to throw hundreds of dollars at our gas tanks every month.
I just can't believe that our country can cut millions of dollars in rebate checks but they can't keep the price of gas at a reasonable rate! Incredible.
Moderan Marvels did a show last night on new "green" technology. One of the most amazing was a new car designed by the French that runs on AIR! It uses just a little gasoline. Just two dollars of gasoline takes you 600 miles. The technology has something to do with some type of energy created when compressed air meets gasoline (or oil, can't remember). There's only one problem at this point in the development stage: it can explode! They're working on improving that defect! LOL Anyway, they've already partnered with car companies on Korea and China (or was it India and China?). It's sad that other areas of the world are willing to try new technology. American automakers aren't willing to try anything else---except that hybrid, but it's not really a huge jump from traditional automaking. Maybe someday....if we're lucky.
