And then there's the cost, both obvious and hidden. I sat down to compute how much my car was costing me (purchase, maintenance, repair, gas, insurance) and realized that it was almost $500/month. This is for a car that is 16 years old, used for a few very short trips each day.
[WS:] Yep. According to Federal government, the cost of driving is 44.5 cents per mile http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=151226,00.html which includes depreciations of the vehicle, maintenance and insurance cost, but it does not include the "law enforcement" racket (fines, towing costs, etc.) which is not tax deductible.
However, the longer you have the car the lower your per mile cost for two reasons - depreciation of the original value is over a longer time period, and your insurance rates go down when the value of the car does. Therefore, I always try to buy a new car an keep as long as possible - 12-15 years if possible.
However, this does not change the fact that cars are a very expensive (and inefficient) ways of moving around, on average four times as expensive as transit http://www.bea.gov/bea/dn/nipaweb/TableView.asp?SelectedTable=65&FirstYear=2 004&LastYear=2006&Freq=Qtr (see lines items for cars and gasoline). They cost more than food, and almost as much as housing and health care. What a fucking racket!
Wojtek