Sunday, November 2, 2008

How much is my time worth?

A couple years ago, my husband and I decided to clear out the garage and have a yard sale for all the stuff we didn’t need. We spent a couple days sorting through stuff, and then spent an entire weekend dragging the stuff out to our front yard, sitting there and fielding customers, dragging the unsold stuff back into the garage on Saturday night, dragging it back out on Sunday morning and then eventually bringing the rest to Goodwill. We made something like $250. Which was great for a garage sale and for stuff we would’ve given away for free.

But, it took an entire weekend! 2 people spent 16 hours each to make $250. That comes out to $7.81 per person per hour. And time that we will never, ever get back. Once we did that little calculation, we weren't so pleased with our $250 profit. And, we’ve never had a garage sale since.

More than the time we wasted, we were really annoyed that we undervalued our time. We both earned more than $7.81 per hour in our jobs. We could’ve worked just a couple more hours in our jobs (and at any rate, way less than 32 hours) and made $250.

I go through the same thought process when it comes to evaluating what I want to outsource. spend money on. How many hours would I have to work to pay someone else to do the stuff I don’t want to do (laundry, dishes, housecleaning, yard work)? Is it worth it? Would I rather work a few more hours in my job or spend my entire Saturday morning cleaning the house? Uh, throw in the fact that I hate cleaning and duh. Paying someone else to do the housework is totally worth it - on an emotional level, a monetary level and a time-wise level.
Labels: , ,
Share |

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)