The Catholic Cricket

The President is rightly getting flack for this.

Now, I’ll ignore his reaction to a large family, and just do the math for my family, just to show how his “solution” isn’t a solution.

We burn through about 45 gallons of gas per week. It’s a rough estimate, but I usually fill my minivan twice a week and Heather’s minivan once a week (maybe less), and each fillup is close to 15 gallons. So I use 30 gallons, Heather uses 15. So we’re looking at 180 gallons per month (give or take), 120 in my tank and 60 in Heather’s.

Gas was about $2.80/gallon a year ago. It’s now $3.80 and climbing.

2010 cost: 180 gallons * $2.80/gallon = $504
2011 cost: 180 gallons * $3.80/gallon = $684

Now, both vans get about 18mpg under normal conditions (built-in systems track that for us, and I reset it once in a while to check current efficiency). 180 gallons * 18 mpg = 3240 miles driven. Two-thirds of that is mine, so I drive around 2160 miles per month, while Heather drives 1080. For simplicity let’s round those numbers down to 2000 and 1000.

I drive more, so let’s start by trading in my 1994 Grand Caravan for a used smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicle. We’ll aim for a car that gets 30mpg, a vast improvement over my measly 18mpg. That’ll save a lot of fuel. In order to drive 2000 miles per month, I will need to use about 67 gallons of gas.

2011 efficient-Matt cost: 67 gallons * $3.80/gallon = $254.60

Looks great! Let’s do the same for Heather. She has to be able to seat 7, since we have six kids. Looking into things, the 2006 Toyota Highlander Hybrid (WOOO! HYBRID! GREEN! </sarcasm>) has an estimated 28MPG city rating (it was the best rating on some “Go Green” site for 7+ passengers). Most of her driving is in city conditions, so let’s go with that. At 28mpg, she’ll only need 35-36 gallons of gas. We’ll round this one down, since we rounded mine up.

2011 efficient-Heather cost: 35 gallons * $3.80/gallon = $133.00

Super! Add them together and we get:

2011 efficient cost: $254.60 + $133.00 = $387.60

Holy cow! Look at that! Not only did that cut over 40% out of my gas bill now, it’s even less cost than what I spent a year ago. I’m saving $116.40/month over 2010′s spending. How is this not a great idea?

Simple. I haven’t figured in the cost of getting those new (to us) used cars. Assuming we can get a reasonable trade in for each current car and apply it to the purchase of a more efficient used car, let’s calculate some things.

I probably can get a fairly efficient small car for me in the $5000 range. 30mpg might be a stretch, but hey. Let’s assume my old 94 Grand Caravan with several issues fetches $1000 for a trade-in. And let’s finance the remaining $4000 over 5 years (an insane amount of time to finance a used car), and the Credit Union gives us the best rate they have right now, 3.49%. That comes to $72.75/month.

This doesn’t look good.

Per cars.com, there’s a 2006 Highlander Hybrid 63 miles from us going for $13,900…the one recommended by that eco-website. Assuming a $4000 trade-in on her minivan, we finance the remaining $9900 for 5 years at 3.49%. Monthly cost is $180.05.

2011-2016 efficient cost: $387.60 + $72.75 + $180.05 = $640.40
2017+ efficient cost: $387.60

So, doing as the President suggests will, for the next 5 years, save me about $44/month. Assuming gas prices stay at $3.80 (which they won’t). But I’ll still be paying $136 more than I did in 2010. And I’ll have two new loans. And I’ll have to hope and pray that both cars survive the length of their loans.

And that, Mr. President, is why your “solution” is useless to real families. Paying $136 or $180 additional per month is still more, and still a strain on the budget.

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