Value of money

[afuna]

Thinking about money a bit more. You can't just do a simple currency conversion of how prices would be back home and expect the amount to make sense in the other currency.

For example: back during my first job, when I was eating out regularly, I'd spend about 150 to 250 pesos per meal (~3.25 USD to 5.5 USD). That range is about correct for a decent sit-down restaurant meal -- any more than that was probably something fancy like sushi or salmon or really really cheap steak. At that, I was probably spending a lot more than some of my officemates, because you can get still yummy and way cheaper food for as little as a third of the price.

And the thing is, I have no idea how much the same would cost in a big city in the US, but my assumption is: more in absolute cash value, than it would back home. If I wanted to eat at the same price as I do back home, I think I'd have to stick to just fast food (I'm not going to try to eat for the same price as back home though!)

Which is to say that absolute prices mean nothing; it's the relative value of money (relative to the expected salary, relative to the cost of goods in the area, etc) that is important to figuring out how much to budget for a trip, and on that I'm completely lost *G*

I used to try to gauge the relative value of money by trying to compare the prices of necessary items to luxury items. Like, the cost of a decent cheap dinner to a mid-range expensive dinner. Or the price of a sandwich to the price of a shirt, or a book.

That worked for me in Thailand, which was on balance a lot like the Philippines, but was not so useful in Japan, where the food seemed unnaturally expensive no matter where I looked especially in comparison to electronics. (This may have been because I was in Tokyo). So I've been trying by other means to figure out how much a sum of money is actually worth in practical terms when travelling to other places. In Hong Kong, as in Japan, food was expensive, but electronics were (relatively) cheap. In both cases, when looking at a menu, I wouldn't be able to tell whether the food was cheap or expensive.

Money is hard :)


Thought experiment:

Let's say you saw a piece of money lying in a mud puddle. You know that the mud is clean (no feces, no insects, nothing spoiled or rotten, not smelly), and that no one owns the money so there's no moral obligation to return it. It's a quarter -- would you pick it up?

What if it were a dollar? five dollars? twenty? a hundred?


(It doesn't have to be mud, it could be somewhere slightly inconvenient like caught in a thorny bush where you can just reach it, but you'd need to be careful and do a bit of work.)


In terms of pesos, it would be for me:

one peso (approximately 0.02 USD) -- I'd just leave it there
20 / 50 pesos - leave it
100 pesos - borderline, maybe take it or maybe leave it
500 / 1000 (a bit more than 20 USD) pesos - take it
(there is no higher denomination)



Or, say you're in a restaurant, and you see two menu items that are similar in class, and differ slightly in price. You're willing to try either. At which point does the price difference become a factor?

Similar in class: say spaghetti vs carbonara; baked potato vs mashed potatos; sour cream and onion fries vs ... some other kind of fries; lasagna vs pesto; fried chicken vs something that tastes as good as fried chicken; pancakes vs waffles. So not something where the difference is really obvious, like steak vs fries.

I just made myself hungry :D


Anyway, if there were a dollar difference, would it matter? How about five dollars? ten? (I'd probably start reconsidering at 50 pesos, but again that's in pesos. My limit is higher when I try to think of it as dollars just because "1" feels less than "50", even though it's approximately the same -- and there lies the trap! *G*)



I shall be with other people so at least I don't need to worry about figuring out tipping conventions. (Whether to tip, how much, etc)

Comments

[exor674]

yeah, you probably can't get much food for $5.50 -- that's just below a standard fast food meal. Sit down restaurants run closer to $10 -- can be lower if you just get an appetizer and don't get a drink.

If you are interested, I'm pretty sure many restaurants have online menus you can look up.

For me ( not sure if you wanted feedback or opinions, but... )

Let's say you saw a piece of money lying in a mud puddle. You know that the mud is clean (no feces, no insects, nothing spoiled or rotten, not smelly), and that no one owns the money so there's no moral obligation to return it. It's a quarter -- would you pick it up?

anything above a quarter for mud ( assuming I was having a day where I felt like leaning down )
anything $5 and above ( if I was having a day where trying to lean down would suck )
a thorny bush or something where there was a risk of injury would require say, $5 and above

Or, say you're in a restaurant, and you see two menu items that are similar in class, and differ slightly in price. You're willing to try either. At which point does the price difference become a factor?

I don't consider anything above say, $2 or $3 as slightly, so that'd be the answer.

[indeliblesasha]

It can also vary in the US by location. I am going to expect to pay more for everything on the coasts than I am in, say, Arizona.

And it varies by restaurant. You can go into a Denny's and get a whole plate of food for 5 bucks. But it's crap food. Tastes pretty good, but is in no way good for you.

You can go into Turley's (a Boulder, CO place) and pay 10 to 20.00 per plate, but it's good food, quality food. Local grown, hormone free type food.

Or you can go into Village Tavern and pay up to 50.00 per person and it's going to be tasty quality food, but you have no idea the source, and you're largely paying for the ambiance and the waitstaff.

But on the coasts you can walk into a place that looks like a dive and be paying the Turley's price for Denny's food. Hello tourism.

(And for anything less than a 20.00 bill I would not put effort into retrieving it. I'd leave it for someone who needs it way more. Depending on the difficulty getting it, I may anyway. But I'm pretty well off, I would feel weird taking money others could use more.)

Prices include tips

[jumpuphigh]

Decent restaurant down the street from me (my go-to when I don't want to cook or drive far), I expect to pay ~$12 for lunch and ~$20 for dinner. Except, I don't go there for dinner because I can get a better meal at lunch for cheaper. If I go there around dinner, I get an appetizer, a salad and an alcoholic drink. That tends to be around $15 (happy hour). Most places, I budget about $15-20 for dinner. I tend to go out for lunch more and I take advantage of happy hours when I want to go out around dinnertime.

Last month, I took a friend to a very nice restaurant with local, sustainable and organic/pesticide-free food. We had 2 entrees and one (alcoholic) drink. The total was just under $60.

I'm a vegetarian so that impacts prices. Usually, my meal is one of the cheapest on the menu.

You can go here
to look at the US government per diem rates for different cities in the US. When I was traveling on per diem for the government, I found that their rates more than covered a day's worth of food. For example, the M&IE (meals and incidental expenses) rate for my area is $71. This breaks down to:
Breakfast $12
Lunch $18
Dinner $36
IE $5
You can definitely eat here, even eating out every meal, for cheaper than $66 per day. If you never splurge, I'd say $40-$45 would be enough. Even when traveling, I don't eat out every meal though. I usually hit up a grocery store and buy fruit and muffins and cheeses to keep in my hotel room. Then I go out for lunch and eat leftovers/food from store for dinner.

[damned_colonial]

Some notes re: OSCON, for what it's worth. The conference provides lunches and snacks during the day. You need to feed yourself breakfast and dinner. Usually, groups of people go out together for dinner. If you go with one of these groups, you can usually expect to pay between $10 and $20 US for your meal. In Portland, particularly, people often go to brewpubs (pubs that brew their own beer and have meals as well). At most of those places, meals would be around $10. Keep in mind that you will add tax and tip on top of the price on the menu. Tipping in the US is around 18% generally. Sales tax varies; in Oregon (where OSCON is) they have none, but in California it's 8.25%. So expect to add 15-30% to the listed price of the meal depending on where you are and how generously you tip.

With regard to currency exchange and travel, my usual technique is to give myself a *local* budget for what I can spend. For instance, when I was in the US as a visitor for the first time, I gave myself $50/day for meals and entertainment and incidentals, which was quite generous given the way I usually travel. Having set a budget in USD, I didn't ever have to think about currency conversion while I was out and about paying for things, I just had to stay within that budget. To make it even easier, I'd put the day's budget in one section of my wallet and know that that section contained what cash I could spend. If I had any left over (as I often did), then I'd roll it over to the next day.

[juliet]

my usual technique is to give myself a *local* budget for what I can spend

This is my approach, too, & I've always found it works well.

[ironed_orchid]

Yeah, I always have to remember that it's not just conversions and that every country has it's own economy and own standard wage and those will determine the actual prices of things more than most other factors. Oh, and whether a place has sales tax, or service tax (in Aus we have both)... it's confusing.

[torachan]

Yeah, anything $5 and under is probably going to be fast food. But you can often get quite a lot for that price. Lots of places have dollar menus.

A sit-down restaurant is going to be more like $10 per person including tax and tip. Of course depending on the restaurant it can be much more.

As for tips, you don't have to tip for fast food. Tip at a sit-down restaurant where someone serves you, and tip for food delivered to your house. 15-20% is about right for a tip.

I would pick up any bills I found somewhere, regardless of how difficult. Quarters I will pick up if they're just lying there, but if it was in a mud puddle, probably not. 5 or 10 cents I will usually pick up, definitely not in a puddle. Pennies I rarely pick up at all.

If two items had a difference of $1 in a sit-down restaurant, it wouldn't make a difference to my choice. On a fast-food menu it might. I can't imagine two similar things having a price difference of $5 or more, though.

[cesy]

Eating out in the US is a lot cheaper than the UK.

[holyschist]

There are places in the U.S. where you can get a decent non-fast food meal (or rather, fast but not junky) for $5-6--sometimes Japanese noodle and bento places, Indian buffets, stuff like that. They're not really common, though. In general I'd say $8-15 is more typical for a lunch or decent dinner, $20-25 for a nicer dinner (without tip).

[vlion]

Didn't see this post cross my radar until now - sorry -

* I expect to pay $10-15 for a decent meal(1 entree, no drink, no dessert), after tip. Standard tip is 15% for normal service. Most entrees will be over 8 dollars.

* If I want steak or I go to a 'nice' place, I expect $20-25. But those places IMO aren't worth it usually, at least around here.

* Often there is a lunch-only menu that's a few $$ cheaper.

* Basic water is always free(there may be fancy water that's not, but I've never been charged for saying, 'just water, thank you'). Water quality is always potable, even if it tastes yuck due to lousy pipes.

* Soda is in the 1.50 for a glass range usually

* Coffee/tea also in the 1.50 per glass. Typically coffee comes with free refills. Other drinks don't.

* Coffeeshops usually charge .50 or so for a refill on drip coffee. YMMV.

* Fast food is fast and cheap but usually bad for your health(makes you fat).

* All of the above should be boosted upwards the more upscale you get. I also would expect adding several dollars when going to a more urban area vs. rural. The most upscale place in my town winds up being $50/plate; if you went to a high-end place( millionare crowd) I'd expect $100-$200/plate.

* The more local/green/organic you go, the more the price rises.

For cost comparisons(everything is modulo your locality. This is on the low end of the scale. Seattle is somewhat more expensive. Ask FFF for her list of cost differences, she used to live in this area):

- Federal minimum wage is $7-odd per hour.
- A starter software engineer in a semi-rural area makes about $25/hr.
- A 20oz soda is $1.60 or so.
- A loaf of decent bread is $4.
- Gas is $3/gallon
- A sheet set is at least $20.
- A decent apartment in a semi-rural area costs about $500 per month.
- A car that won't need much repair costs at least $5000.
- A new car costs at least $15,000
- A house costs at least $175,000


Good luck. Wish I was in Seattle area during your stay.