The cost of the commute to work adds up
But not all employers are keen. Some are taking a hard line on workplace flexibility, forcing some workers to decide whether their job is really worth it.
So far, Amazon, Tabcorp and Dell are among large employers to issue strict return-to-office mandates, requiring staff this year to be in the office five days a week.
But it's not cheap to get to work. The fluctuating cost of petrol, train and tram fares, tolls, parking costs, coffee and lunch adds up. Train fares in Sydney vary based on distance and the time of day. A single trip can range from $4.20 to $10.33. The daily cap for full-fare rides on Melbourne's public transport network is $11 a day.
The average person spends about $99 a week on commuting costs, according to Finder, equivalent to $4367 a year. This includes $42 for fuel. Toll roads, parking and other costs such as car insurance are excluded. Public transport costs are about $39 a week on average.
Not adding up
Workers are feeling the pinch because their wages aren't keeping up with rising costs, leaving them worse off than they were a year ago.
Wages increased 3.2 per cent over the past year, but it might not be enough to outpace the cost of living. The Consumer Price Index rose 2.4 per cent in the 12 months to February 2025. Everyday essentials like groceries, utilities, rent and fuel outstripped wage gains in many regions.
A worker earning $80,000 a year receiving a 3.2 per cent raise will gain about $2560 a year. However, they are likely to be about $3000 worse off when rising costs across groceries, rent, fuel and other essentials are accounted for.
Loading
Working from home also allows workers to save money by having more time to handle household tasks, gardening, errands and childcare, and preparing meals at home rather than relying on takeaways.
If you're commuting to the office, here are some ways to cut costs.
Concessions: Check to see if you're eligible for any public transport concessions.
Carpool: Find someone in your local area travelling at the same time each day and take it in turns to do the driving, halving your petrol costs.
Carshare: If you don't use your car much beyond commuting, it could be worth considering carsharing. You can book a car by the day and let the owner pay maintenance and registration costs.
Travel another way: Add it up. If it's cheaper to take public transport, walk or cycle to work, commit to travelling a cheaper way at least one or two days a week.
Try a co-working space: Check if there is a co-working space in your suburb and ask your employer if you can work from there instead, which could halve the cost of your commute.
Find cheaper parking: It might be convenient to park in the multi-storey carpark but look for cheaper or free parking spots further away and walk to the office from there.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Perth Now
33 minutes ago
- Perth Now
Trump says he plans 100pct tariff on computer chips
The United States will impose a tariff of about 100 per cent on semiconductor chips imported into the nation, President Donald Trump says. "We'll be putting a tariff on of approximately 100 per cent on chips and semiconductors," Trump said in the Oval Office while meeting with Apple chief executive Tim Cook. "But if you're building in the United States of America, there's no charge." The Republican president said companies that make computer chips in the US would be spared the import tax. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a shortage of computer chips increased the price of autos and contributed to an overall uptick in inflation. Inquiries sent to chip makers Nvidia and Intel were not immediately answered. Demand for computer chips has been climbing worldwide, with sales increasing 19.6 per cent in the year-ended in June, according to the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organisation. Trump's tariff threats mark a significant break from existing plans to revive computer chip production in the United States. He is choosing an approach that favours the proverbial stick over carrots in order to incentivise more production. Essentially, the president is betting that higher chip costs would force most companies to open factories in the US, despite the risk that tariffs could squeeze corporate profits and push up prices for mobile phones, TVs and refrigerators. By contrast, the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act signed into law in 2022 by then-president Joe Biden provided more than $US50 billion ($A77 billion) to support new computer chip plants, fund research and train workers for the industry. The mix of funding support, tax credits and other financial incentives was meant to draw in private investment, a strategy that Trump has vocally opposed.
Sydney Morning Herald
4 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Firing people can't save Trump from the US economy's unflattering reality
In response, a group of statistical agencies that goes by the name The Friends of the Bureau of Labour Statistics released its own, more factual, statement that read: 'This escalates the President's unprecedented attack on the independence and integrity of the federal statistical system. The President seeks to blame someone for unwelcome news,' it said. It's also worth noting that the group statement was issued by William Beach, who was McEntarfer's Trump-appointed predecessor at the bureau. It's hard to overstate what Trump has done. Imagine if Anthony Albanese decided to sack the nation's chief statistician because the latest inflation data was not what the government wanted. There would, rightly, be an outcry. Naturally, the Trump apologists have been out defending the indefensible, ignoring the fact that the bureau has always revised job numbers (up and down), no matter the occupant of the White House. Last year, while Joe Biden was still in office, the bureau revised its jobs figures between January and July down by 340,000. But the single largest downward revision came in March and April 2020, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when the number of jobs was cut by almost 925,000. Loading Revisions are part and parcel of what the Bureau of Labour Statistics does. Every month it updates its numbers as it receives more information. The monthly release, plus the revisions, are vital to policymakers (like the Federal Reserve) and investors so they can see how the economy is travelling in as close to real time as possible. Ever since he declared a record crowd at his 2017 inauguration, Trump and reality have been at odds. In the grand scheme of things, crowd size does not really matter. But using a Sharpie to extend the expected landfall of a hurricane, gutting agencies responsible for tracking climate change, and ignoring employment data have very real consequences. Economists and policymakers have, for years, been worried about the statistics coming out of nations where the political leaders meddle with the numbers. In Argentina during the 1990s, the government fired bureaucrats who released less-than-flattering inflation figures and began releasing their own (sound familiar?). Understandably, this made international investors wary and increase their premiums as protection. By 2001, the government was in a full-blown debt crisis and defaulted on $US93 billion of debt. Greece, Turkey, Russia and China have also tried to play fast and loose with statistics over the years. It got to such a point in the case of China that outside economists used electricity consumption or satellite pictures taken at night (to see artificial light) as a de facto measure of GDP because their trust in the official numbers was so low. As financial analyst Ned Davis told The Wall Street Journal, ' Your initial thought is, 'Are we heading toward what you see in Latin America or Turkey, where if the data doesn't look good, you fire someone, and then eventually stop reporting it?'' Just a few days before McEntarfer's sacking, Trump was saying how great the economy was travelling – and demanding the Federal Reserve cut interest rates because it was going so well. Of course, the GDP figures did not show that (growth is slowing while inflation, at 2.7 per cent, is above the Fed's 2 per cent target rate). But Trump couldn't admit that, so he told his own story. Loading Around the same time, the president claimed that his government had cut pharmaceutical prices by '1200, 1300, 1400, 1500 per cent. I don't mean 50 per cent, I mean 1400, 1500 per cent'. And he's the one who thought the Bureau of Labour Statistics was making up numbers. The problem with making up your own numbers, or installing people who will make the numbers show what you want, is that they will be at odds with the lived experience of voters. Just as Biden struggled to convince Americans that the cost of living was getting better while they could see the price of everyday essentials going up, saying the economy is great to people lining up for unemployment benefits has a short shelf life. There's an adage used by economists to describe the models they use to understand the economy: Put crap in, and you get crap out.
The Age
4 hours ago
- The Age
Firing people can't save Trump from the US economy's unflattering reality
In response, a group of statistical agencies that goes by the name The Friends of the Bureau of Labour Statistics released its own, more factual, statement that read: 'This escalates the President's unprecedented attack on the independence and integrity of the federal statistical system. The President seeks to blame someone for unwelcome news,' it said. It's also worth noting that the group statement was issued by William Beach, who was McEntarfer's Trump-appointed predecessor at the bureau. It's hard to overstate what Trump has done. Imagine if Anthony Albanese decided to sack the nation's chief statistician because the latest inflation data was not what the government wanted. There would, rightly, be an outcry. Naturally, the Trump apologists have been out defending the indefensible, ignoring the fact that the bureau has always revised job numbers (up and down), no matter the occupant of the White House. Last year, while Joe Biden was still in office, the bureau revised its jobs figures between January and July down by 340,000. But the single largest downward revision came in March and April 2020, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when the number of jobs was cut by almost 925,000. Loading Revisions are part and parcel of what the Bureau of Labour Statistics does. Every month it updates its numbers as it receives more information. The monthly release, plus the revisions, are vital to policymakers (like the Federal Reserve) and investors so they can see how the economy is travelling in as close to real time as possible. Ever since he declared a record crowd at his 2017 inauguration, Trump and reality have been at odds. In the grand scheme of things, crowd size does not really matter. But using a Sharpie to extend the expected landfall of a hurricane, gutting agencies responsible for tracking climate change, and ignoring employment data have very real consequences. Economists and policymakers have, for years, been worried about the statistics coming out of nations where the political leaders meddle with the numbers. In Argentina during the 1990s, the government fired bureaucrats who released less-than-flattering inflation figures and began releasing their own (sound familiar?). Understandably, this made international investors wary and increase their premiums as protection. By 2001, the government was in a full-blown debt crisis and defaulted on $US93 billion of debt. Greece, Turkey, Russia and China have also tried to play fast and loose with statistics over the years. It got to such a point in the case of China that outside economists used electricity consumption or satellite pictures taken at night (to see artificial light) as a de facto measure of GDP because their trust in the official numbers was so low. As financial analyst Ned Davis told The Wall Street Journal, ' Your initial thought is, 'Are we heading toward what you see in Latin America or Turkey, where if the data doesn't look good, you fire someone, and then eventually stop reporting it?'' Just a few days before McEntarfer's sacking, Trump was saying how great the economy was travelling – and demanding the Federal Reserve cut interest rates because it was going so well. Of course, the GDP figures did not show that (growth is slowing while inflation, at 2.7 per cent, is above the Fed's 2 per cent target rate). But Trump couldn't admit that, so he told his own story. Loading Around the same time, the president claimed that his government had cut pharmaceutical prices by '1200, 1300, 1400, 1500 per cent. I don't mean 50 per cent, I mean 1400, 1500 per cent'. And he's the one who thought the Bureau of Labour Statistics was making up numbers. The problem with making up your own numbers, or installing people who will make the numbers show what you want, is that they will be at odds with the lived experience of voters. Just as Biden struggled to convince Americans that the cost of living was getting better while they could see the price of everyday essentials going up, saying the economy is great to people lining up for unemployment benefits has a short shelf life. There's an adage used by economists to describe the models they use to understand the economy: Put crap in, and you get crap out.
