Above is a really cool infograph about how money from the average consumer unit (I think this means household) is spent. The largest expenditures are housing, transportation, and food, which seem pretty standard. One obvious tie back to the class I saw was the huge chunk taken out of income after taxes (fiscal policy). Is there anything about this graph that you find alarming or unexpected?
For more cool economic-related graphs, click here.
Great graphic. I'll have to use it in future classes. The President's urban affairs director said yesterday that the administration is working to devise a new "affordability" measure based on housing and transportation. It used to be that households spent about 1/3 of their income on housing. In many places, transportation expenses are very large.
ReplyDeleteThe original poverty line is based on food which was assumed to cost 1/3 of income. So the poverty line is essentially, the cost of aminimally nutritious diet multiplied by 3. Many people say it is the wrong measure for today's world.
I love the graph too, especially ones that are straightforward and very easy to read/understand. I never really thought to breakdown an average person's spending to this extent. This graph is good but it seems to be geared toward older adults. For a college student, our education category would probably be one of the greater percentages. Like professor McKinney mentioned, a new "affordability" measure based on housing and transportation would be a very good idea because it would increase spending in other categories of the graph above and allow many people to afford better housing as well as other essentials for living. (A)
ReplyDeleteI agree that this is a good graphic since it's easy to read and understand. What struck me was the amount spent on alcohol and tobacco. Tobacco was roughly three times the amount of reading while alcohol was almost four times that of reading. This is shocking. If $100 more was spent on reading, think how much more information we would know and be aware of. A
ReplyDeleteThis was a great infograph! The colors caught my attention, it is very straightforward with the labeling, the percentages, and the amount of actual dollars. I very much appreciated this and found it interesting, so thanks, Bridget. I think this graph is good for government looking at where they can place sin taxes. It shows how highly important tobacco and alcohol are to some, and therefore that it would be highly effective to tax them.
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i really like this graph, but it made me wonder what my family's expenses look like compared to this one. i know for instance that we spend way more money on books and currently with two kids in college on education. i also wonder at what the graph would look like for a younger demographic, perhaps for mid twenties. would those people be more likely to spend on outside of the home meals?
ReplyDeleteOh my goodness, thank you so much for posting something visual! This really helps the average person see the break down of how most people's money is spent.
ReplyDeleteIt also made me want to take my own household's data and set it up in a similar fashion.
Really liked this post!
This is a really interesting break down of someone’s income. It shows how people spend their money and it makes so much sense that it makes me wonder how my families pie graph would look because everyone’s is different. It really interesting to see how people spend more money in clothes and miscellaneous than in books/ education; although that this varies from family to family this graph really makes sense. E.A
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone above that this is a very cool and interesting graph to look at. I really do think it would be interesting to see it on a more personal level and see how we break down our own expenses. As far as any surprises, I also thought it was a bit of a shock to see how much we spend on alcohol and tobacco. Especially in relation to reading and education. A
ReplyDeleteAwesome graph, but I feel like most people's expenditures would differ greatly from the results we see. It would be interesting to make multiple graphs and then break them down by age group.
ReplyDeleteInformation like this definitely shows areas to place taxes when times are tough though..
A, E
Diddo to everyones opinions on the "amazigness" of this infograph. YetI wonder if this graph is representative of a certain group of people (i.e. middle class adult Americans) What about those who rent, who take the bus, are uneducated, can't afford new clothing and has no health insurance. While I most definitely agree that this a great graph my question is "who is the average consumer and what kind of lifestyle do they live?" A
ReplyDeleteGreat graph, very easy to understand and visualize what it's trying to say. I also wonder if this represents the 'average' American and if so, who is the average american? Would transportation be higher or lower if one lived in an urban area? Or how about a rural area? etc.
ReplyDeleteI wonder why apparel and services and one segment. Does that mean apparel related services like dry cleaning and tailoring (is that a word)? If not, then what kind of services are we talking about? That seems kind of important...
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