Tag Archives: opportunity costs

Swimming With Dolphins On Vacation

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Both of my kids love dolphins!

dolphin

Awesome Dolphins

So this year my wife found a package were the family can “swim with dolphins” and the go to Sea World the next day during our Florida vacation.  Needless to say, this package is expensive.

Since both of my kids are still relatively young, a requirement in the deal was that at least 1 adult had to also swim with the dolphins too.  After a talk, my wife said she would like to do it, so we agreed that she was definitely going to be the one to swim with the dolphins too.

Because of the high cost, I chose not to do the “swim with the dolphins” activity.  While I like dolphins too, but by not going I will shave an additional $150 off of the price for the experience.  Obviously, the decision was purely financial in nature, but I have to wonder, is this one of those missed opportunities in life that I will regret later because I’m being too frugal?

After a few weeks of thinking about it, I hate to say it but I’m sure that this is one of those experience that I will miss in life because I’m trying to save a buck.  I would now like to reconsider and update the experience so that I too could swim with the dolphins, but the event needs to be scheduled because they only have so many people swim with the dolphins per day.  So even though I changed my mind, I doubt that I will be able to upgrade my time there to include the “swimming with dolphins” element too (I still get to snorkel though).

I don’t see us doing this again in the future, so I’m afraid that I just lost out on a wonderful experience for $150 extra…

What would have you have done?  I’m sure I’ll still have a great time either way…  Later, after my vacation, I will have a follow up post on this experience from my wife and kid’s perspective.

Bests,

MR

 

 

5 Ways To Lessen The Duration Of Undesirable Events

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Undesirable Events:

As a child, I would dwell on undesirable events such as major tests in college, dentist visits, certain family functions, and so forth.  I use to dread the events the very moment I would wake up in the morning, and think negatively about the event for the entire day and sometime into the next day and beyond…  So this following advice is for the benefit of someone who still goes through these emotions and for my kids since I’ve noticed that they display some of the same reactions to such undesirable events as I once did.

Drawing out the Duration:

Now that I’m no longer a child, I’ve come to realize that such behavior is both time and thought waste.  To dwell on the what ifs and continue to complain about it is a type of opportunity cost, because such efforts are in vain.  The are in vain because that’s wasted energy that could be enjoyed doing other things.  In stead of enjoying at least a little of the day, I use to go into such a negative spiral that I was miserable for that entire day!  Even when the day might have been filled with some great positives, I would take that one small negative and convert my entire day to a negative. 

5 ways to Lessen the Duration:

  • If possible, do the event with speed and effectiveness.  To do it slowly and draw it out make the negative event take twice as long!  So if you have to do a chore do it quickly and be done with it.  As I kid I learned this lesson fairly quickly.  The same can be said with homework…
  • Cap the amount that you let the event affect you.  I’ve learned that sometimes I use to make mountains out of mole hills.
  • If the event is a mindless boring event, use your mind to escape!  I’ve been able to think of some great ideas (and even blogging articles) while in such mind-numbing events.
  • Quickly forget the event.  If there is no life lesson (like a dentist appointment visit), forget it as quickly as possible!  Why dwell on such a worthless thing to think about (brush your teeth after every meal).
  • Pepper in some activities before and immediately after the negative event.  The activities could be productive activities so that you feel like you accomplished something even though the negative event happened.  If you don’t have and productive activities to do, then consider doing cheap positive activities (a walk in the park, a movie and/or dinner, finishing a good book).

View every day as an opportunity to experience or accomplish some positive or at least productive activities.

Readers, we would love to hear if you have any techniques to lessen undesirable events in your life?

-MR

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The Cost Of Twisting Opportunity Costs

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While reading https://financefreelancelife.com’s post on Opportunity Costs, I decided to write about a concern I have on Opportunity Costs.

In economics class in college, students learn of the concept of “Opportunity Costs”.  Opportunity Costs questions where it’s worth the time and money to do an activity, and if there isn’t a better way to spend your time and money.  It’s about weighing and choosing the best option given the chance to do two activies but time to do one. 

Most students grasp the concept of working on Wall Street instead of a fast food restaurant.  But once they are employeed, some students twist the “Opportunity Cost” concept into something else.  Once they have a dollar amount per hour pegged to what they earn in their primary job, from their perspective, all work that they do has to be worth at least an equivalent amount of money.  So if they make, let’s say $40/hr, then if they look for a side job they feel that then need to at least make that $40/hr rate. 

So, is that true?

No, it’s not.  Often time the same student will watch a movie or go out to the bars.  So instead of earning a rate of pay, they’ll actually pay for the “Opportunity” to not earn money…  Eventually, even watching TV is a better opportunity than trying to work a side job to make additional money.  The funny thing is, that they don’t understand the real concept of opportunity costs.  Their leisure is costing them additional security and social interactions that could enhance  their life above the rate of pay.  If you work an additional job, you can choose something that you are passionate about.

Why am I bring this up?

One of my friends, use to make a decent amount of money for the city that he lives in.  Well, he got laid off and is now on unemployment benefits.  The funny thing is he had a few opportunities to be employeed, but decided not to because they were less than the rate of pay as what he use to make.  Now he’s in the situation where his unemployment is about to expire, and he still doesn’t have a job.  You can say that he was holding out for a better opportunity, but the hidden opportunity cost of deciding to hold out will cost him.  His resume now has a huge hole, that he can’t honestly fill.  He’ll be making a $0/hr rate of pay after his unemployment benefits run out.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, don’t twist a concept like “Opportunity Costs” into something that it’s not.  My buddy twisted it to justify him blowing off great jobs that while not perfect, were great opportunities.  Actually one of the jobs was for the same rate of pay, but the commute would have been a little over an hour for him…  Unbelievable!

-D