quote:

Originally posted by whalewatcher:
One beer a day??

I was thinking that, but some travelers won't drink even that, so consider it an average.

In my opinion it may be more helpful,instead of estimating the expence of traveling for a period of time, that you should make this list more city specific. I live in Seattle and finding 5 touristy things might not be that hard but I'd be hard pressed to stay more than three or four days tops if I didn't live here. I would estimate the expense of the local hostel, daily and weekly, then I can do the math on how long I want to stay in a particular area. Same with public transport, museums, etc,...

I guess I just think that these are really hard to judge and can be really personal. I'm a big museum person and spend quite a bit of my budget on museums. Then again, I am more likly to eat cheaper or drink less to counter act that. Maybe we there could be levels? Barebones, middle, and high? Not the normal 5 star high, but a backpacker high?

The point of travel for me is doing activities there - so maybe adding one activity cost per day is fair..

quote:

I was thinking that, but some travelers won't drink even that, so consider it an average.

It's gonna be extremely difficult to come up with a basket. We're not really a very conform, stratified sample here. And some of the differences in personality will make a huge difference in price levels. I'm a vegetarian - to me expensive McD meals are far inbetween (whenever I really, really want a clean toilet in a very, very dirty city). Others smoke. A pack a day out here is gonna make that 70-100 bucks a week! (Fuck! I got to stop smoking.) Also, there are regionial differences that change your behaviour. In Asia, I used to drink AT LEAST one fruit juice a day. Out here, I'd never pay 7 bucks for diluted shit.

This leaves me with the conclusion that in order to find a fairly general basket, it should stay with absolute essentials of travelling - and completely disregard individual consumption (alcohol, cigis, souveniers, etc).

- Centrally located hostel
- Breakfast
- Two cheap meals a day (incl 1 drink)
- 2 l of water sounds good (not the cheapest water in order to level out those who drink soft drinks)
- Local transport
- Regional transport (i.e. going to the beach in Freo)
- Inter-city travel (if possible the next most logical step from your city, if there is such a thing)

Also, we're talking about city costs. As argued before, few of us tend to stay 4 weeks in one city. Therefore it makes little sense to do this over a 4 weeks period. I reckon, to get a decent avarage, it should be a three day period with one day of 'tourist activity', one day of going out and one day of just chillin'. Therefore for the three days.

- Two tourist activities (take your cities 5 most popular / 5 * 2)
- One cinema ticket
- One club entry

Remember, we're trying to get an index...not the actual 'daily expense'.

Hey El Adi -

Most of what you said makes sense, but I reckon it should be for a week and include only local transit. I think you're right that 4 weeks is too long, but I also think that, if you're looking for local city costs, including costs for travel out of the city don't really apply. Transit out away is more likely to be through some national organization than something paid for by local tax money (and therefore a local cost).

Other than that, I think the basket you proposed will work fine.

When I publish the spreedsheet you are all free to add/remove beers, etc. i don't drink soda, am a veggie, hate plays, but whatever....it is an index. the important thing is that it is consistant basket accross cities...that's what makes it comparable.

OK, 1 week is cool if we are dropping the "personal items". i think it represents something close to the average. four weeks just seems to long. (i initially included it just to have the personal items.)

I'm liking something very similar to Christina's basket at the moment:

-7 beers (one per day)
-one t-shirt (standard, tourist grade)
-cost of transit for the week
-3 tourist/entertainment activity ticket prices (2 museums, 1 walking tours)
-1 movie
-1 low/middle-end play (movie if unavailable)
-1 week in a hostel dorm in the city center
-1 load of wash at a laundrymat or service (whatever is cheaper)
-1 return trip to the airport by the cheapest means possible (train, bus, taxi, donkey, etc.)
-5 postcards + stamps to another continent
-1 hour per day at internet cafe
- Food:
- three bits of fruit and some bread (breaky)
- 1 cheap takaway meal (falafel, piece of pizza, bowl of soup)
- 1 sit down meal at an inexpensive restraunt
- 5 coffies per week
- 1L of water per day
- 1L of soda per day

The discussion of which cities is here

Great idea!

If this is an index, rather than a set cost per city, why have 7 beers? Listing the cost of beer, coffee, big mac, won ton, etc. is good, but I would have thought it makes more sense to list the cost of one of everything, so that we can all work out what we need.

For example, I never take cabs but I do buy t-shirts a lot. So having the cost of a taxi ride is fine, but I will generally just ignore it (the cost of a bus journey is more relevant).

Waiting in anticipation

The idea is to mimic what those other indexes do, but make it specific to 'us'. we have a nice definition (into a city for a week of backpacker touristy stuff and out and what we might buy on that trip.) if we only include on of every thing then we are not representing what one might spend in a week.

it's a hard bill to fill, but it is better than some economist idea of living in a city based on buying a car, dinging out at stellar restaurants, cost of full coach tix to nyc, etc.

Stoo I took your list & altered it slightly. How does this sound, everyone? Any other thoughts?



- 7 beers (one per day -- include the tip if it's not typically included in the price)
- one t-shirt (standard, tourist grade)
- cost of public transit for 1 week (no taxis)
- 3 tourist/entertainment activity ticket prices (ie. museum or walking tours)
- 1 movie at a cinema
- 1 entrance to a nightclub/discoteque (low-to-middle end)
- 1 play (low-to-middle end)
- 1 week in a hostel dorm, city center
- 1 load of wash at a laundromat or service (whatever is cheaper)
- 1 return trip to the airport by the cheapest means possible (train, bus, taxi, donkey, etc.)
- 5 cheap postcards (not museum quality) + stamps to another continent
- 7 hours at an internet cafe (1 hour per day)
- 7 cheap takeaway breakfasts (i.e. a muffin and a piece of fruit)
- 7 cheap takeaway or sitdown meals (one that will fill you up -- a slice of cheese pizza wouldn't do it -- a calzone and a small salad would)
- 7 sit down meals at an inexpensive restaurant (include the tip)
- 7 coffees/teas (or whatever the everyday cheap beverage is in that city you can buy from a street vendor)
- 14L of water/soda/juice (2L per day)

Note: Sub in a movie for either the nightclub or play, if those are unavailable.



• I'm giving the exact number of items, so it's a set basket.

• I'm limiting the transit costs to public transit only, because it just gets too hard to figure out standard distances for taxis.

• I made it coffee or tea, because coffee might become a luxury item in some cities if we are strict -- I think coffee or tea covers that type of cheap everyday beverage that everyone drinks as a ritual.

• I thought we should include a nightclub admission.

• I figure we're aiming for low-to-mid range on the general budget. So write down what's a very cheap price and what's a mid-range price for items like beer or a play, and figure and submit the average between the 2.

Christina - I agree with your list.

Everyone ok with it? If so, I think we should use it.

I am happy with it.

I have a question about the 3 tourist attractions. I guess the idea is to pick three similarly priced attractions, which can be easy in some places (Rome: Colosseum/Palatine 10 euro, Vatican Museums 12 euro, Capitoline Museum 7-ish euro) but difficult in others.

One of Sydney's major attractions in recent years has been BridgeClimb, where you get to climb to the top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It's a fantastic experience and I'd say it's the best single tourist attraction in the city. On the other hand, it costs AUD$169/$US120-ish and greatly skews the total cost, so should I include it in the basket or not?

For what it's worth, when I travel I like to have a daily budget to stick to (more or less) and then a set amount of 'extra' funds to spend on things that don't really count in the daily budget such as a short flight, visa, or an expensive attraction like seeing gorillas in Rwanda/Uganda, as an example (not that I've done that!!). So if I was a backpacker in Sydney, I'd do the BridgeClimb and use my 'extra' fund to pay for it so I wouldn't have to worry about the cost.

I would say the BridgeClimb doesn't count as a standard tourist attraction. It looks great (I haven't done it) but it's an awful lot of money. Same league as going skydiving or bungee jumping in my opinion