[nUcLeArEnVoY]

Originally Posted by 71GP76TA

Most Trans Am's of that era would go a couple hundred thousand miles pretty easy if the were somewhat maintained. Out here in California cars last forever if maintained.

Not everyone is good with driving a little sh!tbox. Some people work hard.. really hard so they don't have to. I daily drive a 2018 GMC Sierra 1500 4x4 with a 6.2 that I bought new and paid cash for.... and it likes gas...,., especially the way I drive.... I could care less about fuel economy. I work hard so that I can drive what I want and not care about fuel economy. My business partner is a little mizer and drives a 2005 Civic Hybrid with cooked paint and 180,000 miles. Personally... I wouldn't drive that sh!tbox around the block... but he likes it because it was cheap and gets 45mpg even though he could afford something much better. Whats the point of working hard and making money if you are just going to stare at your account balance?

I get that you should splurge if you have the disposable income, but I'm going to assume there is a generational gap between the two of us (maybe not, maybe you're aorund my age - I'm 36). My generation is very far behind on financial freedom (I'm a millenial), and today's affordability crisis kind of instills a sense of frugality among my agegroup. We are saddled with inflated school debt averaging $35,000 since that's what we were taught in gradeschool to do in order to achieve success (as we put on clown makeup); we are forced to rent since home ownership has been sequestered among the affluent almost exclusively; and the rents to which we are forced to adhere have skyrocketed this past couple years and leave very little additional room in your average budget to pay for utilities, groceries, or god forbid save money. I made 100k last year for the first time in my life and that used to be an aspirational income, but it doesn't really get you far, anymore. Our dollar doesn't bring us nearly as far as previous generation's, and so a sense of practicality takes precedent over splurging. I already splurged on my Trans Am back in 2020 when things were way different (it's amazing how much has changed in just a few years). I don't need to splurge on anything else, and if I have no practical application for a truck, then I'm not going to spend the extra money on something I don't need; especially when my agegroup feels disenfranchised from even buying a damn home.

And we do work hard. Very hard. lol The only reason I made 100k last year was because I put in around 200 hours of OT in the last 3 months of the year, and as an ER nurse getting berated and screamed at by drunk patients; having to explain to families that their loved one is circling the drain because the physician is too shy to do it themselves; and shortening my lifespan by willingly working night shift just for the extra $6.00/hr differential, I like to think I earn my keep and that I deserve to splurge as well... but I can't. At least not since a couple years ago when inflation spiraled out of control while wages, while they did indeed go up, still remain proportionately stagnant.

But I suppose for the same reasons listed above, taking my advice from my previous post may fall on deaf ears for a lot of the folks here who have the disposable income to drive something fun daily. Like I said, it's a generational difference in idealogy. I'll be the first to admit that a lot of my generation is very idiotic with their spending habits like spending thousands on luxury fashion that they show off in their TikToks and Instagram feeds, or even blowing 70k on an Audi when they bring home that same amount every year; but the majority of suffrage is in silence.