Why Commuting to Work is Killing You #020

Oh it's my favorite. Well, now that I'm commuting by bike mostly, had another great ride today to and from work. It was lovely. I feel like you guys are about ready to switch it to uh one car. You know, I haven't given it some more thought, and I think we're getting closer for sure. Although a bunch of episodes ago we talked about this app called Rapidfi right wrapping your car and you thought it was ridiculous. Yeah, that was like episode two or three or something like that.

And so they started a new campaign in our area. And I'm getting my leaf wrapped on Thursday, dog, are you really? Yeah? I'm gonna make myself like fifty bucks a week. That's two hundred bucks a month. Yeah, that's two h bucks. But what is it? I mean, what's gonna be on your car? I think your Salesforce. I don't really know what they do, and I don't really care. Wait, that's who are that's who park it works for? Way to Go, Parker. You just got on my vehicle. Oh

my gosh. Okay, I will say that's much better than a lifetime daytime TV show or uh. I kind of want something less business e and more goofy. I was kind of hoping the Honey Booboo thing would work out, but because because the Salesforce is gonna seem a little too like legit, like you actually work for Salesforce and yeah, people are gonna be like, oh, well, how's how's it working for Salesforce? I'm like, I don't, I don't know. This is just that's the wrong guy exactly, sending for

the buck. The Honey Boo Boo thing though, and if you didn't hear that episode, the potential campaign that I was gonna participate in and get my car wrapped four was a new Honey Boo Boo Show or Honey Boo Boo's Mom's Show or something like that, and I just, I mean, I thought that was gonna be hilarious and my neighbors would probably Letty Bobo's mom's sister once in on the action, right, Yeah, she wants her on show now too, And I just thought that would be really funny.

But sadly it didn't work out, did not quite in time. But this one is working out. Legit on Thursday, can wrapped on Thursday. She don't care. She don't care, all right, Kate would care. Well, you guys have one car and she drives that, and so this is the car that you know, I might drive it just a little bit, even just up and down the street because you have to wrap up like ten miles a day in order to get the requirement, the full bounty or whatever. Do

you drink anything this past week? I uh totally broke something out of the seller, which I don't do all that often. And I've got this, like I call it a seller. I got like twelve beers in my pantry that so. But I do like to I think, like we talked about recently, I like to age some beers over time. And I've pulled out one of my loa Gunitas high West Ifides oh whoa high West ifies those

like those way back. Yeah, it's so good. It's like coffee stout aged in whiskey barrels, rye whiskey barrels, and it it was delicious, aging perfectly so nice. Yeah. So if anybody out there, I think we've mentioned this before, if you have some sour beers or better aged or if you have you know, bourbon barrel aged stouts reporters or something like that, those beers are often great to hang onto for a couple of years, and the flavor changes over time, so it's always fun to go back

to something like that. Do not age an I p a or a palele, No drink those fresh. Those dastes terrible with a few months on them. So yeah, I asked what you had, man, because I just had my first Athena. Yeah, that's such a good beer. After having that French Imperial Berlin of Vice, I was like, you know what it's it's officially Berlin of Vice season man.

And so yeah, having that Athena, it's such a good summer summer light drinking beer, not like lighting body, but it's got that acidity, has got that sour, that tartness, that wheat finish and it's it's one of those perfect beach beers too, So we're gonna have to bring some of that to the beach. Is anything. It's like under five percent and light and refreshing and tart like that. I mean, I just love that. It's the It's the

perfect thing to drink. Feet in the sand, you know, waves, waves crashing up on the shore and everything after up, I cried, Yeah, let's move on to the beer were drinking today. And we went from an awesome major brewery last week, ale Gash Too, a brewery that I guarantee you probably nobody listening to this podcast has ever heard of,

because we're ultra hip guys. We're drinking something from. It's like listening to bands that you've never heard of yet, you know, like, yeah, yeah, I totally heard of them. I just made that name up. We're drinking something from.

My friend John is a home brewer, and there are a lot of good homebrewers out there, but there's also a lot of bad home brewers out there, right, And so if I say homebrewer, you might be like, oh, it's probably gonna taste like crap, But no, no, no, John's legit, man, he might be one of the best brewers in the state. Yeah, he just doesn't produce it for public consumption, that's right. So he bottles a few things and I was fortunate to get one of these,

and so Matt and I are drinking tonight. It's so good John's beer. And his brewery is called Little Cottage Brewery and the beer is called a splinter in the mind. And I'm really excited about this, Matt, because literally, if you asked me what my favorite style of beer was, it would be a Flanders Landers Red. Man, this is the best. I'm with you, man, this has got it all like Flanders Red. It's got like the sour sort of heart aspect of it, right, yep, you like that.

You like that side of it. I love that side of it. But then I love the vinegary side. It's got this distinct vinegary kind of taste. And so I'm really excited to get his take on it and see what this tastes like. It's almost like a shrub. I don't know if any of you guys out there have had like like that cocktail, Like, have you ever ever

had shrubs? I don't need shrubs, man, It's weird. It's like, I mean, it's a very it's a high, highly acidic sort of cocktail that you kind of age and you muddle and you know, you adge into it, making me think about Monty Python. Say, is that what we're talking about? Similar? Yeah, it was like that, all right, but uh but yeah, it's similar as a cdity level, which is, yeah, something

I'm drawn to. But then on top of that, the other aspect of it, man, is then they take them and they age them either onwood or in barrels, and then that just gives it another round of amazing flavor. Yeah. And so this one in particular is aged fifteen months in a rye whiskey barrel and then another two months on tart cherries. Gosh, so it just sounds perfect. So juiced to have this thing. Man, it's gonna be so good. So I'm pretty pumped. Let's uh, let's pop it now.

So the pop sound was a little weak on this because John did a wax wax the top of the bottle, which is kind of a cool look but also sometimes makes it a pain in the ask to get to the beer. Yeah, we each got one of these cute little bottles. Man, They kind of look like mini bombers, you know, they're like the they look like the big ones,

but they're kind of like your own personal pan pizza. Yeah, I think Lander's red style, right, Yeah, these are I think the three seventy five million liter bottles, which are really cool looking. When I stop my nose in that glass, oh my gosh, that smells so good. The size of your cheeks just start watering because it's got that My mouth knows what's up. It's like we're about the party taste buds getting excited. So Flanders right, known for the color too. Yeah, it's got a brownish red color to

that classic Flanders red red lick to it, and it's perfect. Dude, How does he do it? So he's known for making he makes amazing stouts, and has he ever made one of these before as far as you know, as far as I know, he hasn't. He's made some good sours, But like, crap, this is such a particularise style and really difficult to make. I assume it's difficult. You just don't see you don't see a lot of people doing it, so you you've got to assume that it's somewhat difficult.

And and and he like seriously nailed this. Oh my gosh, that's like a Barry Bonds home run or Tiger Woods sunk putt or something like that. Like that's what this tastes like, a little lebron in a glass right here, exactly exactly. It's unparalleled. Sorry, if you don't know sports, those are sports references. I'm not so good at the sports. It starts off with that classic Flanders red aggressiveness, but then immediately you can it switches to the cherries. You

taste that fruit. You totally get the cherries, which is so nice, like the sweetness from the cherries and the the whiskey barrel. I think kind of keeps it all in check that it's not too sweet or too vinegary or too tart. And it's like this mellows it all out there, and perfectly balanced representation helps it to finish a little dryer, like kind of having that wood there.

I think, like I said, this is my favorite style, and I've had some really good representations of it, and I've had some really bad ones, and this is like up there top two, so good. This might be the best beer I've had all year, Like seriously, right now, best beer. You want to go ahead and say it, because this is freaking amazing, I'll say it. We had some great beers on the podcast, some great beers. We have a ton of great beers. Yeah. Pretty much every

week we have a great beer. Yeah exactly, and that doesn't fail. And this is probably the best one so far. So John, you're the master. Thank you, John. This is fantastic. Man. Cheers. All right, man, let's talk about commuting. Why it's killing you. Let's do it. Commuting is essentially the opposite of this beer that we're drinking. Yeah, white knuckled hell, this is like this brings life, that brings you. So let's cover

the problem first. Yeah. Yeah. So ultimately, one of the major problems is that we sit too much in our culture, and traditional commuting in your car is by yourself sitting right, Yeah exactly. We touched on this recently too in a in an episode. I forget which one, but we're talking about how you most folks literally you sit in your car, you drive to work, you sit all day, you sit in a cubicle, and then you just repeat the whole

thing over again. Can you come home? And then you are a lot of times sitting there watching TV or you know, eating dinner, sitting on our butts. It's like the it's not good for you, and we need to get off our butts more in the winter. Man, Like when I'm sitting in my home office they're working, I can literally feel my body just like slow down and rotting away, like it's not able to keep warm. Like my body is not able to do the thing that

it needs to do, which is maintain it's temperature. You have to get this huge down jacket because you just stop moving and the blood starts slowing down, and it's just bad. Yeah, I hate it. One scientist a few years back said sitting is the new smoking, and so he had done some research on what sitting does to

your body. And in our culture, with how sedentary we've become, like we said, you know, with commuting, sitting at work, sitting at home, all the time, we're we're sitting, sitting, sitting, and and essentially it's so bad for us. It's the one researcher says that it's like smoking, that it's that bad for you, and so it's something that we should be concerned about. Estimates say that we sit for half of our waking hours. And dude, I would even say

more than that. I mean, literally, if you think about the amount of time that people work and the amount of time they spend in their car right there, I feel like that's over half. And it's not like they

spend the rest of the day standing up. And we're not talking about everyone here, but yeah, maybe you know, most people that do sit down when they work, maybe they get up to go to the bathroom or to grab something off the printer, but probably eighty two percent of their you know, in a stat I just made up, probably that probably that much of the time is spent sitting in front of their computer. Rule exactly. It's well documented. Yeah. Man, that's a huge problem. And another thing too is that,

I mean it's costing us money. So it's it's literally taking our health and now it's also taking our money. You take into account what your hourly wages, but then you actually if you take into account the amount of time you spend in the car getting there, I mean, you divide that out and you're actually earning, you know, a good bit less than you actually think you're making. So if you're making but you're commuting forty five minutes, each way and sitting in traffic and car costs and

fuel and all these other things added in. You should actually do the math and see what you're real hourly wages. It turns out that you're probably making substantially blessed than you thought you were with all of the costs that are associated with going to work and commuting in a big steel box. And so it's really important to factor the costs of your commute and car ownership and how much time you're wasting into that hourly wage to d to get a realistic picture of what you're actually earning

from your job. Yeah, we recently talked about the legit way to own a car. So on top of all this, like Joel said, if you are financing, say a brand new car, not only is this killing you, but it's actually costing you way more money than you even realize. I think, on top of the fact that we're sitting too much and that's killing us, and that we're actually not making as much money as we think because we're spending a lot of time in the car as opposed

to time in the office actually making the money. Right, We're spending money on fuel costs and on the actual car that gets us there, and the time it takes to get to work that we're not actually getting paid. So those are a lot of costic have to be factored in. But on top of that, I mean, how

awful is traffic? Right? Yeah? Man? I mean like the stress, the stress of sitting in traffic, like what it does to you psychologically, doesn't get the endorphins flowing for you, and you feel all you feel all jazz once you get home and you get all loose and you're like, it's just like nothing, just like a night out with my lady in traffic, you know, can't be a I

have home in Atlanta. Traffic Certainly where you live, maybe it's not quite as bad as as we have it here, but still I guarantee nobody really enjoys driving to and from work. Is it time to talk about the solutions? Then? Yeah, there are a lot of solutions that are out there for people who are, uh, who are taking their car to work. And so I think too, you probably know

some of these basic things, right you. You know that you know we're gonna say bike to work, and you might say, well that doesn't work for me, but we're going to offer a bunch of different solutions, and hopefully there's something that you can implement in some way, form or fashion to commute less frequently, or to commute in a different way, or to change the schedule that you have at work. We're gonna come up with a lot of options here for you to consider so that you're

commuting is less bad and hopefully costing you less money. Yeah, man, Like you said, these aren't things that are revolutionary, right, Like the actual things that we're going to suggest, So what we're talking about are the alternatives the traditional commuting, so either car pooling, public transit, biking, even walking, uh

and but even working from home as well. Like, these aren't things things that, say, you've never heard of, But what we're gonna do is specifically to talk about why that they're good not only for you obviously, but as well for like your employer and even your city and the environment as well. Yeah, and and also how you can actually implement some of these things in your life.

And we're not gonna be able to speak to every circumstance, right, If you are calling on accounts across town, chances are that, I mean, that's not even a commute, that's just what you do right, and so that's really hard to cut down on your a ups driver and yeah, that's your life. The truck's gotta get gotta get around town to drop

off the packages. There's not much you can change. You can listen to this podcast on repeat and that's going to help at least, But they're they're only there's only uh, certain professions that can actually be helped by this. But I think there's a lot of people and there's a lot of practical takeaways for almost everybody in this. Yeah. Also, first let's talk about the benefit to employees. So you

as workers, I mean it should be obvious. Thing goes without saying that employees want to have options, to be able to either work from home or at least hopefully to have some sort of incentive, like you know, it's like some sort of carrot dangled in front of them to sort of challenge them to think, oh man, what are some other ways that I could get to work, you know, while maybe saving money, while enjoying myself more and not being nearly as stressed out as I normally am.

So if you are able to work from home, you should take advantage of that and consider asking if you can work from home more than you're currently allowed to do. It's less stress in your life if you don't have to fight traffic, it's less cost less war and terror on your car. And the other cool thing is that sometimes you're more productive when you're working from home, right, Yeah, mean there's just so much time that you can essentially

reclaim and kind of put towards productivity. It gives you a little more time to be flexible, maybe stay during the day, but basically, yeah, it allows you just to get more stuff done, uh, in a shorter amount of time. Yeah. And like Matt, for you, when you were able to start working from home, you know, you're makeup time got cut in half, Like you you didn't have to look beautiful for all the people at the office like you stop.

You know, you started wearing T shirts as opposed to these like three piece suits and stuff like that, right yeah, and that you had like the pocket watch and ye yeah yeah, the monitors take a long time to put on. That's what I'm saying. So that's another great benefit of working from home as you can just keep your pjs on, right, make a quick breakfast and sit down and get to work. Um, there's fewer meetings that you have to tend, fewer interruptions.

And granted, I'll tell you I enjoy working in office. I enjoy working with people, but it's really nice to work from home. Sometimes I do feel more productive when I am at home, working alone and don't have the constant interruption of working in a workplace where surrounded by other people. Yeah, and surrounded by just like those constant

meetings that you kind of get scheduled for. We're just like, I don't need to be in this meeting, but I'm on the list and I was sent to invite, and I'm supposed to be here, I think, but I just don't need to be here. I just remember those from ten years ago, back when I used to work in an agency, and I hated those. Dude, like I've been there,

done that. Oh my gosh, probably yesterday. That's just the kind of thing that just drives me crazy, is you know, like when you're just staring inefficiency in the face and you're just like, I just want to shoot myself right now. Like yeah, and not the worst, not all meetings are bad, but you know, and sometimes it's just an impromptu visit from a coworker, and those are fun. But there are days where it's nice to feel like you're uper productive.

And I know the days that I feel like that are usually either on Fridays when everyone else is working from home and I'm in the office, or when I'm working from home, I feel like that. So I enjoy having the interactional with my coworkers. But those days are really nice to have. And in another point, another benefit to alternatives to traditional com meeting. I mean we already touched on this, but you just save a lot of money. You just take a new account how much money you

put towards gas, towards your car upkeep. You know, if you're driving in solo and that's just a lot of your monthly budget that you're not gonna have to put towards transportation. And not only that, you're gonna see your vehicle just last you longer. The value is gonna kind of maintain and you're not going to see it depreciate nearly as much as if you're driving it every day

forty five minutes to from work. Yeah. Completely, If you're able to take a few thousand miles off your car every year, you know, that might be one fewer oil change, and it's so easily, especially city driving. To man, that's like the worst versus just like hopping on the interstate, you know, and that's less gas, so you've got to use and that less breaks, less everything, maybe cheaper insurance

that you can get. If you can get under a certain mile cap from your insure, you might be able to save you know, a hundred dollars or a hundred and fifty dollars every year by driving less. Yes, So they're all all these costs that you're not factoring in that go into your commute into work every day. So it's really important to sit down put those things on paper to at least know what you're spending so that you can know what to ask if your employer when

you're looking at alternative commute options. So another benefit, and this is specific to working from home, but just being able to work from home and have that flexibility to kind of do some personal stuff. And I know this kind of sounds counter like counterintuitive to like the productivity one, but occasionally instead of taking say a half day off at work just because yet you know, you have to take time to get to somewhere and then pick somebody

up and all that. If you're already at home, you're still able to get a lot done. But then if you have a little bit of flexibility to say, go do something that you need to do, or like with us with having rental properties, it's nice to be able to have a little bit of time to kind of jump out and go check something out, meet a contractor over at a house. Having flexibility is key. Yeah, And if you cut the hour and a half commute, the

time there, the time home. If you're able to cut that commute out once once or twice a week, and then you can you know, hop into see your dentist and that's a quick hour appointment, but you made it up because you're not commuting. It's things like that that

are really nice. Or you know flex days where let's say you're able to work a little bit longer on another day of the week while you're in the office, it might help you avoid traffic two and then give you more flexi the next day to work a little bit less so you can factor in a doctor's appointment and not have to take a full day off of work. So if an employer can be flexible, if you can work with your employer to add some flexibility to your

work schedule that can really benefit both of you. Yeah, it's huge, man, I don't know how many we're at the age now where we've got friends with kids and the kids stuff and stuff is just uh, it's becoming a thing, you know, Like we're like our schedules. We're starting to plan our years around like the school schedule,

which is kind of crazy. But more and more we hear parents talking about like how those flex days are so clutch, being able to kick off a little bit early in order to go pick somebody up, or go to an event, go to parent teacher conference. I don't know, like all these things that we're about to learn firsthand. Yeah, and so we should talk about too, like the employer and how the employers can work on answering this question. And if you are not an employer, you're just an

employee listening. I think this is an important section for you too, because it kind of helps you to know how to approach your employer when it comes to asking some of these questions and trying to increase some of the flexibility that's in your schedule so that you can

cut your commute time and your commute costs. Yeah, this is your AMMO, right, because if your employer doesn't really see how this is going to affect their bottom line, they're not necessarily gonna be for They're gonna think, oh, this is just some sort of gimmick. You know, this is what all the kids are asking for these days. Maybe we'll do it. Maybe not. This is a ploy for Jimmy to knock off early and go play some disc golf or something like that. By Jimmy you mean Joel,

I mean myself. You can't just create an avatar for yourself and only change the last three letters of your name. Dude, he has like all the same hobbies that you do, but Jimmy wants to go to this Jimmy wants to play some nerdy board games tonight. Um. Yeah, I mean it's important for them to realize how that's gonna affect their business. Right. If you work for a smart, successful employer, that's what they're going to want to see. That's that they want to see how that's going to affect the

bottom line, the bottom dollar. Yeah. I think ultimately workers appreciate flexibility and being treated like adults. And one of the biggest things that does for you as an employer to treat your employees as adults, like they know how to make their own decisions. And part of that comes out of the hiring process, right making sure you know the people that you're hiring and you trust them to do a good job. You trust them not to take

advantage of the rules. But if you do treat your employees with that sort of care and intention, it'll breed loyalty. And what's one of the highest costs for employers. It's finding new talent and then training that talent and giving them a similar into the workplace. It's so much better to keep good talent that you have in your workforce.

And if they feel like they have that autonomy in that ability to create a flexible schedule and work hard for forty forty hours a week that they're tasked to do, but have the freedom to knock off early or start work early the next day if they had to leave early for a doctor's appointment or to see their kids soccer practice, that creates this amazing loyalty that keeps people in the company. You create a culture where people want

to stick around. Yeah. Man. Not only that, but having that autonomy, like you said, it kind of gives an employee like ownership of the work. And so not only do they are they just doing what they're being told to do, but they kind of feel like they are invested, you know, like this is like their company, this is

part of who they are. It starts to, like you said, like that culture, it starts to kind of seep into everything and it and if it's good culture that you wanted to seep into everything, it affects everything, and it it affects the work, the quality of the work, and the creativity. You can't beat it. Yeah, that's sort of mentality towards your employees is you're not just a worker. B You're a part of what makes this company work. Yeah,

You're part of the team yep. And and that has such an effect on what you're gonna get out of people, the mindset that they come into work with. Not that I have these tasks I need to accomplish, but I have this business in this brand and this culture that I want to be a part of and I want to build. And so as an employer, you're really really smart to think of your employees in this manner and

treat your employees like adults. To breed that loyalty. I mean, really it's kind of self serving, you know if you think about it, Like we're saying that these are things that are good for the employer, but like, yeah, do these things for your employees because it's gonna benefit you, like these things, like it all comes back to the employer. So and another solid, sort of tangible way that this

saves and benefits employers too is just space. Uh, there's less of a need for obviously cars, right, if you've got folks that are car pooling or taking alternative means, whether it be public transit, biking, walking, you don't need to pay for that extra two levels of the parking deck because you're eployees don't need it, And maybe some of your employees are riding a segue. I wouldn't recommend that,

but I wouldn't incentivize that. I'm just kidding. But I see more people on these like the bird scooters and the segways, and it's fine, but not my preferred method of transport. It's it's more for fun. It's like you want to go on a tour of the city, Yeah, your helmet pop on a segway? Why not? But yeah, so actually I have a personal example here of when it comes to a fewer parking spaces. So a couple of days of the week there have been more people working in the building that I work in, in the

parking garage gets full. And so Mike, I know, right, And so my company is considering adding onto the parking deck like building more and that just sounds like a really big expense, sounds really stupid. And I am literally the only person in my building that rides a bike to work, and that's fine, but I just I notice it that I'm literally the only bike in the parking lot. But I know that there are more people that live

close by that would consider car pulling. And I've said before in the show I've car pull with my coworkers sometimes, but mostly I bike. And so if my employer would offer an incentive instead of adding space to this parking garage, which is expensive, it's a lot of concrete, right, It's it's this big time thing. Creating small incentives for employees to bike or two car pool to work, I think would be so much better for not only their bottom line,

but the company culture as a whole. And I just think that there are better solutions to the problem that that we're facing in our building in particular and buildings around the country where workhorses are fully staffed right now, than adding more space or building more on a parking deck. Yeah, yeah, you gotta think that there's a more elegant solution, right, Like like hearing that makes me think of like the whole problem of like traffic, and so what do you do, Oh,

you just make the interstate wider. Let's build more rows. So we need, we need wider lanes, we need let's take it from a fourteen lane to a sixteen lane. That'll do it. Yes, certainly, that will allow there to be more space. No, it's a dumb solution, and I think it's just such a near sided thought process, you know, like let's let's take these drastic steps to create this structure,

and it's a major undertaking. It's gonna cost, yeah, like you said, a lot of money, and it's just, yeah, not a great solution, and not even just parking too. But I mean we've we've barely talked about actual office space. If you have all of your employees, they're under the same reef. Certainly there's times when that's called for and you need to get together as a team, brainstorm whatever.

But yeah, if you rarely have all of your employees together like that, think about how many fewer offices you would actually need to have least in order to house your staff. Yeah, I mean think about it logically, using a space from eight to five Monday through Friday, and that's the only time, but everyone's in at the same time.

It's just an inefficient use of space. And so you could do it better by creating alternating schedules, by allowing people to work from home on certain days and alternating those things so that people are all together sometimes, but that for the majority of the time people have flex work schedules. And again, I know this isn't a one size fits all solution. This doesn't work for ups drivers like we said, or or doctors or nurses or certain

other things. I mean, we'll talk about some steps that hopefully even doctors and nurses can take that they can do on their own. And I know that this doesn't necessarily work for all employers, but you know what, in our economy, with the kind of communication that we can have between each other, with email, texting, phone calling, slack, there's slack. Yeah, there's all these ways to communicate. We don't have to all be in the building at once.

There's video chat. I mean, it's amazing technology allows us, especially for doing things like this. It can really cut down the cost for employers. You know, another way that employers can cut down costs. No, tell me healthcare. So true, it's more of a traditional thing, right, the health care model that we have in the States where the employer pays for it. But regardless, it's widespread and it's it's

the model. It's it's it's how it currently is. And bottom line, if you have healthier employees, right, if you have employees that are biking and walking, they're more physically fit. If you have employees who are either car pulling or taking public transit, or and even working from home, they're less stressed because they're not dealing with the traffic, the rush to make sure they're they're on toime. I'm feeling like they're battling the other guy and the giant stuv

one lane over. Too often, stress sort of gets discounted, you know, like it's a real health issue, Like it's something that affects people. It affects their health, that affects how their bodies function. And if you're able to allow your employees to take care of their bodies, uh mentally, but and physically, you're certainly going to see a decrease in the expenses that go towards healthcare and you'll see your employees taking fewer sick days. So yeah, that's such

an outed benefit as well. Your workers will show up to work if they bike or walk or something like that and a little more jazz. Yeah, they're not going to drag in because they just came in on their bike. They're gonna be totally pumped. Yeah, that's one of the major benefits I've noticed when I started biking in was that when I get to work, I was in gear. Man, I was ready. You know, you're not like dragging in, like, oh,

Monday is am? I right? Yeah, let me get that cup of coffee and then I'll sit down and start typing. And you know, you sit down, you drink like a leader of water and then you're like, let's do this. Feel like I just drink a can of Surge or something like that. You know, I'm ready to go. And so I noticed the days I bike in, I'm better,

I'm better me I'm a better employee, better Jimmy exactly. So, yeah, it's the fewer sick days, and it's the increased energy level when you're at work, and on top of that, it's that building culture and loyalty. There's all these amazing parks for employers if they will only incentivize their employees and kind of create buy in on that level. I see a lot of benefits for companies that are willing to think outside the box and offer incentives to people

to to commute alternatively. Yeah. Man, I like how you said culture again too, because like, if I had a company with like a bunch of employees, like that's the kind of culture that I would be so excited to

try to create. I want to have a company where the culture of the employees it is about biking and like how fast they got there on their bike and how fit they are, versus like the car culture of like, oh yeah, I just got the latest so and so late model truck, But you know what, you gotta get it for the boat because you've also got that boat payment and your truck payment. And I don't worry, I'll have it paid off in eight years and citrated in

before then. And it almos sounds like hip right to say, Oh yeah, of course, Matt and jo All they're talking about bite culture and how cool that is. Well, like, it's not that it's just cooler, it's little. It's legitimately better if you want to be healthier and be less stressed. I feel like I can objectively say that it is better.

It's not like hip or cool, it's it's something that you will legitimately see a difference in your life and and those around you that you interact with when you're when you're making decisions that are not only benefiting yourself but also the company that you work for. Yeah, and just an example of talking about culture, our nation's culture and how we approach this stuff, our nation as a whole, Like we don't care about this stuff and it's such a bummer and we want to change that trend. Let's

do something about this, Matt, because it's ridiculous. And one example of that is the bicycle commuter benefit. It was a tax incentive that in this most recent legislation was cut by the Senate. And so there used to be employers were allowed to for a tax incentive to their employees for commuting to work, and it wasn't all that much.

I'm pretty sure it was like twenty bucks a month. Now, yeah, it was small, but it was to cover you know, a flat tire or a tune up or whatever you needed to do to your bike to kind of keep it in shape. And I will say this, my employer didn't even offer it when it was available, which not cool. Yeah, I take that, um but cut by the Senate, And that just goes to show that our culture as a whole doesn't care about alternative commuting options and isn't invested

in this. And so let's change that from the top down. Let's create a culture in general that says this matters. This is good for our bodies, and this is good for our lives. Yeah, man, And not only is it good for those things too, it's good for like the cities that we live in in general. If there are less individual cars on the road that are taking single individuals from home to work and then back again, the city as a whole is just gonna be more livable.

There's gonna be less congestion, people are gonna feel more comfortable walking on the sidewalks, and the city as a whole is just gonna be more comfortable and enjoyable place to live. And I think when we're in our steel boxes on the road with other people in their steel boxes, it makes it easier to see each other as not human, right, and will flip the bird or ride somebody's tail, whatever it takes. But it makes it a really unpleasant way

to live. If you're on your bike or your feet and you see people that you're passing or you have a close encounter, you're way more likely to respond kindly than you are in a steel box. There's something that just cars pit each other against each other. Yeah, man, it it just the humanizes everybody, yeah, man. And another perk is it helps local businesses when employees are working at a coffee shops or whatever, and so you save

money on commuting costs. But then guess what, walk down to your local coffee shop and enjoy a cafe ola or a latte or something like that. Right, And it sounds like you must have recently been to France. I just I love getting a coffee at a coffee shop. I rarely do it, but man, I'll tell you what. I had a uple morning meetings last week at coffee shop, and that coffee shop culture is so fun. It's so great. I love to drop three bucks and then get to

work from there. That day was absolute pleasure. And so I think, you know, a lot of personal finance people would say cut you have it, and while if that's something that you're spending too much money on, maybe yeah, maybe that's okay. Yeah, but if you're cutting out car commuting to work at your coffee shop with the free WiFi and uh and and the three dollar coffee, that's awesome.

I think it's great. And another thing, walking and biking means more small business visits and more meeting your neighbors. Like we said, you're out of the steel box where humans are pitted against each other reacting poorly, and you're interacting with the people around you. It's just such a

more wonderful experience. Yeah, I mean, you imagine you have a forty five minute commute, right, so an hour and a half say a day that you literally get to do nothing that really adds value to your life, maybe except for listening to awesome podcasts, uh subscribe, subscribe, But just imagine during the middle of the day, you're sitting there working and you know, you get out and go for a thirty minute walk or something like that, stretch out your legs, get the blood flow, and say, heyt

any neighbors. Yeah, Joe's totally good for the neighborhood. Um, and it helps toe when you're working from home, just

a little petty crimes. You know, we live in the city and there's just you know, like the Amazon package kind of getting grabbed like that sort of thing is kind of happen more and more when half your block works from home and they're all the home offices are in the front of the house and you're looking out on the street like half of our block is those guys don't really get away with that kind of stuff. You're able to keep an eye out and you've got

each other's back. Yeah, and ultimately it's better for our environment as a whole. Cities that are built more around bikes and walking paths usually public transit as well. Yeah, usually have more green space. And yeah, we haven't really talked about public transit, but that's another great way. Although that can be grueling too, at least you're able to read a book or do something productive and thoughtful while you're on your commute. Um, it's still good it's just

a different kind of good. But alternative commute options are good for your environment, taking a car off the road here and there. And the more we do that, you know, it's less pollution in our cities, it's less clogging of the freeways and incentivizes more walking paths and green spaces in our cities. Yea, and for people to want to come and visit, you know again, and then what are you doing. You're bringing in tourism. Like if all of a sudden your city is fostering this sort of environment,

this sort of growth. That's better for the local businesses and it's local, it's better for like tourism, folks are coming in and ultimately that's that's kind of good for you. Like how fun is it to have a place where you live and that you're proud of where people are coming to visit because they're because they say, oh, this is such a nice place. So I guess the question is when are we creating Matt Joel topia. I think that might be what people are saying right now. So, yeah,

we've talked through the benefits. I guess we can do it on some city. Oh did you play some city back in the day? Oh man, yeah, some city was it was awesome. Man. We had this off this off brand version as well, called a train. I never heard of it. Yeah, and we out there ever heard of a train? Hit me up? It was sort of like some city but less options. That was sort of focused on me on train. Feel like the trained nerds, I think, but simp Steve was the bomb is awesome. It was good.

And so a lot of this might seem sort of fire reaching, right. You might be thinking, oh, well, yeah, this is great to say and talk about, but how do you actually take the steps necessary in order to make this reality? And that's what we want to focus on next. Yeah, maybe you can't bend the iron will of your employer, but there are things that you can do in practicality to make changes in your life. And

let's first talk about what employers should do. I think they should incentivize these things, and things they might need to do is offer a safe storage place for bikes, and maybe some showers would be nice for really nice yeah right, taking a long, long, long commute and you don't want to freshen up before work, that'd be a great thing to offer. That being said, though, don't worry if you were a little bit sweaty. I feel like too much emphasis is placed on like everything being perfect.

You know, obviously, if you've got a sales job and you're constantly meeting with clients, yeah, you may not want to bike into work that day. But yeah, if you biked into work that day, get a little sweaty, keep some Diotora and at work maybe like another extra T

shirt or something like that, it'll be fine. Yeah. I was talking to a lady at the park the other day and she and her husband both biking to work, and they're both lawyers, and so I mean, if you think you can't do this, like I feel like that's an excuse, right, and you can do this. So for those people that makes me so happy, man, Like, those are the people we need to meet and spread the help spread the gospel of biking in even if you

have a fancy job. Another thing that employers can do is to offer a small amount of extra pay dedicated towards bike expenses. And so it's not this huge rays that you have to give your employees, but just that small amount of money in every paycheck ten dollars towards bike expenses, towards tires, and towards those tune ups like we talked about. That incentivizes employees to to make it happen. That will cut your costs in the long run as an employer, and it will create that culture that you're

looking for. Yeah, and a lot of companies do sometimes offer that incentive. And then not necessarily if you biked into work, but it's just as long as you didn't drive to work. And so I was actually talking to my buddy Tyler, and he works for a well known company called mail Chimp. But I thought to myself, I know that mail chimp's offering some sort of incentive because that's just the kind of company they are. They do

awesome stuff like that. And I checked in with them and sure enough, he was getting ninety bucks a month a month for not driving into work. That's amazing and then awesome. And so you can take that and you can put it towards running shoes if you're running in every morning, or or bike maintenance or public transit if if you need to put some of that money towards a leg of your trip where you need to take the bus. So I love that and maybe, yeah, I

thought that was awesome. Man, that's like, that's like chunk of money. You know, like you wouldn't have to rapidfire your car if if if you work for a company that was offering us pretty sweet incentive, right, that's true. I'm excited to hear your car wrapped up. It's gonna look good. So yeah, I think that that's a really cool thing for employers. And you know what, just maybe incentivize your employees to take alternative commuting options of the time.

Even that would cut down on a lot of expenses for you as an employer and would incentivize your employees to do something different, to get act I and to at least look into doing something different with their commute. Yeah. So those are steps that an employer could could potentially actively do right to make things a little more attractive for their employees. The first thing you, as an employee could do is just to ask to be able to work from home. That's something that may not necessarily be

in place already. There may not be a program. But if there's not a program, I guarantee you're not the only one thinking that, like, oh man, this would be fantastic for our company. And maybe you're the third person to ask your boss that week, and you're the tipping point and he or she is like, wow, that's I guess a lot of people are into this and I didn't know. And so maybe you're the tipping point that tips the scales into the company pursuing letting people work

from home more often. Yeah, this is sort of a nod back to a couple episodes ago. We talked about asking for a discount, right how it kind of works that muscle, and that's an easy thing to ask for. You're not asking for a raise, you're just asking for more flexibility. Yeah, this might seem ridiculous, but maybe it's time to look for a new job. If your employer is unwilling to bend, maybe you can find employment closer to where you are and with more flexible commute options.

Especially we're in a hot labor market right now. There are plenty of employers looking for skilled workers, and maybe it's a time for you to work closer to home than commuting becomes a whole lot easier. Yeah, something else I thought of too, Man, just you talking about the hot labor market continually. The story right now is that there isn't wage growth, and so what in another sweet way to be able to sort of entice in good talent,

good employees with these extra benefits. Because employers currently really aren't willing to increase wage rates, why not offer these sweet incentives, you know, like give employees that the flexibility, the options, or even incentivize a little bit here and there to be able to attract that talent, attract and keep those employees. Are and some of those things involved, right your employer saying yes or no. But there are some things that you can do without having to consult

your employer at all to change your commute. Yeah, yeah, So the first thing is just consider biking or walking to work or even taking public transit. These are things that you can really start doing tomorrow morning, and it doesn't require I mean, it requires some planning because you need to figure out your oute, like how to get there, how do I buy, how do I bike there? You need to figure out what bus or what train to take. But these are things that do not require any permission

from anybody. You can start doing it now, and it is the best way to cut down on costs. If you're not commuting every day by yourself in a car, you're foregoing all of these expenses that are associated with with with a car, and potentially you could even consider maybe even going without a car. You know how awesome would that be. Yeah, I challenge you to time your commute, use Google Maps and actually check out how long would it take if I walked? How long would it take

if I biked? And there was an article recently in The New York Times that said people vastly overestimate how long would take to walk or bike to work. And so you might say that would take me an hour and a half to bike to work, but it turns out it would only take you an hour, And well, how long is you're commute taking you minutes? At least do the math. At least do the research and figure out how long will biking or walking take you. You You might find out it's not as bad as you thought.

And in the end, you know what, you skip time going to the gym because yes, you're getting fit just on your commute. Yeah, you're getting fit and saving money at the same time when when in car pooling. That's another great option to consider. Talk to people in the office who might live close to you. If you don't know, maybe post something on the company Facebook page or messageboard or your neighborhood community group online or something like that too.

There might be you may not be the same company, but you might be going to like the same part of town, and you know what, getting from your neighborhood to the same midtown or downtown or something like that maybe a lot easier than you realize when you're car pooling, no doubt. So this could allow you to have one less car as a family if you alternate driving with your coworker, or maybe even if you're single, allow you to have no car at all if you pay for

the gas for your ride share mate. Yes, so car pooling can allow you to cut your car costs, your insurance costs, your gas costs, and possibly even allow you to have one less car as a family. And at the very least, it just keeps you from having to sit behind the wheel, you know, save you're alternating, like you could just you know, at the very least, not have to drive every single day. You can just swap

take it easy for half of the time. And the last thing, a more drastic measure, can you find a job closer to where you live, or maybe move closer to where you work. I think those are you know, bigger things. But let's say your leases up in two months, or you just really getting fed up with the commute that you're currently in. There are changes that you can make, and they're bigger, harder changes to make, but that doesn't

make them not feasible. So if you have a twenty five mile commute each way right now, consider whether you can do one of those things, either finding a job that's closer to where you currently live or moving closer

to where you currently work. If you can do that, it might even be worth an increased amount of rent or uh slightly higher mortgage payment if it changes your lifestyle, adds more hours back into your life every day and allows you to commute alternatively and cut down on your car costs, and you know what, clear your head and get more fit at the same time by commuting via bike or walking or public ends. It you'd be able to pay a little bit more for something that wasn't

literally killing me every day. Right. Yeah, So much of this is costing you money and is hurting your body all the sitting that we're doing. But then on top of that, it's cramping your lifestyle and it's sucking your time and your time is so valuable. I just can't imagine commuting every day for that long of a period of time. And that's why I think one of the important things to do is to kind of write down how much this is actually costing you when it comes

to your car, when it comes to your time. That might give you the kick in the pants you need to ask your employer for something, or to even make a drastic change like moving or finding new employment. All right, Joel, back to this lovely delicious beer. I gotta tell you, I don't have much else to say. I mean, it's perfect. Yeah,

it really is good in a blind taste. Ut Like if I put this next to some like thirty dollar bombers from some of the best sour Flanders red guys out there as today making them, I think this one would crush man. Now, I know, it's so stink and good. And we felt that way about a lot of the beers he's made. And uh, and he's made um of the best doubts I've ever had in my life. Yeah, this is like his magnum opus. Yeah, this is like

his love letter to my heart. I think this beer right here, it's it's actually the splinter in my mind. That's what it's called. It's again, this is a splinter in the mind by Little Cottage Brewery, Little Cottage Brewery, and it's an American sour specifically though it's a his interpretation of a Flanders red. And I will say, if you ever get your hands on this, which you won't, you'll never ever get to taste this. But if you did, it's delicious and you should pick one up. But you

never will get to try this beer because it's it's homebrew. Sorry, all right, Matt, let's wrap it up. Also, the solution to traditional car commuting to work are a number of things, but we're looking at We're talking about biking, we're talking about walking, public transit, car poling, and working from home. So it benefits employees because it's less stressful when you don't have to commute in every day, When you don't have to drive in every day to work, you're less

stressed and you're happier. Yeah, Matt, you know, I'm down with saving money. And it lowers your transportation costs as well, which is huge. Yeah, And having more of that personal flexibility, man, that is such a big selling point for millennials and for young families as well to have kids that need

that flexibility. Yeah, and you know what, employers see a huge benefit to first off, flexibility and incentives to commute alternatively, attract better employees and create ultimately a better culture and more loyalty from the employees you currently have and hiring and firing that's such a huge cost associated with employees.

Another way that employers are able to save in general when you've got alternative commuting options is you're gonna be able to lower the healthcare costs that you spend on your employees. And there are other costs that you can lower as an employer as well, like money spent on parking spaces and workspace. In general, when you offer increased flexibility and commuting alternatives and also benefits employees and benefits the employer, it also benefits your city as a whole.

The less individual car traffic that there is, the more livable, the more one full of your CD is going to be and and ultimately that's what we all want in in the place that we live and work. Yeah, so what do you do next, Well, you take action, You do something. The first thing you can do is to ask your boss, ask your employer. If you can work from home, maybe it starts off at one day a week,

but that's at least a good place to start. But if you don't have the option to work from home, consider some of the alternatives like walking or biking public transit, and even if those may not work for you, at the very least you can try card pooling. Yeah. And ultimately, a lot of this comes down to creating a better lifestyle for yourself, not even just saving money and hitting the nuclear option like finding a job closer to where you live or moving closer to where you work, can

be the ultimate best solution for fixing your commuting problems. Yeah, Because while it might seem like the nuclear option, right, it seems like such a huge thing to do. In reality, if you're reprioritizing your life and focusing on what's actually important, it might be a lot easier for you to shift things around. Yeah. And it's way better than an hour and a half in a car every day, five days a week, just to get back and forth to work. Yeah. Yeah, man,

that's a good word. Hopefully your listeners are able to at least take one thing from this. There's a lot of options that we presented in a lot of benefits and hopefully that gave you, guys some AMMO, some some information to be able to say either go to your employer with or at least the very least to encourage yourself to consider some of these options to the hard task, the drudgery of of commuting to work by yourself every

single day. All right, everyone, thanks for listening, And if you are listening in your car right now, thank you for listening. You know, Joel, you don't have to be driving your car to listen to podcast too. You can be on public trains. It right, we're taking a walk into your neighborhood. Our home on the web is how to money dot com. We'll have show notes up there for you. Yeah, if you like what you hear, let us know, please review and subscribe anywhere you listen to podcast.

It really helps us out and helps more people find out about the show. So cheers, Matt. Cheers. Best Friends Out Man, Best Friends Out.