Decision: Car or Education?
In 2005, I had a big decision to make. I had saved up a decent amount of money with my consulting business, and my current car was just about out of warranty. So should I spend my savings on a new BMW , or going back to school ? Now, in theory, the "smart" choice was obvious. Pros for Car: Fun! Flashy! Cons for Car: Expensive. High depreciation. Pros for Education: Knowledge = Power! Cons for Education: Hard work. So I went ahead and took a year off doing a full-time MBA program at Wilfrid Laurier . It's nearly five years later. Did I make the right decision? From a financial standpoint, it's not entirely clear. Let's say, to make it simple, my savings were $100 . Ignoring inflation, the car would have been worth about $40 today, whereas the education money is completely gone = $0 . Also, had I bought the car, I would have earned my regular income that year (let's say $100 again) instead of the reduced amount while taking full-ti