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A La Carte (4/29)
- 04/29/09
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How Much is Watching TV Costing You? "To put it into perspective, if you watch an average of 31.5 hours of TV each week (which the average person in the US does) and you value your time at minimum wage of $5.85 an hour, you are spending nearly $800 a month ($798.53) to watch TV. That comes to nearly $10,000 ($9582.30) a year."
An Interview at Gospel Coalition Dr. David Murray of Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary took a few minutes recording this video interview with me at the Gospel Coalition Conference. Like Father, I Pray Like Son Patrick Schreiner, son of theologian Tom Schreiner, shares a tribute to his father. "I want to encourage imitation of my Dad by telling three stories. I could praise him for his knowledge of Greek, or his numerous books, or his pastoral heart, or his hospitality, but I want to focus on things that few people know. I want to focus on the things that happened after he came home from work. The things that are done at home, these things make men who they are. " A Pro-Life Pastor Chooses Jail Z shares the story of a pastor who, by all accounts, was unfairly accused and convicted of a crime and who chose to serve time in jail. "On Feb. 19, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Stuart Hing sentenced Walter Hoye, a Missionary Baptist minister, to 30 days in jail after Hoye refused a plea deal that included three years' probation, a small fine, and an order that he stay at least 100 yards away from Family Planning Specialists, an Oakland abortion clinic." Inside a BSL-4 Lab Popular Mechanics has an article about what you'd find inside a Biosafety Level 4 Lab (where they study the most contagious diseases and viruses in the world). Banner of Truth Ministers' Conference The annual Banner of Truth Ministers' is coming up. Registration increases in just a few days, so if you are going to go, register now. Speakers include Sinclair Ferguson, Alistair Begg, Walter Chantry and others.
Published in 2008, this book
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This review of the bestselling
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Comments (4)
Interesting perspective on how much TV costs you, although I'd recommend reading the comments too as several people rightly point out the danger of quantifying your leisure time by how much you value your professional time.
I've had the pleasure of sharing a meal with Pastor Hoye, and I can tell you that he is of a most gentle and kindhearted demeanor and presentation. He had no unkind words for those who were wrongly persecuting him. His life has been a great testimony to my high school students as I have shared about the story of his pro-life commitments. I would encourage all your readers to check out his website, www.issues4life.org and to watch some of his stuff on youtube. Just enter his name.
I'm all for persuading people that there are better things to do with their time than TV, but the economic calculation doesn't make sense. If you weren't watching TV, you wouldn't be earning your hourly wage, you'd be doing something else non-economic. You might even be doing something that uses up things you've worked for! Taking up a hobby usually costs some amount of money, but that's not an argument in favor of watching TV instead.
It's a common mistake to judge the worth of one's non-working time based on one's wages. It's just as much of a mistake to claim that time consuming but frugal practices (e.g. hanging out laundry) "aren't worth your time" as to claim that an hour reading a book, or watching TV, or playing with your kids, or cleaning your house "costs" you your hourly wage, unless you were considering doing it in lieu of working more hours at a job, which is generally not the case when people make this argument. There's nobody out there offering you your hourly wage not to hang out laundry, or watch TV, or serve your neighbors. If what you're doing doesn't detract from your ability to earn or save in some other way, it doesn't "cost" you in dollars. It's the wrong argument to make.
Hoyt was duly convicted by a jury of violating a law that protects women from being harassed outside health clinics by anti-abortion protestors. The judge gave him a choice at sentencing and he chose jail. Doesn't virtually every convict claim that they're innocent? A judge and jury found otherwise.