Factors that Go into Making up a Given Household Budget Research Paper

Factors that Go into Making up a Given Household Budget - Research Paper Example Households in variety of living situations and geographical areas were considered in order to properly represent different types of consumers and budgets. The data for household expenses as measured by housing tenure and area type was focused upon. This data reflected the annual expenses of consumers who owned and rented in a variety of contexts, as well as those who dwelled in urban, suburban, and rural community settings. The number of relevant variables which go into determining total household expenditures was defined down to the lowest number possible while still affording strong predictive accuracy. Because healthcare expenses are a primary focus of recent public debate, it was decided that healthcare dollars spent would constitute at least one of the primary independent variables. Two others were chosen, the amount of money expended on gasoline and the amount of money expended on alcohol. The general feeling was that gas expenses impact other costs such as food in a roughly correlative fashion, and that alcohol served as a proxy for expendable income that was believed to be a stronger measure than other alternative factors such as entertainment. This is because it is more pervasive in the various community types considered. (There may be few entertainment options, for example, available in some rural communities, but alcohol will be available everywhere.) Given these three independent variables, it was expected that one could quickly predict the amount of household money available for expenses. One important note: it may be asked why housing expenses were not taken into account. It was felt that with the current difficulties in the housing market, the turbulence in using such a measure may not yield fully predictive results. The expenses in gas, alcohol, and healthcare were believed to be more stable measures of household expenses at present; therefore, they were the variables chosen to predict overall household budgets. Ultimately upon determining a useful estimate of overall family budgets, the researchers will offer conclusions regarding the basic importance of each variable to family budgeting and suggest directions for pricing considerations. Descriptive statistics Table 1 presents the descriptive findings. As can be seen from a review of the table, there were a variety of family budget levels in the survey, ranging from a low of less than $34,000 for renters to a high of almost $65,000 for owners with mortgages, and a low of just over $41,000 for rural consumers to a high of over $52,000 for urban/suburban. The range of expenses concerning the independent variables varied considerably depending on housing situation and the community type. Interestingly, it appeared that rural and inner city communities sometimes varied with urban/suburban communities and sometimes went in the opposite direction For example, the inner city correlated roughly with urban/suburban consumners regarding alcohol consumption while it varied on healthcare, and the rural