The Road to Poverty

The day is drawing near. The day I've longed for ever since my tongue first learned how to contort itself so it could spit out the word "car". I will soon be legally allowed to drive a car by myself. A quick trip around the block with a driving inspector is all that remains between me and the realisation of a life-long fantasy. Perhaps that should be a 'brief' trip around the block.

I should be excited. Bouncing-off-the-walls wetting-myself excited. I should be kept awake at night dreaming about it. But strangely, I'm not. The one thing keeping me awake at night is the thought that I will shortly be a homeless and starving tramp.

Let me explain. When you are young, with your first job, you are expected to be sensible and prudent and to save your earnings. After all, "you never know when you'll need it" and "it's good to have it there". And on the whole, I have tried to do this.

But because he is neither sensible nor prudent, John, generally speaking, has not. He - shall we say - rather likes diecast model cars, so he - as he likes to say - 'invests' quite a lot in them. Despite reminders that he must grow up and start saving for one he can actually drive. Quite naïve, particularly the first bit.

Naturally, he has a comeback - something along the lines of his cars being significantly cheaper, but that's mostly just a simplistic attempt at getting off the hook. Like most of his rebuttals really.

Recently, however, it has slowly dawned on me just how profound his statement is. Accidents do happen from time to time I suppose.

Cars are expensive things at the best of times; in fact, probably one of the biggest true investments you'll ever make in life. So when you've finished stacking cans of Heinz beans at the grocery store and rock up to the local second-hand car dealership clutching a plastic wallet you got from a Christmas cracker, it's not very long before you're left weeping in a corner. Just about all of what has been so preciously guarded in your bank account suddenly has to go away, then and there.

And that's the cheap bit. Paying to then drive the car is really what gets you. If the car was the camel, all the other expenses on top of it would be a paddock of hay bales.

This is the real reason why so many young people are homeless

This is the real reason why so many young people are homeless

First, there is the driving test, which costs around $200, and a good deal more if you don't have your own car. If you fail this test - which you will, because they will make sure you will - you have to pay it all over again.

Once you have passed, you are entitled to a Provisional licence, another $200. But on its own that's just a useless credential, because your car must also be registered, which is the government's way of saying, "Give us $1,000 every year and we'll let you drive on the road".

Now you must insure the car, in the event you decide to use it as a machete. And because you are a P-plater, you are statistically more like to do just that. Your ilk are often prone to thinking that the "P" stands for "Professional".

And as we know, insurance companies avoid spending money on anything other than lawsuits that get them out of spending money, so naturally, this means that your premiums will be substantially higher than those of the average older and more-experienced driver. Which is just not fair - those with the lowest-paid jobs are charged the most.

And that's not even the end. Just as you drive off for the first time in your very own car, hooting into the air with joy, you realise that your petrol tank is nearing empty. Your hooting quickly turns to howling, because this means you must stop and fill up on fuel, which would be cheaper if it were the waters of eternal youth. And in a week's time, you will have to do it again.

Oh, and the car will require a service every six months. And a new battery and new tyres every few years.

With all this, it's amazing anyone even bothers driving. Or that anyone can possibly afford to do anything else. Why don't we all just keep our money and catch the bus.

Except that's exactly what the government wants us to do. They know people will stomach the thought of sitting in their beloved discarded-food trolleys from the infectious diseases ward and next to a man who forgot he had armpits that morning, so long as it means they don't have to scrape the bottom of their piggy bank every time they just want to get to work.

There are times in everyone's lives, however, when this doesn't work, when you just need a car. When it's three in the morning and your wife is having contractions, say. Well, you'll be relieved to learn that the government has thought of this too.

And this is the real reason why cars are so expensive

And this is the real reason why cars are so expensive

They realise all too well that attempting to live life without a car on the scene is like walking through the mall with no trousers on. The deficiency is painfully obvious and inconvenient. This means they can make the trousers as expensive as they like, because the people will still have to buy them. A necessity is to be seen as an opportunity to make money.

What it all really boils down to is a concerted attack on the motorist from the rosy-tinted left. Rich people shouldn't be the only ones who can afford to drive a car. So, Minister Mao says, "We'll make the rich poor. And then put them all together in a tram. What an equal society we'll have then!"

Except they won't. Because this is socialist thinking, and socialist thinking has never worked the miracle cure it's supposed to. I know someone who works at a bakery twice a week, and yes, she's putting off getting her licence due to the sheer towering cost of it all, but because her family lives beyond the city's limits and consequently, the reach of the sacred buses, this just means that her father must drive her. In his Audi.

I haven't let imminent poverty get in the way of my starting on the road to motoring. I already have a Learner licence and have been diligently practicing for close to two years now. But part of me wants to keep it this way. L plates do limit my driving to only when someone is with me in the passenger seat, but the upside is that I pay virtually nothing at all. Not the best arrangement, but not at all far off.

But all good things must come to an end. The licence is nearing its expiry date, which means the joys and sorrows of car ownership are just around the corner for me. Don't get me wrong, I'm desperate to start driving. But if I'm honest, I'm a bit less desperate to sell all my organs so I can start driving.

Nevertheless, I and my bank balance must soon take the plunge. Even it kills both of us.

Picture credits: Caradisiac.com; Immortal Car Blog; Wikimedia Commons

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