RE: Hive PPP Index — Life is EXPENSIVE! (an Inquiry by @livinguktaiwan)
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Thanks so much for this @denmarkguy, especially doing all the conversions.
The mobile definitely stands out above the rest. What I can't understand is, if people have WiFi at home and work, do they still need unlimited data on their phone? I guess I'm thinking about myself as I'm home most of the time and 5Gb is more than enough for me when I'm out and about. If that also applies to American, then wouldn't getting 2 x 5 GB at $48 work out a lot cheaper than the $126.73 unlimited plan? Just curious 😄
We used to be stuck in the old miles/gallon/pound/pint world as well, but being near Europe we're gradually moving over to the metric system. Beer is still sold by the pint, it's very ingrained in the culture, as is milk, we produce it all ourselves. And a lot of the older generation still measure our weight in stones! Heard of that one before?
1 stone = 14 pounds 😁
Hi @livinguktaiwan, thanks for stopping by!
Yes, I know what a stone is! My late stepfather was English, and I spent three years at boarding school in the UK (5th, L6th and U6th forms) to finish off my lower education. Of course, that was a long time ago (late 1970's) and I know things have changed a lot since then!
As for the phone plan thing, I would speculate there are several reasons. For one, public wifi is not nearly as widespread in the States as in Europe, and a lot of ostensibly *"public" wifi is usually behind some kind of paywall. Many folks end up using their phones to create mobile hotspots so they can work on their laptops during lunch or other times away from their offices. Also, the sheer size of the country and lack of public transportation is often overlooked. Many people spend upwards of 90 minutes in their cars each way every day, and stream music and news on their phones while commuting.
Looking at our monthly data usage (from our Internet bill), we use in the range of 800-1500GB per month, all told.
It used to be a lot less when we had something called the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) which was available to people below a certain income level, but the government subsidy funding for it was lost in April of 2024, and our Internet+phone went from about $77/month to the current $260-ish, as a result.