If you wear glasses, you could get LASIK surgery. (I haven’t done this.) According to these speculative calculations, the cost per hour of time saved is somewhere between less than zero (not having to get new glasses saves you money) and $55. But you can get the benefits only once, unfortunately.
Discount rate: 10%
Financial cost of glasses
cost of a pair of glasses each year: $15–$400
addional cost for updating prescription yearly: $50 (?)
total: $65–$450/year (PV ~ $650–$4500)
Time cost of glasses
putting on and taking off glasses: 20s/day
cleaning glasses: 20s/day
looking for misplaced glasses: 20s/day
updating prescription, shopping for glasses, ordering: 3 hours/year
total: 9 hours/year (PV ~ 90 hours)
Financial cost of LASIK
cost of LASIK surgery and follow-up appointments: $2,000–$5,000
Time cost of LASIK
scheduling, filling out paperwork, counseling, travel, etc. (pre-surgery): 3 hours
surgery: .5 hours
four checkups at 1.5 hours/checkup (including transit time)
Not wearing glasses have huge social signaling benefits & people somehow treat me nicer & listen to me more. As usual this is based on my perceptions and may be placebo effect.
If you about break even per-hour, you should definitely get it
If you wear glasses, you could get LASIK surgery. (I haven’t done this.) According to these speculative calculations, the cost per hour of time saved is somewhere between less than zero (not having to get new glasses saves you money) and $55. But you can get the benefits only once, unfortunately.
Discount rate: 10%
Financial cost of glasses
cost of a pair of glasses each year: $15–$400
addional cost for updating prescription yearly: $50 (?)
total: $65–$450/year (PV ~ $650–$4500)
Time cost of glasses
putting on and taking off glasses: 20s/day
cleaning glasses: 20s/day
looking for misplaced glasses: 20s/day
updating prescription, shopping for glasses, ordering: 3 hours/year
total: 9 hours/year (PV ~ 90 hours)
Financial cost of LASIK
cost of LASIK surgery and follow-up appointments: $2,000–$5,000
Time cost of LASIK
scheduling, filling out paperwork, counseling, travel, etc. (pre-surgery): 3 hours
surgery: .5 hours
four checkups at 1.5 hours/checkup (including transit time)
total: 9.5 hours (PV ~ 9.5 hours)
total: $2,000–$5,000
net financial cost: -$2,500 to $4,350
net time savings: ~80 hours
per-hour cost: negative to ~$55/hour
Got it. WORTH.
Not wearing glasses have huge social signaling benefits & people somehow treat me nicer & listen to me more. As usual this is based on my perceptions and may be placebo effect.
If you about break even per-hour, you should definitely get it