<p>In trying to figure out the monthly "allowance" for our kid next year, I thought I'd gather some stats from current students. Leave out food expenses for now (some dorms will have required food plans, some have kitchens and hence a different cost for eating).</p>
<p>What would you say you spend each month on snacks, entertainment, books, transportation, etc.? I know this will vary wildly, but some bounds would be helpful. Thanks!</p>
<p>There actually isn't a "required" food plan, unless you mean that some dorms have dining halls, and hence money will probably be spent on already-prepared food rather than cooking.</p>
<p>I probably spend about $40 a month on entertainment, given that I go out to the movies once or twice a month (and pay for the boyfriend as well). Class texts are a once-a-term expense of about $200-$250 (if you shop online rather than paying the Coop prices). Transportation is cheap, maybe $10-20/month if you travel on the T. Every once in a while I go on a shopping binge and spend a lot of money, but otherwise I can definitely live on less than $20 a week on average, excluding food.</p>
<p>My biggest expense is definitely food, both in TechCash form (which my parents pay for) and also out of my own pocket (ordering food and also going to the grocery store).</p>
<p>Mootmom, 10k/mo should do it.</p>
<p>(Greg, if she falls for it, I want a commission.)</p>
<p>Thanks, Ben, I'll use that as my upper bound, k? </p>
<p>About "food plans": molliebatmit, I heard some of the dorm guides at CPW mentioning that there was some per-semester required charge for a minimum food service card, or something like that: some sort of "pay $x and get $2X worth of food" or something -- I don't remember the exact number. But it was designed to ensure that you spent at least some portion of your eating in the dining hall there, I think. (Baker might have been one of the places I remember hearing this.) Did I misunderstand? Is there anything y'all would consider a "food plan", required or otherwise?</p>
<p>the meal plan works in the following way: if you live in Baker, McCormick, Simmons, or Next, then you pay a $200 fee at the beginning of the term (mandatory) and all the food you purchase in the dining hall is half the listed price. If you live in any of the other dorms, then this is an optional plan.</p>
<p>Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot that's been instituted at the dining hall dorms. Is it only required freshman year? I thought I heard that somewhere.</p>
<p>no, i think it's for as long as you live there.</p>
<p>i'm poor, so i don't buy books (maybe 1 or 2/term, if they're in the $50 range) and i walk most places i want to be, tho soon i'll fix my bike and that'll be grand. i've been spending marginally more on entertainment than i used to, for various reasons, so that averages to around $30/mo? i don't keep a real good handle on numbers; if i need it, i buy it, and it works out, since i work enough to pay off my credit card, my food, my techcash (laundry), and my housing bill. <em>shrug</em></p>
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if i need it, i buy it, and it works out, since i work enough to pay off my credit card, my food, my techcash (laundry), and my housing bill. <em>shrug</em>
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<p>Yeah, I've had a job ever since I've been at MIT (worked in a library freshman year, then UROPed sophomore year and this year). I think it's good not only because I have spending money in my pocket, but also because it's forced me to have good time-management skills.</p>
<p>I wouldn't want my parents to have to pay for my pocket money anyway... they pay enough already for tuition.</p>
<p>Less than $200 per month. That incudes groceries (he cooks most of his meals), laundry, any restaurant meals and entertainment. However, he says he's not typical and that's probably true. He's never been one to spend much money. Says he spent about $400 total for textbooks freshman year.</p>
<p>goddess32585, can you actually do well without having textbooks? Do you actually need textbooks?</p>
<p>hehehehehehe
reasons for needing a textbook around: it supplements the lecture notes, it contains derivations too lengthy to do out in class, it have problems assigned on the pset, you don't go to lecture so you need to find the material somewhere, you're ocd and study too much so you need more things to study than just the lecture notes and your own notes.</p>
<p>ways to have a text without buying it: borrow it for a term from an upperclassman (if they don't want it, they'll often sell it for quite cheap too), snag it off reuse sometime, have a friend who really likes and can afford buying books and borrow from them for a weekend (to read; you're already doing psets together, right?), get them from the library.</p>
<p>in my case, i have enough classes that actually consistently hand out coherent lecture notes and don't rely on the texts for much of anything (one class this term had >10 books, recommended, and the prof said "no, don't buy these, just check them out sometime and if you find one of them particularly useful, buy it for yourself, but none of them are truly excellent enough for me to require them.") also, i don't care particularly much about having my own and obsessively tracing derivations and such. so i get by using friends' books, and buying the one book that has problems assigned out of it, b/c it's pretty cheap. figure out which of the above reasons applies to you, and which methods you find convenient, and that'll tell you whether you want to buy books.</p>
<p>note: i have pretty ****ty grades, but i'm pretty sure that's unrelated to my not buying texts. possibly they're both effects of me being a lazy bum. to counter, the guy across the hall also never buys books (he goes the library route) and has damn good grades, and is on his way to grad school. he's also physics, tho; it'd be cool if someone would point out that some other majors, you really can't get by without getting the book yourself.</p>
<p>Well, a lot of upper-level biology tests are open-book. Hence one would be fabulously screwed if one were not in posession of said book. But generally you know which classes those are, so you can buy the books for them, and not the ones for which you don't need the book.</p>
<p>In other majors (such as course 9), the profs don't even bother to assign books for the class.</p>