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CNN Live Saturday
Dollar Signs
Aired June 14, 2003 - 16:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: In our "Dollar Signs" segment today, a story which could impact every cell phone user in America. A federal court has ruled consumers should be allowed to keep their cell phone numbers when they switch service providers. Chris Murray is with the Legislative Council for the Consumers Union in Washington. He joins me now to talk a little bit more about this ruling. All right, Chris, so how does it go? This will benefit just about every cell phone user. Why?
CHRIS MURRAY, CONSUMERS UNION: I think that's exactly right. When consumers are able to take their cell phone numbers with them, they can shop on price and quality of service, rather than just being held hostage to a company because they've got your cell phone number.
WHITFIELD: So meaning you could even move to another area as well, and it really does benefit those who, perhaps, own a business?
MURRAY: That's exactly right.
WHITFIELD: ... and use that cell phone number for their business.
MURRAY: It helps to make the market more competitive, because if you're a business user, as you said, it's very difficult to imagine who is the entire universe of people that might have your number. So this allows us to reduce some of the switching costs, and it's economics 101.
WHITFIELD: Now, why has this come about? What was the impetus for this decision?
MURRAY: Well, in 1997, the Federal Communications Commission decided that we were going to do this, we are going to allow consumers to take their numbers with them, both wireless to wireless as well as land line to wireless in order to make markets more competitive. The cellular industry has fought for delay after delay after delay. This is since 1999, consumers were supposed to have portability. And here we are in 2003, potentially contemplating one more delay. The Senate is going to take a vote on Thursday that may set up another obstacle to consumers getting this on November 24.
WHITFIELD: Are there any real potential disadvantages to this kind of portability?
MURRAY: Not as far as we can think of. The best argument that the cellular industry has come up with is that it costs, and that is true. There is a cost to doing number portability. But we've already spent most of that money. So at this point, the remaining costs to the cellular industry is the costs of additional competition.
Now that may erode their profit margins, but for you and me, as consumers, that mean a dollar in my pocket and not theirs.
WHITFIELD: Now, Chris, we did try to invite some members of the cell phone industry and their trade association to be on our program today. They declined. But Tom Wheeler, president of the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association, did give us this statement. And here it is, as follows. Quote -- "We are disappointed in the court's decision. This decision increases the pressure on the FCC to do what they have yet to do, define the implementation of number portability. There are only 24 weeks between now and the portability deadline, but the basic how-tos are yet to be addressed. If there is to be number portability in November, the FCC must announce final rules by Labor Day, or consumers will find chaos in the market."
Well, what's your reaction to that statement?
MURRAY: I'm not sure what chaos in the market he's talking about. I think that is the additional competition that we're going to get by reducing switching costs, as I said before.
It's not clear to me what details are yet to be worked out. The framework is basically there. We're happy to work with industry to resolve any questions they've got about how to implement this. But the fact of the matter is, they've known since 1999 that this was supposed to be in place. And the last 12-month delay that we gave them, last November 24, was predicated on the notion that, you know, maybe with E911 and some new services we want to offer consumers, we need to work out some technical difficulties.
Well, they've had a year to work those out, and instead of actually just getting down to brass tacks and getting this done efficiently and at as low a cost as possible, they've been noodling around with their lobbyists in Congress, fighting for a delay after delay after delay.
WHITFIELD: So, Chris, we were hoping that this might elicit a response via e-mail and telephone, and it has. We've got Jim on the phone from Los Angeles. And Jim, what is your question or comment?
CALLER: I've got two questions. The first is, are the cellular phone companies able to charge a tariff or a fee for this number portability? We were told by our wireless company that they're going to start charging us $1.99, which upset me for that. And I don't know if that's right or not. And then the second -- go ahead.
WHITFIELD: Chris, why don't you go ahead and answer that first question, and Jim, hold off for a second.
MURRAY: Sure. I think the answer is that, yes, they are able to levy a charge on portability. And as a matter of fact, I think a number of carriers are already doing so. Now, we should remember, we've already paid for most of the costs of portability. That happened last year, November 24, when they implemented something called number pooling. So what's left now, the big cost is going to be the costs of additional competition. And I think that $1.99 is probably a little on the fat side for what that should cost.
WHITFIELD: Jim, what's your second question?
CALLER: Second question is that the phones that we all have, if we want to take our number and go to a different company, our phones more than likely aren't going to be compatible with the next company we go to. And I'm wondering if there's any changes as far as the gains that these phone companies play? In other words, they give you the phone and they lock you in a contract. And then when you try and leave them, because you're not happy with the service, and since you can take your number, you're more apt to go to a company who might work for you, but you're held, again, hostage by this phone.
MURRAY: That's exactly right. There's three main switching costs that we've got as consumers. One is number portability. We can't take our numbers with us. Number two is just the big hefty early termination penalties that we pay. It's about $200 with most carriers. And the third, as you mentioned, is handset portability. Even if the technical standards are the same on a network that you want to go to, in a lot of cases for business reasons, carriers have decided they don't want to make it easier for consumers to leave. So you can't take your handsets with you.
We'd like to work with Congress and the Federal Communications Commission to get all of those switching costs reduced. And I think that handset portability is really within reach.
WHITFIELD: All right. Jim in Los Angeles, thanks very much. And Chris Murray from the Legislative Council for Consumers Union, thank you very much for joining us as well.
MURRAY: Thank you kindly for having me.
WHITFIELD: All right. Appreciate it.
Well, is a new high-tech cell phone on your wish list? Up next, cell phones and gadgets. We'll show you what your choices are from cameras to tuneful rings to games to voicemail. The options are endless. And of course, you can still e-mail us at dollarsigns@cnn.com. We want to hear from you, or you can call in. That number is 1-800-807-2620. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Welcome back to "Dollar Signs." We're talking about cell phones and consumer options, from tuneful rings to games to voicemail, cell phone users have a lot of choices. And some of you can get into a lot of trouble because of that. General Motors is just one of the companies that has banned its employees from using cell phones with those built-in cameras. They say they're worried about keeping their product lines under wraps. Any employee caught using a phone with a camera can be fired.
So do we really need all of these gadgets?
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: ... keeps an eye on the latest gadgets in our San Francisco area for Cnet.com.
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: ... argue, yes, they need a lot of those gadgets...
(AUDIO/VIDEO GAP)
JONI BLECHER, CNET.COM: ... with cell phones is because of the digital networks, and they tend to do better with...
(AUDIO GAP)
BLECHER: ... before all these digital networks came out. So it's not the best call quality, but it tends not to interfere with hearing impaired capabilities.
WHITFIELD: OK. Another e-mail comes to us from Robert in Atlanta. And he writes -- "What is the best maker for cell phone signals? Which company is best overall in coverage?" Perhaps this is kind of the question that I was asking
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: .. really promote that there may be one cell phone maker that's better than the others?
BLECHER: Well, that's a very tricky question, because call quality and service and, you know, getting the best coverage really depends on where you live and how those towers are deployed. So it varies from place to place to place. And typically, what I tell people to do is to ask their friends, their neighbors, the people that they know that make calls, and ask them how their coverage is, and ask them who their carrier is. And the most important thing is that your phone works where you're going to use it most. And it's very hard to say which carrier is the best.
There've been tests done across the country, and sometimes Verizon is the top of that list. But, again, if you're in an area where you might not have Verizon coverage, maybe AT&T is going to be better there. The best way to find out is to really talk to people when you see them on cell phones and ask them who their coverage provider is.
WHITFIELD: And since so many of us have become kind of married to our phones, we're hearing from a lot of folks who are concerned about their health -- you know, they're hearing things about whether they're using their cell phone a lot, holding it up to their ear and perhaps it may cause some health problems a bit later. So I've got a question coming from Alan of Venice, California, which pertains to health. And it says -- he asks, "which cell phones emit the least radiation?"
BLECHER: Ah, the big radiation question.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
BLECHER: Well, that is actually always changing, because as the new models come out and the manufacturers are, of course, aware of this, we actually have a chart on Cnet, if you go to www.cnet.com, you can look at the radiation charts and get the radiation level for each phone.
WHITFIELD: OK...
BLECHER: So it's always changing.
WHITFIELD: Yes, no kidding. You've got to keep up on this stuff. From Vero Beach, Florida, I believe, on the telephone is Jawanza. What's your question or comment, Jawanza?
CALLER: Yes, I have a question regarding the various gadgets and cameras that are now in cell phones and how they affect the battery life.
BLECHER: That's a good question. The phones that have cameras on them are also color phones. And initially, we saw that the color phones were having less battery life. But the manufacturers have worked hard at that, and the battery life is not nearly as bad as one would expect. Of course, if you're using the camera to take pictures, it drains battery a lot more. And if you're uploading and using the data networks to send pictures, that also is going to drain your battery a lot faster.
WHITFIELD: And Joni, how about in the case of some phones that have PDA features in them? They're using them as their organizers. I imagine that there may be a battery issue there, right?
BLECHER: Yes. But those are actually bigger devices. So they have bigger batteries. So it's sort of levels out. And the problem is with that is if you're using the phone, that's a totally different drain on the battery than if you're just using the PDA features. So if you're just using the PDA features, your battery life is going to be a lot longer. But when you start to turn on the radio basically so you could be using the phone, that will drain the battery a little bit, but those have bigger batteries.
WHITFIELD: OK. And are there phones -- cell phones that are already being used that are kind of that pocket-sized wallet in your phone, you can actually buy a beverage from a machine by use of your phone?
BLECHER: That's actually much bigger in Europe than here.
WHITFIELD: OK. BLECHER: So not quite yet.
WHITFIELD: We're still light years behind? All right.
BLECHER: Yes. But it's a really nifty feature.
WHITFIELD: It seems like it. I'm scared of it. All right. Joni Blecher, thanks very much, of Cnet.com, the cell phone diva. Thanks for joining us.
BLECHER: Thank you.
WHITFIELD: Well, coming up, it's your money and your time. How can you save more of both? Find out how a calculator can actually help you figure it all out. More of your calls and e-mails right after this break. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Welcome back to "Dollar Signs." We're going to shift our focus now to two things people never seem to have enough of -- time and money. Is it worth it to do the mundane tasks in your life yourself, or should you pay someone else to do it? A new calculator at smartmoney.com may help you decide. Stacy Bradford with smartmoney.com is in New York to help us work out all the figures.
All right, how does it work? We all are trying to figure out, is it worth my time to do the mowing of the lawn myself, should I be doing my own laundry or should I pay someone to do it? How do you make that decision?
STACY BRADFORD, SMARTMONEY.COM: You're absolutely right. That is the question on everybody's mind, so we found a professor over in England at the University of Warwick, and he figured out a formula for just that. Now, he takes the wage that your employer pays you, and then he takes into account taxes and your cost of living, and that will actually give you what he considers a real wage.
WHITFIELD: And then what do you do with that?
BRADFORD: Well, we came up with this calculator, and what this will do is it puts in your real wage. And for our purposes, we took $20, which is the natural average for a white-collar worker, and we put it against a bunch of tasks. Some of them some of us would consider a bit of a luxury to hire them to do, and some are a little bit more mundane and we think it might make more sense to hire someone for. What we actually found is it comes out to be quite the opposite.
WHITFIELD: Really? So that's part of the problem. I think a lot of folks think, you know, they feel a little guilty about, you know, paying someone to do things that they are perfectly able to do -- the laundry, cooking, even. And people feel guilty that maybe they're not, you know, they're wasting money when we're getting messages from all over that we need to save more money.
So how do you get past the whole guilt stage and make a determination as to whether you're deserving of paying or hiring out for some help?
BRADFORD: Well, that's actually a very tricky question, and we aren't making specific recommendations. We're just trying to put this into some kind of context versus what your employer would pay you. But perhaps we can give you a couple of examples and that might help a bit.
WHITFIELD: All right.
BRADFORD: Well, first of all, let's think about what makes sense you might consider a better use of your time to hire someone to do. And we were actually quite surprised to find out that it makes more sense to order takeout than to cook and clean a meal for yourself. Another one is, it makes more sense to send out your laundry versus doing it yourself.
Now, we took a look -- it would cost you roughly $21 of your own time to wash one week's worth of men's clothing, button-down shirts particularly. Instead, it would only cost you $12 if you went to your local cleaners and had them laundered and pressed.
WHITFIELD: Oh, really?
BRADFORD: Yes.
WHITFIELD: So all folks have to do is you go to your Web site, right? And where do you go on your Web site in which to start this calculating process?
BRADFORD: Well, if you go on to our home page, you'll then see we have a personal-finance tab, and it's just along that list of stories that we have there over the weekend. And then you go in and you can put in your hourly wage. Just figure that out based on your annual salary and calculate out 40 hours per week.
WHITFIELD: Wow. I'm sorry. Go ahead.
BRADFORD: I was just going to say, if you do that, we then have about 10 or 12 items that you can compare, everything from cooking, cleaning your house to more whimsical things, such as exercise versus plastic surgery or going to the beach and getting a tan versus buying a bottle of self-tanner.
WHITFIELD: Oh, wow. And relaxation is priceless, isn't it? I like one of these other examples you gave, especially for parents out there who I think would really appreciate this, talking about if you stayed at home, it would certainly cost you more to stay at home and watch your own kids than it would to hire somebody to do it for you? What did you calculate?
BRADFORD: Well, that's right. Now, just so that everybody knows, this is not a recommendation. We cannot put a dollar on how important it is to spend time with your children, but if you're strictly looking at the dollars with our calculator, we found that if you stayed at home -- and we took this at 45 hours per week, because there is your commuting time as well -- it would cost you roughly $478 per week. Now, the average day care per week, in a typical city across the U.S., would only be $250 a week.
WHITFIELD: Wow.
BRADFORD: And that doesn't even take into account what you would be making in addition to that.
WHITFIELD: And I think we're running out of time. Maybe our last example, which I know everybody can appreciate, especially me, talking about cleaning your home, justifying why you should get help to do it.
BRADFORD: Well, actually, I have some bad news for you.
WHITFIELD: Oh, no. Don't tell me that.
BRADFORD: It makes sense to actually clean your own home.
WHITFIELD: Oh, no.
BRADFORD: So we looked at it in a two-hour block. So it will take you about two hours, that's $21 worth of your time. Now, it will cost you twice that to hire a maid. So you could really save by doing it yourself.
WHITFIELD: All right. Well, that's a fair enough tradeoff, Stacy. I guess I'll clean my own home, but at least I can hire somebody else to do the cooking for me, huh?
BRADFORD: That sounds good like a good idea.
WHITFIELD: All right. Stacy Bradford with smartmoney.com. Thanks very much. Of course, check the Web site in order to find out how to calculate your time and your money.
Well, coming up tonight at 6:00, tomorrow is Father's Day, so it might be a good time to show how much you appreciate dear old dad or dear young dad. Despite tough economic times for many Americans, dads are proving to be the workhorses of the work force. At 6:00, we'll take a look at a new study that may give you one more reason to celebrate Father's Day.
That's it for us. For this edition of CNN SATURDAY, thanks for joining us. Up next, a check of the headlines and then a special edition of "PEOPLE IN THE NEWS" -- a look at the leaders trying to map out the road to peace. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Have a great evening.
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Aired June 14, 2003 - 16:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: In our "Dollar Signs" segment today, a story which could impact every cell phone user in America. A federal court has ruled consumers should be allowed to keep their cell phone numbers when they switch service providers. Chris Murray is with the Legislative Council for the Consumers Union in Washington. He joins me now to talk a little bit more about this ruling. All right, Chris, so how does it go? This will benefit just about every cell phone user. Why?
CHRIS MURRAY, CONSUMERS UNION: I think that's exactly right. When consumers are able to take their cell phone numbers with them, they can shop on price and quality of service, rather than just being held hostage to a company because they've got your cell phone number.
WHITFIELD: So meaning you could even move to another area as well, and it really does benefit those who, perhaps, own a business?
MURRAY: That's exactly right.
WHITFIELD: ... and use that cell phone number for their business.
MURRAY: It helps to make the market more competitive, because if you're a business user, as you said, it's very difficult to imagine who is the entire universe of people that might have your number. So this allows us to reduce some of the switching costs, and it's economics 101.
WHITFIELD: Now, why has this come about? What was the impetus for this decision?
MURRAY: Well, in 1997, the Federal Communications Commission decided that we were going to do this, we are going to allow consumers to take their numbers with them, both wireless to wireless as well as land line to wireless in order to make markets more competitive. The cellular industry has fought for delay after delay after delay. This is since 1999, consumers were supposed to have portability. And here we are in 2003, potentially contemplating one more delay. The Senate is going to take a vote on Thursday that may set up another obstacle to consumers getting this on November 24.
WHITFIELD: Are there any real potential disadvantages to this kind of portability?
MURRAY: Not as far as we can think of. The best argument that the cellular industry has come up with is that it costs, and that is true. There is a cost to doing number portability. But we've already spent most of that money. So at this point, the remaining costs to the cellular industry is the costs of additional competition.
Now that may erode their profit margins, but for you and me, as consumers, that mean a dollar in my pocket and not theirs.
WHITFIELD: Now, Chris, we did try to invite some members of the cell phone industry and their trade association to be on our program today. They declined. But Tom Wheeler, president of the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association, did give us this statement. And here it is, as follows. Quote -- "We are disappointed in the court's decision. This decision increases the pressure on the FCC to do what they have yet to do, define the implementation of number portability. There are only 24 weeks between now and the portability deadline, but the basic how-tos are yet to be addressed. If there is to be number portability in November, the FCC must announce final rules by Labor Day, or consumers will find chaos in the market."
Well, what's your reaction to that statement?
MURRAY: I'm not sure what chaos in the market he's talking about. I think that is the additional competition that we're going to get by reducing switching costs, as I said before.
It's not clear to me what details are yet to be worked out. The framework is basically there. We're happy to work with industry to resolve any questions they've got about how to implement this. But the fact of the matter is, they've known since 1999 that this was supposed to be in place. And the last 12-month delay that we gave them, last November 24, was predicated on the notion that, you know, maybe with E911 and some new services we want to offer consumers, we need to work out some technical difficulties.
Well, they've had a year to work those out, and instead of actually just getting down to brass tacks and getting this done efficiently and at as low a cost as possible, they've been noodling around with their lobbyists in Congress, fighting for a delay after delay after delay.
WHITFIELD: So, Chris, we were hoping that this might elicit a response via e-mail and telephone, and it has. We've got Jim on the phone from Los Angeles. And Jim, what is your question or comment?
CALLER: I've got two questions. The first is, are the cellular phone companies able to charge a tariff or a fee for this number portability? We were told by our wireless company that they're going to start charging us $1.99, which upset me for that. And I don't know if that's right or not. And then the second -- go ahead.
WHITFIELD: Chris, why don't you go ahead and answer that first question, and Jim, hold off for a second.
MURRAY: Sure. I think the answer is that, yes, they are able to levy a charge on portability. And as a matter of fact, I think a number of carriers are already doing so. Now, we should remember, we've already paid for most of the costs of portability. That happened last year, November 24, when they implemented something called number pooling. So what's left now, the big cost is going to be the costs of additional competition. And I think that $1.99 is probably a little on the fat side for what that should cost.
WHITFIELD: Jim, what's your second question?
CALLER: Second question is that the phones that we all have, if we want to take our number and go to a different company, our phones more than likely aren't going to be compatible with the next company we go to. And I'm wondering if there's any changes as far as the gains that these phone companies play? In other words, they give you the phone and they lock you in a contract. And then when you try and leave them, because you're not happy with the service, and since you can take your number, you're more apt to go to a company who might work for you, but you're held, again, hostage by this phone.
MURRAY: That's exactly right. There's three main switching costs that we've got as consumers. One is number portability. We can't take our numbers with us. Number two is just the big hefty early termination penalties that we pay. It's about $200 with most carriers. And the third, as you mentioned, is handset portability. Even if the technical standards are the same on a network that you want to go to, in a lot of cases for business reasons, carriers have decided they don't want to make it easier for consumers to leave. So you can't take your handsets with you.
We'd like to work with Congress and the Federal Communications Commission to get all of those switching costs reduced. And I think that handset portability is really within reach.
WHITFIELD: All right. Jim in Los Angeles, thanks very much. And Chris Murray from the Legislative Council for Consumers Union, thank you very much for joining us as well.
MURRAY: Thank you kindly for having me.
WHITFIELD: All right. Appreciate it.
Well, is a new high-tech cell phone on your wish list? Up next, cell phones and gadgets. We'll show you what your choices are from cameras to tuneful rings to games to voicemail. The options are endless. And of course, you can still e-mail us at dollarsigns@cnn.com. We want to hear from you, or you can call in. That number is 1-800-807-2620. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Welcome back to "Dollar Signs." We're talking about cell phones and consumer options, from tuneful rings to games to voicemail, cell phone users have a lot of choices. And some of you can get into a lot of trouble because of that. General Motors is just one of the companies that has banned its employees from using cell phones with those built-in cameras. They say they're worried about keeping their product lines under wraps. Any employee caught using a phone with a camera can be fired.
So do we really need all of these gadgets?
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: ... keeps an eye on the latest gadgets in our San Francisco area for Cnet.com.
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: ... argue, yes, they need a lot of those gadgets...
(AUDIO/VIDEO GAP)
JONI BLECHER, CNET.COM: ... with cell phones is because of the digital networks, and they tend to do better with...
(AUDIO GAP)
BLECHER: ... before all these digital networks came out. So it's not the best call quality, but it tends not to interfere with hearing impaired capabilities.
WHITFIELD: OK. Another e-mail comes to us from Robert in Atlanta. And he writes -- "What is the best maker for cell phone signals? Which company is best overall in coverage?" Perhaps this is kind of the question that I was asking
(AUDIO GAP)
WHITFIELD: .. really promote that there may be one cell phone maker that's better than the others?
BLECHER: Well, that's a very tricky question, because call quality and service and, you know, getting the best coverage really depends on where you live and how those towers are deployed. So it varies from place to place to place. And typically, what I tell people to do is to ask their friends, their neighbors, the people that they know that make calls, and ask them how their coverage is, and ask them who their carrier is. And the most important thing is that your phone works where you're going to use it most. And it's very hard to say which carrier is the best.
There've been tests done across the country, and sometimes Verizon is the top of that list. But, again, if you're in an area where you might not have Verizon coverage, maybe AT&T is going to be better there. The best way to find out is to really talk to people when you see them on cell phones and ask them who their coverage provider is.
WHITFIELD: And since so many of us have become kind of married to our phones, we're hearing from a lot of folks who are concerned about their health -- you know, they're hearing things about whether they're using their cell phone a lot, holding it up to their ear and perhaps it may cause some health problems a bit later. So I've got a question coming from Alan of Venice, California, which pertains to health. And it says -- he asks, "which cell phones emit the least radiation?"
BLECHER: Ah, the big radiation question.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
BLECHER: Well, that is actually always changing, because as the new models come out and the manufacturers are, of course, aware of this, we actually have a chart on Cnet, if you go to www.cnet.com, you can look at the radiation charts and get the radiation level for each phone.
WHITFIELD: OK...
BLECHER: So it's always changing.
WHITFIELD: Yes, no kidding. You've got to keep up on this stuff. From Vero Beach, Florida, I believe, on the telephone is Jawanza. What's your question or comment, Jawanza?
CALLER: Yes, I have a question regarding the various gadgets and cameras that are now in cell phones and how they affect the battery life.
BLECHER: That's a good question. The phones that have cameras on them are also color phones. And initially, we saw that the color phones were having less battery life. But the manufacturers have worked hard at that, and the battery life is not nearly as bad as one would expect. Of course, if you're using the camera to take pictures, it drains battery a lot more. And if you're uploading and using the data networks to send pictures, that also is going to drain your battery a lot faster.
WHITFIELD: And Joni, how about in the case of some phones that have PDA features in them? They're using them as their organizers. I imagine that there may be a battery issue there, right?
BLECHER: Yes. But those are actually bigger devices. So they have bigger batteries. So it's sort of levels out. And the problem is with that is if you're using the phone, that's a totally different drain on the battery than if you're just using the PDA features. So if you're just using the PDA features, your battery life is going to be a lot longer. But when you start to turn on the radio basically so you could be using the phone, that will drain the battery a little bit, but those have bigger batteries.
WHITFIELD: OK. And are there phones -- cell phones that are already being used that are kind of that pocket-sized wallet in your phone, you can actually buy a beverage from a machine by use of your phone?
BLECHER: That's actually much bigger in Europe than here.
WHITFIELD: OK. BLECHER: So not quite yet.
WHITFIELD: We're still light years behind? All right.
BLECHER: Yes. But it's a really nifty feature.
WHITFIELD: It seems like it. I'm scared of it. All right. Joni Blecher, thanks very much, of Cnet.com, the cell phone diva. Thanks for joining us.
BLECHER: Thank you.
WHITFIELD: Well, coming up, it's your money and your time. How can you save more of both? Find out how a calculator can actually help you figure it all out. More of your calls and e-mails right after this break. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Welcome back to "Dollar Signs." We're going to shift our focus now to two things people never seem to have enough of -- time and money. Is it worth it to do the mundane tasks in your life yourself, or should you pay someone else to do it? A new calculator at smartmoney.com may help you decide. Stacy Bradford with smartmoney.com is in New York to help us work out all the figures.
All right, how does it work? We all are trying to figure out, is it worth my time to do the mowing of the lawn myself, should I be doing my own laundry or should I pay someone to do it? How do you make that decision?
STACY BRADFORD, SMARTMONEY.COM: You're absolutely right. That is the question on everybody's mind, so we found a professor over in England at the University of Warwick, and he figured out a formula for just that. Now, he takes the wage that your employer pays you, and then he takes into account taxes and your cost of living, and that will actually give you what he considers a real wage.
WHITFIELD: And then what do you do with that?
BRADFORD: Well, we came up with this calculator, and what this will do is it puts in your real wage. And for our purposes, we took $20, which is the natural average for a white-collar worker, and we put it against a bunch of tasks. Some of them some of us would consider a bit of a luxury to hire them to do, and some are a little bit more mundane and we think it might make more sense to hire someone for. What we actually found is it comes out to be quite the opposite.
WHITFIELD: Really? So that's part of the problem. I think a lot of folks think, you know, they feel a little guilty about, you know, paying someone to do things that they are perfectly able to do -- the laundry, cooking, even. And people feel guilty that maybe they're not, you know, they're wasting money when we're getting messages from all over that we need to save more money.
So how do you get past the whole guilt stage and make a determination as to whether you're deserving of paying or hiring out for some help?
BRADFORD: Well, that's actually a very tricky question, and we aren't making specific recommendations. We're just trying to put this into some kind of context versus what your employer would pay you. But perhaps we can give you a couple of examples and that might help a bit.
WHITFIELD: All right.
BRADFORD: Well, first of all, let's think about what makes sense you might consider a better use of your time to hire someone to do. And we were actually quite surprised to find out that it makes more sense to order takeout than to cook and clean a meal for yourself. Another one is, it makes more sense to send out your laundry versus doing it yourself.
Now, we took a look -- it would cost you roughly $21 of your own time to wash one week's worth of men's clothing, button-down shirts particularly. Instead, it would only cost you $12 if you went to your local cleaners and had them laundered and pressed.
WHITFIELD: Oh, really?
BRADFORD: Yes.
WHITFIELD: So all folks have to do is you go to your Web site, right? And where do you go on your Web site in which to start this calculating process?
BRADFORD: Well, if you go on to our home page, you'll then see we have a personal-finance tab, and it's just along that list of stories that we have there over the weekend. And then you go in and you can put in your hourly wage. Just figure that out based on your annual salary and calculate out 40 hours per week.
WHITFIELD: Wow. I'm sorry. Go ahead.
BRADFORD: I was just going to say, if you do that, we then have about 10 or 12 items that you can compare, everything from cooking, cleaning your house to more whimsical things, such as exercise versus plastic surgery or going to the beach and getting a tan versus buying a bottle of self-tanner.
WHITFIELD: Oh, wow. And relaxation is priceless, isn't it? I like one of these other examples you gave, especially for parents out there who I think would really appreciate this, talking about if you stayed at home, it would certainly cost you more to stay at home and watch your own kids than it would to hire somebody to do it for you? What did you calculate?
BRADFORD: Well, that's right. Now, just so that everybody knows, this is not a recommendation. We cannot put a dollar on how important it is to spend time with your children, but if you're strictly looking at the dollars with our calculator, we found that if you stayed at home -- and we took this at 45 hours per week, because there is your commuting time as well -- it would cost you roughly $478 per week. Now, the average day care per week, in a typical city across the U.S., would only be $250 a week.
WHITFIELD: Wow.
BRADFORD: And that doesn't even take into account what you would be making in addition to that.
WHITFIELD: And I think we're running out of time. Maybe our last example, which I know everybody can appreciate, especially me, talking about cleaning your home, justifying why you should get help to do it.
BRADFORD: Well, actually, I have some bad news for you.
WHITFIELD: Oh, no. Don't tell me that.
BRADFORD: It makes sense to actually clean your own home.
WHITFIELD: Oh, no.
BRADFORD: So we looked at it in a two-hour block. So it will take you about two hours, that's $21 worth of your time. Now, it will cost you twice that to hire a maid. So you could really save by doing it yourself.
WHITFIELD: All right. Well, that's a fair enough tradeoff, Stacy. I guess I'll clean my own home, but at least I can hire somebody else to do the cooking for me, huh?
BRADFORD: That sounds good like a good idea.
WHITFIELD: All right. Stacy Bradford with smartmoney.com. Thanks very much. Of course, check the Web site in order to find out how to calculate your time and your money.
Well, coming up tonight at 6:00, tomorrow is Father's Day, so it might be a good time to show how much you appreciate dear old dad or dear young dad. Despite tough economic times for many Americans, dads are proving to be the workhorses of the work force. At 6:00, we'll take a look at a new study that may give you one more reason to celebrate Father's Day.
That's it for us. For this edition of CNN SATURDAY, thanks for joining us. Up next, a check of the headlines and then a special edition of "PEOPLE IN THE NEWS" -- a look at the leaders trying to map out the road to peace. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Have a great evening.
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