Many of you have heard my reasoning for not having a fancy cell phone. That extra $30-$40 a month for a dataplan just seems outrageous to me. That got me to thinking about my current plan. My wife and I share 500 minutes and pay $0.20 per text for about $54 per month. We never go over our minutes and one rarely would we even break even if we upgraded to an unlimiting texting plan. My service provider would like me to think I pay $54/500 = 0.10 per minute during the Anytime minutes and that all my other calls are "Free". I don't think of my usage that way. I pay $54 dollars a month and a certain number of "communications" for that. Most of those are about 1 minute long, and to make things simple, I'll consider a "Text" to be a 1 minute call. When I calculate the numbers that way, I pay $0.17 per minute or a whopping $0.47 per communication. Armed with this information, I now know that every time I reach for my cell phone I just tossed two quarters at Sprint. (Granted, I tossed them the quarters already, I'm just now getting to use them).

Notes: I deliberately excluded the cost of the cellular device. I don't include my computer in the cost of my home broadband bill, nor the cost of that 40" LCD panel in my cable bill. I'll exclude the cell phone from the monthly cellular service as well.