Weekly costs of families $562

Press, 24 December 1986, Page 8

Weekly costs of families $562

PA Wellington Families with two parents working spent an average $562 a week in the year to March 31, 1986, according to the Statistics Department. Where one parent worked, spending was an average $473 a week. The Government Statistician, Mr Steve Kuzmicich, said that the difference of $B9 a week between those two figures was fairly even over the main areas of commodity expenditure. Families with both parents working spent $l2 a week more on food, on average, than did twoparent families with one working parent. They spent also on average $l5 a week more on housing, $ll a week more on household running, $lO a week more on clothing and footwear, $l4 a week more on transport and travel, $ll a week more on other goods, and $l6 a week more on other services. Families with both parents working spent on average $l9 a week on meals at restaurants and take-away meals, $6 a week more . than was spent by families with just one parent working. The two types of family spent about the same amount a week on fruit ($7 to $8), vegetables ($6 to $7), meat ($l2 to $l4), poultry ($2 to $3), fish ($2), farm products, fats, and oils ($l3), cereals and cereal products ($l2 to $l3), sweet products, spreads, and beverages ($ll to $l2), and other foodstuffs ($5). Families with two working parents, and who lived in rented accommodation, paid an average of $59 a week, compared with $55 a week for one-working-parent families in rented accommodation. When averaged over all households in each group, the weekly rental was $8 a week for families with both parents working and $lO a week for families with one parent working. This difference reflects, in part, that only 11 per cent of families with two working parents lived in rented accommodation, whereas 16 per cent of families with one working parent lived in such accommodation.

Each type of family spent about the same weekly amount, on average, for mortgage payments ($4l to $42), rate payments to local bodies ($8 to $9), and property maintenance goods such as tools and garden supplies ($l6 to $l7).

Families with two working parents spent on average considerably more on the net cost of buying and selling property ($l6,

compared with $10), and on property maintenance services such as building and renovating ($24, compared with $l6).

In the area of household running, -the expenditure of families with two working parents differed little from that of families with one working parent Each group spent an average of $l7 to $l9 on home appliances, $ll to $l2 on fuel and power, $8 to $lO on furniture, $9 to $lO on household services such as dry cleaning, telephone, and postage, $5 to $6 on household supplies, $3 to $5 on floor coverings, the same on textiles such as towels and bedclothes, $3 on household equipment and utensils, and $1 to $3 on furnishings.

On clothing and footwear, families with two working parents spent a weekly average of $7 on men’s clothes and $ll on women’s clothing. In contrast, two-parent families with only one parent working spent an average of only $5 a week on men’s clothing and $6 a week on women’s clothing.

Each group spent an average of $5 to $6 a week on children’s clothing, $3 on clothing supplies and services, $1 to $2 on men’s footwear, $2 on women’s footwear, and $2 on children’s footwear. Families with two working parents spent an average of $l5 a week on alcohol, and $l3 a week on leisure and recreational goods. Families with one working parent spent only $ll and $9, respectively, on those commodities. Each group spent about the same amount a week, on average, on tobacco products ($5 to $7), medical goods ($2), toiletries and cosmetics ($3 to $4), personal goods ($5), pets, racehorses, and livestock ($4 to $5), publications and stationery ($8 to $9) and recreational vehicles ($3 to $4). In the other services area, the biggest difference between the two groups of families was in payments for superannua,tion and life insurance. Families with two working parents spent an average of $22 a week on such payments, while families with one working parent spent only $lB. Each group spent much the same, on average, on health services ($6 to $7), personal services ($2 to $3), educational and tuitional services ($3 to $5), accommodation services ($3), financial, property insurance and legal services ($lO to $l2), union dues ($1), leisure services ($5 to $8), and various other services ($ll to $l2).