[light_hue_1]

Owning a car is far cheaper than living in NYC!

You definitely spend more than $10-12k/year once you have a family for even a modest amount of space.

And that's the average cost of car ownership, it's easy to find a cheap car.

[geodel]

Further car can be useful in lot of ways, like hauling large amount of things, groceries, going for a out of town trip and so on. I think in case of NYC don't need a car in city vs can't afford a car in city use cases are mixed and need to be separated out.

[steveBK123]

Yes, $10-12k is like the monthly mortgage on a family sized apartment in NYC.

Many NYers need to construct elaborate fantasies to delude themselves that actually living in NYC is totally economical/convenient/rational, and not just their personal preference. Something about a river in Egypt.

In reality while it's fun, its also often inconvenient, expensive, or both.