From the Evening Standard:
London’s men spend 42 days a year commuting
Men from [sic] London in their early 40s spend more time on jam-packed trains and roads than anyone in the UK - 42 days a year.
The shocking figure - more time than most people get in annual leave - is revealed in research published today. The study shows the average commute for a male Londoner in his early 40s takes 84 minutes every day.
It also showed that teens in the capital spend far more time traveling to and from work than other young people around the country.
The actual research they reference is all good stuff, and the TUC have produced a handy table showing typical commute times by age, gender and region.
That 84 minutes figure (42 minutes each way) looks about right to me, so I did a quick check: 1.4 hours times x 230 working days a year = 322 hours = 13.4 days. Which doesn't sound too terrible, actually.
Let's read on:
Frances O’Grady, General Secretary of the TUC which undertook the analysis, called for firms to help workers use time more productively.
She said: “Men from London in the early 40s spend a whopping 84 minutes on their daily commute.
"That’s 42 working days a year in cramped trains or traffic-choked roads.
“With the cost of commuting set to rise again in the new year as wage-busting rail fares come into effect, businesses must do more to help staff avoid rush-hour traveling time.”
Aha, she's dividing 322 hours by 7.66 hours to arrive at 42 working days per year, that's why. So at least she was accurate and precise.
(But this is still a fairly meaningless figure, it's like saying that in your lifetime you spend twenty years sleeping or ten months on the toilet or something. So what?)
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