If you are having difficulty balancing your budget, why not consider a car share arrangement with friends and/or colleagues, whereby each of shares the burden of the daily commute?

Also known as "car pooling", all you need to do is get tw, three or four people who travel the same journey to work each day and then alternate the drivers. It doesn't have to be done daily of course, you could for example, have one person use their car one week and another the next.

There are numerous advantages, the biggest of which is the money saving. In addition, we all know that commuter driving can be extremely stressful, so not only will you save money, you'll probably reduce your blood pressure a few notches too!

It's best if the car sharers live close to each other, so that none of the participants are unduly inconvenienced by the sharing arrangement, but that's down to how you want to play it and your group's tolerance for travel!

Naturally, you need that each of the people in your car share group are reliable, otherwise you could find yourself being late on occasions, so it's important to set up the rules early on in the arrangement so that there are no misunderstandings between you.

Also, you need to ensure that you all have a means of contacting each other for when things go wrong, as they will from time to time, with illnesses, traffic jams etc.

In some cities, people have set up car share clubs whereby they can contact people from other places of employment close by and make arrangements, even contingency arrangements for when unexpected things happen - for example, the driver is taken ill at work and leaves you stranded at the office!

The issue of environmental pollution is demanding more of our attention as the planet warms and becomes damaged by human excesses and the car is the worst offender.

In London for example, a city that was once renowned for being foggy and smoky due to the fossil fuels that were burned by its inhabitants, it's estimated by Friends of The Earth, that around 90% of current pollution is caused by cars.

Congestion in cities could be solved if just one journey per driver per week could be eliminated.

Car sharing offers an economical and logical solution for people who hate, or don't have easy access to public transport.

Billions of dollars are lost to business annually in most areas of the world because of road traffic congestion.

Car parks are fast filling up and are now so over-crowded in major cities that costs for parking have rocketed.

In summary, car sharing will:

Save you cash on fuel

Lower your car insurance costs

Reduce your stress levels

Improve your long term health

Reduce pollution (and could save the planet)

Eliminate congestion

Ease the daily commute

All things considered, there are far more reasons to car share than there are reasons not to.

What's your excuse today?