- The document analyzes survey data from 210 undergraduate students at Ashoka University about their personal budgeting trends. - It finds that students' monthly allowances vary greatly, from Rs. 1000-1999 to over Rs. 8000. Students with lower allowances of Rs. 1000-1999 tend to spend most of their money only on food and supplies, while those with higher allowances spend on other things like shopping. - The data also shows that budgeting does not necessarily help students avoid running out of money, and both males and females have around a 50% chance of running out regardless of whether they budget or not.

1. Project 1
Statistics for Economics
What are the personal budgeting trends of Undergraduate students in Ashoka?
Group 2
Aashay Verma, Adwitiya Dawn, Aritro Bose, Charvi Saraf, Pallavi Agrawal, Raghav Katyal,
Vaishnavi Shinde

2. Introduction
Aim
To find personal budgeting trends in Undergraduate Students of Ashoka University.
Background and Reason for Interest
Students of Ashoka University, akin to students across the globe, often make the claim that they
are on a ‘student budget’, which has grown colloquially to mean a budget that is not sufficient to
engage in expenditure as per need or desire. The term ‘I am broke’ is also extremely common to
hear while engaging in conversation with students. Thus, we decided to choose the topic of personal
budgeting trends in order to find patterns in allowance, mode of payments, preferences on
expenditure, use of applications to track budget across different years of study, gender and amongst
one another.
Tools and Methodology Used
• To create the survey: Brainstorming amongst group members on the type of questions that
will invoke maximum responses
• To collect data from the survey: An online short Google form with Multiple Choice
Questions, and a catchy title ’Are you broke’ to ensure greater traction and response on the
survey.
• To test the data received and make observations: Hypothesis testing – According to this
method, different hypothesis based on common knowledge and assumptions were collated
and tested against our data.
• To minimise errors: The most basic way to ensure there is low scope for errors is to get a
big sample size. The survey had 210 respondents which surpassed the required of 62.
Additionally, for testing certain hypothesis, certain particular sections of the respondents
were not considered since their responses were either too few, or had a much higher
probability of having false/ignorant responses. Lastly, by keeping the survey anonymous,
we strived to minimize any external influence on the responses.
• Properties of a sample: An effective sample must be random and be sufficiently large so
that trends are noticeable. Our sample is random because an online survey form was sent
out to all four UG batches. The sample size of 210 respondents is a good size for our data
analysis.
Overall Summary of Survey data
- Number of respondents: 210
● UG 1: 82
● UG 2: 90
● UG 3; 31
● UG 4: 7
- Number of Female respondents: 93

3. - Number of Male Respondents:117

4. Trends and Observations
Income Groups and Expenditure
In Ashoka University, like any other place, people’s income/ allowance varies greatly.
• There are students on campus with a monthly allowance of more than Rs. 8000, and there
are also those on campus with a monthly allowance between Rs. 1000 and Rs. 1999. Both
sets of students’ make-do with their allowances.
• Not everyone who has a monthly allowance of Rs. 1000 and Rs. 1999 runs out of money.
Through our survey we wanted to see where the people getting an allowance of Rs. 1000-1999
(and don’t run out) spend their money, compared to that of those with higher allowances (and run
out of money).
We also wanted to see if there was any correlation between having a smaller allowance and
making a monthly budget.
Monthly allowance and expenditure trends
For this, we are comparing expenditure on 6 categories of:
• Students with an allowance of Rs. 1000-1999, who haven’t run out of money before
• Students with any other allowance, who have run out of money before
The 6 categories are:
1. Food (on campus)
2. Food (off campus)
3. Personal Supplies
4. Shopping
5. Stationery/ College Supplies
6. Miscellaneous
Out of the 210 respondents we had, a mere 31 reported a monthly allowance of between Rs.1000
and Rs. 1999. These constituted 18 males and 13 females.
We made an interesting observation:
• Contrary to what we believed before sending out the survey, nearly 75% of those who get
an allowance of Rs. 1000-1999 have their permanent residence outside Delhi NCR. We
thought that parents out concern for their children would forcibly give them money even
when the latter didn’t need any for the parents’ satisfaction, but we were proven wrong.

5. Next, we compared the spending trends of students with monthly allowance of Rs. 1000-1999
(who haven’t run out of money) with those of students with higher allowance (who have run out
of money). As we can see from the two graphs below:
• Almost all those who get an allowance of Rs. 1000-1999 spend the most on buying food
on campus.
• In fact, these people spend most of their money only on food on campus or on college
supplies.
• If we compare this to those who get more than Rs. 1999 per month, there are those who
spend most of their money on things other than food on-campus and stationery too.
Another trend worth noticing is the amount spent by the students on shopping:
• Most of those with a lesser monthly allowance marked it as the activity they spend the
least on.
• In contrast to this, for people with higher monthly allowances, there are some who spend
the largest on shopping.
Most of the students with an allowance of Rs. 1999 or lesser spend a fair share of their money on
personal supplies, with most of them ranking it third.
Lastly, one other trend we noticed:
• Those with allowance of more than Rs. 1999, the graphs for the first and second rank are
largely similar.
• For those with the lesser allowance, however, there is a clear difference between the two
ranks.
• This could be a hint to how people with lesser money to spend know for a fact where
most of their money is spent, whereas those with more money aren’t too sure, i.e. they
can’t differentiate with clarity where they spend the most and where they spend the
second-most.

6. Figure 1
Figure 2
Low allowance and making a monthly budget
In a survey where more than 50% of the respondents have a monthly allowance of more than
Rs.4000, we wanted to see whether those with an allowance of Rs. 1999 or lesser have
meticulous plans in place to keep everything in control.
Our data tells us that:
• 15 out of the 31 people (48.4%) who get an allowance of Rs. 1999 or lesser make a
monthly budget.
• The number of people who don’t make a monthly budget in this allowance bracket are
just marginally higher: 16. Hence, we know that those with lower allowances don’t
necessarily use budgeting to manage their finances.

7. • Budgeting doesn’t seem to be helping, however. 9 out of the 15 who make budgets have
run out of money (60%). This is lesser than 5 of 16 (31.25%) who have run out of money
without making budgets.
Monthly Allowance and Running out of Money
Students in Ashoka University come from diverse backgrounds, and the findings suggest that this
diversity is also visible in the monthly allowance of individuals. However, this inequality in
allowance across students doesn’t mean that those with slightly higher allowance are necessarily
better off with reference to personal budgeting such that they never run out of money.
The graph below represents the ratio of students, based on their respective monthly allowance,
who run out of money (either midweek or mid-month).
• As visible, the graph fluctuates between the 0.6 mark. This means that overall there is a
0.6 chance of running out of money.
• marked by its highest point in the Rs. 5000-5999 monthly allowance bracket, and its
lowest point, where the proportion of running out of money is low, is in the highest
bracket Rs. 8000 and above. The latter seems logically deducible, since all necessities
have been covered under 8000 and the student can thus spend money judiciously such
that the chances of running out of money falls considerably.
Figure 3
(In this analysis, first year students have been excluded since they are not a good sample to test
for running out of money)

8. Running out of Money and Making a Budget
Given the trend visible in the possibility of running out of money based on allowance, we look at
a comparison of running out of money with what we usually perceive as a tool to keep expenses
in check, i.e. maintaining a budget every month.
The graph represents the ratio of those who run out of money after making a budget and without
making a budget.
• According to this graph, less than 40% of those who make a budget do not actually run
out of money, i.e. nearly 60% run out of money even after making a budget. Instead,
students who don’t keep a budget seem to be better off in events of not running out of
money.
• Students who do not maintain a budget have a 50% chance of running out of money, and
50% chance of not running out of money.
Figure 4
(In this analysis, first year students have been excluded since they are not a good sample to test
for running out of money)
Gender, Creation of Budget and Running out of Money
Breaking this down further, we check the trends across genders and budgeting and not running
out of money. Women are often said to be more cautious of their spending patterns, and this is
tested in two categories - With a budget and without a budget. Below is a graph representative of
the same.
• The ratio of females who make a budget is higher than that of males, but by a small
margin. The majority of students, however, do not create a budget.

9. • Females also have a higher success rate of maintaining budget and not running out of
money, though it is is low for both genders but still higher for females.
- Another interesting observation is that females and males tend to be equally cautious of
running out of money when they don’t make a budget, and is about 30%.
Figure 5
(In this analysis, first year students have been excluded since they are not a good sample to test
for running out of money)
Permanent Residence and when Students receive allowance/Income
We compare the trends of Students permanently residing in Delhi NCR vs. Students permanently
residing outside Delhi NCR based on when they receive their allowance/income. It may be
expected that those in Delhi will get their money at uch shorter intervals in comparison to those
from outside Delhi. This is because majority students (over 98%) are still not financially
independent, and rely on parents as primary source of allowance.
Below is a graph that shows how often students get their money income/allowance based
permanent residency region.

10. Figure 6; Figure 7
This graph shows that while percentage of those students receiving monthly allowance is the
same, those who receive weekly and per-semester differ greatly.
• This may be explained due to Ashoka’s distance from Delhi which is reasonable
across to other permanent residencies. Weekly allowance can be given to Delhi NCR
students much easier than those outside Delhi.
• For those outside NCR, semester system is more viable. This is because students have
a long break at the end of each semester where outside NCR students also visit their
respective homes.
Preferred Mode of Payment and Permanent Residence
There are various modes of payment accepted today. Amongst the most common are cash,
credit/debit card, Paytm and other e-wallets. In Ashoka Univeristy, these trends were observed,
and a comparison was made based on permanent residency (since allowance may be in the form
of cash, Paytm money or deposit in Bank Account).
• Cash is preferred almost unanimously, but there is still a greater chunk of Delhi NCR
students who prefer it. This may be due to the fact that they receive cash from
parents/source of income.
• All other payment methods are preferred by Outside NCR students in comparison to
NCR students. This also arises due to the fact that the only ATMs readily accessible
to students on campus dispense 2000 Rs notes, which is a demotivation to withdraw
since change is not readily available on campus.

11. Figure 8
Dependence of living in Delhi NCR/Outside Delhi NCR on individual monthly allowance
The surveyed data set includes 210 respondents (74 from Delhi NCR and 146 from Outside Delhi
NCR) who are undergraduate students at Ashoka University. All students live on campus. The
independent variable on the x-axis is monthly allowances with bins of uniform intervals. The
dependent variable on the y-axis is the percentage of Delhi NCR/ Outside Delhi NCR permanent
residents in each of the above intervals and a comparison of the two.
We wish to study the percentage composition (on the basis on permanent residence) of each of
the monthly allowance ranges starting from 1000-1999 upto 8000 and Above. Our aim is to
explore any interesting trends in this composition e.g. whether the respondent’s permanent
residence has a positive/negative or no correlation with the amount of money they receive
monthly.
Figure 9

12. The following conclusions can be drawn from the above graph:
• It is interesting to note that the overall shape of the lines are very similar. They both
initially rise till the 4th range, fall until both reach 7th range and then start increasing
again.
• The maximum percentage of residents from both Delhi NCR and Outside Delhi NCR
(21.9% and 21.2 respectively) fall under the 4000-4999 range of monthly allowance. This
is also where the share is almost similar (differing by a mere 0.7%).
• The maximum difference (of approximately 6%) between the composition of residents
can be seen in the 3000-3999 and 7000-7999 ranges. In both cases, people from Delhi
NCR seem to be commanding a higher percentage share (20.3% and 7.8% respectively).
• As the monthly allowance ranges increase as we move along the x-axis, the fluctuation of
data points (increase and decrease in value on the y-axis) for Outside Delhi NCR is more
sudden and sharp as compared to that for Delhi NCR.
Therefore, this data sets reveals more similarities than anomalies in terms of the two lines
keeping up with each other. Around 67% of respondents from both Delhi NCR and Outside Delhi
NCR receive a monthly allowance of less that Rs. 5000 whereas the remaining 37% receive more
than Rs. 5000. It can be concluded that the respondent's permanent residence solely does not,
under normal circumstances, cause a disparity in the monthly allowance received.
Percentage Composition of respondents from Delhi NCR and Outside Delhi NCR & their
expenditure on food (off campus)
This analysis focuses solely on the respondent’s share of monthly expenditure on food off
campus. The rationale behind including this comparison was to check whether biases held by the
surveyors regarding the behaviour of the respondents were true or not. This view was based on
the assumption that respondents hailing from Delhi NCR would go back home over the weekend
as opposed to those from Outside Delhi NCR who would, under normal circumstances, stay on
campus. The primary bias was to believe that those who went back home would end up spending
more on food off campus.
Figure 10

13. The following observations can be drawn from the graph above:
• Food off-campus is the second most highly ranked item which comprises the
maximum percentage, almost 60%, in the share of respondents’ monthly allowance.
The composition of this ranking is fairly equal among all the respondents irrespective
of where their permanent residence is.
• Barring Rank 2, all the other ranks have a similar percentage composition of
respondents from Delhi NCR and Outside Delhi NCR.
Thus, we can conclude that there is no significant relationship between the respondent’s
permanent residence (i.e. hailing from Delhi NCR or outside) and their ranking of monthly
expenditure on food off campus.
Patterns in Expenditure of UG-2 and UG-3
The expenditure patterns of second and third years are significantly different, and reveal an
almost opposite trend when correlated with when they get their income. The following 2 charts
correlate when respondents get their allowances with chances of them running out of the same
mid-month, mid-week, or both.
Figure 11

14. Figure 12
There are significant observations to be made from the 2 charts:
• While a 100% of all UG 2nd year respondents who get their allowance at the beginning of
the year do not run out of money, a 100% of all UG 3rd year respondents do run out of
money (50% in the middle of the month, the rest both mid-week and mid-month). This is
diametrically opposite behaviour, indicating that 2nd year students who get an yearly lump-
sum are more responsible with their expenditure.
• 75% of both 2nd years and 3rd years who get a lump-sum every semester do not run out of
money. This observation seems to contradict the behavioural pattern emerging from the
first observation, because the sense of monetary responsibility seems to be the same across
batches in this case. One explanation could be that during the semester both batches spend
in a similar manner, however, for those who get an yearly lump-sum, the third years tend
to spend a lot more in the breaks between semesters, and hence have a higher chance of
running out of money.
• 2nd years who get a monthly or weekly stipend display a greater chance of not running out
of money than third years. 50% of 2nd years with a weekly stipend do not run out of money,
while 42% of 2nd years with a monthly stipend do not run out of money. For third years,
these figures are 20% and 5% respectively.
• All observations seem to support the claim that 2nd years spend more judiciously than 3rd
years. Apart from one section of Figure 1, i.e. the 44% 2nd years who run out of their
allowance mid-month after receiving it on a monthly basis, all other figures support the
aforementioned claim.
UG 1st years and UG 4th years were not included in the finding of these trends, since the 1st years
are too new to provide us with accurate budgeting information, whereas 4th years form a very
minute chunk of the total respondents (3.33%) for us to find any trends in their behaviour.

15. Permanent Residence and Consumption of Food
We tested the following assumptions about how a person’s permanent residence may influence
their first preference of expenditure on food, and decided to obtain separate figures for UG 2nd
years and 3rd years.
• People from both Delhi NCR and outside spend equal amounts on food on campus, due to
the easy availability of so many outlets. (Figure 13).
Figure 13
The following conclusions can be made from the graphs above:
• Our first hypothesis, regarding people from outside Delhi NCR spending as much as people
from within Delhi NCR on food on campus, is accurate. 70% of people from outside Delhi
NCR and 79% from within have food on campus as their rank 1. This number drops sharply
for both groups for ranks 2 through 6. The chart (Figure 13) indicates that the trends across
both groups is very stable and similar. An explanation for this trend could be the easy
availability of eateries on campus, and the tendency to eat a lot to cope with the stressful
environment of college.
Saving and Usage of Budgeting Apps
67% of first years haven't ran out of money at all. 26% of people have ran out of money mid-
month which is probably because their allowance wasn't sufficient and they expected the
expenditure at campuses to be lesser.
• According to our data, only 40% of the undergraduates make a monthly budget at
Ashoka.

16. • About 90% of people do not use a budgeting app but 19.5% think they should use one. It
is interesting to note that only 10% people use an app for their budgeting at a university
campus.
Figure 14
Most of the undergraduates use their mobile phones for their day-to-day activities but only a small
percentage use an app to record their income and expenditure. According to a studies, people tend
to use budgeting apps to have some sort of control on their expenditure. According to our data,
45% students still run out of money. The effectiveness of budgeting apps is in question as per our
data.
Figure 15

17. Figure 16
• Even though the most commonly used phrase at university campuses is “I am broke,”
our data (given above) suggests that more than half of people never run out of the
money at Ashoka!
• There is a common notion that people who budget themselves are not likely to fall short
of money. That notion can be debunked by our data. 55% of people fail even after
making a budget as they run out of money. This leads to the following:
a) people underestimate their expenditure while making a budget
b) lack of implementation of the planning
• Here is the composition of people who make their budget and their allowance category.
The shape of the graph is similar to the allowance graph. No matter which bracket
people fall into, they still make a budget.
Figure 17

18. Tendency to Save
Out of the people who make budget, 52% make a provision for saving while others don’t. However,
only 20% of people don’t run out of money in spite making a provision for savings.
Figure 18
For all those people who make a budget, as per the data, not all people make a provision for savings.
There could be various reasons for the same:
• They don’t feel that their monthly allowance is enough for them to save a part out of it.
• No need to make a provision for savings as they will be given an allowance every month.
Another interesting observation in this data is that a lot of people save in the Rs. 8000 and above
bracket. A straightforward reason of which may be that their necessities are all taken care of with
such an amount of money and therefore, they still prefer to save for their other wants. In the Rs.
7000-7999, no person makes a provision for saving. There is no concrete reason for the same and
the number of people making a budget in that category is also very small which is misleading.
Others might save for their own personal desires or they have an awareness about the virtue of
saving. The 20% people who make a provision for saving and still run out of money are not only
overspending out of their budgeted expenditure but also their savings which indicates that they
spending patterns are on the higher end.
Allowance and Expenditure Trends
Here we are comparing the expenditure pattern of students with different allowances, we have
taken two groups: 1000-1999 and 8000 and above. We are trying to analyse how, what they
spend the most on, is related to their allowance.

19. Figure 19
• It is interesting to see that majority of people spend most of their money on food (on
campus), regardless of the difference in allowance.
• No one from the 1000-1999 allowance bracket spends the most on miscellaneous.
Indicating that people with less allowance tend to keep their expenditure limited to
necessities (food, personal supplies, stationary) only.
• More people from the 8000 and above range spend most of their money on Food (off
campus) compared to people with lower allowance. One probable reason for this
could be difference in the choice of eateries. People with more allowance might
prefer eating at more expensive places and vice versa. Another probable reason for
this could be that people with more allowance go to eat off campus more frequently
compared to those with lesser allowance.
• No one from the 1000-1999 allowance spends most on shopping, which is expected
since their allowance is only enough to cover the necessities. But it is also interesting
that only a few amongst the people who have more money, like to spend most of their
money on shopping.
Gender and Expenditure
The graph below aims to find out gender based expenditure patterns by analysing the items that
each gender spends most and least on. The monthly expenditure of each respondent comprises a
variety of items which have been depicted on the x-axis. The y-axis depicts the percentage
composition of respondents’, both male and female, highest and lowest ranking of the given
items.

20. Figure 20
The following conclusions can be drawn from the above graph:
• Food is King: Both males and females spend most on food in general. 82% of both male
and female respondents consider food on and off campus to be the items on which they
spend the most. The heavy expenditure on this proves the pre-eminence of food as a
necessity.
• Shopping is a low priority area: Only 2% of females and 4% of males ranked shopping to
be the item of highest expenditure, as opposed to 50% males and 26% females ranking
shopping to be the item of least expenditure. It can thus be said that shopping occupies a
very small section of the respondents’ budgets. This busts the myth of expenditure on
shopping being gendered.
• Gender Parity in spending habits: The maximum difference in the spending on any item
in Rank 1 is not more than 3% between males and females. This leads us to the
conclusion that individuals, irrespective of their gender, tend to spend similarly on
various items and is a shot in the arm for gender parity in spending habits.
Conclusion
Key highlights of our survey are:
• Only 10% of the sample population uses a personal budgeting app.
• Food is something most respondents spend the most amount of money on.
• High degree of gender parity in spending habits.
• Irrespective of the allowance bracket, people do not rank shopping as either Rank 1 or
Rank 6.
• It is incorrect to assume that people from Delhi NCR who go home over the weekend
effectively spend more on food off campus as opposed to those from outside Delhi NCR
who don’t go home.
• Only 10% of
• Noting down the budget is not an effective tool that can be used to ensure people don’t
run out of money.

21. • Those living in Delhi NCR get much higher proportion of weekly allowance in
comparison to those living outside Delhi NCR.
• Not all those who claim to be broke are actually broke
It is easy for us, as surveyors to make strong assumptions about the outcome of certain trends in
the data because we are very similar to the respondents (in terms of the survey question posed to
the sample is applicable to us as much as it is to them). We learnt that this approach was wrong
and that being unbiased in framing questions for the survey as well as drawing conclusions is the
hallmark of an effective data analysis project.