Living paycheck to paycheck
Guess I'm in the minority here. My wife and I both work, if either of us lost our jobs, both of us make enough to pay all our bills on our own.....if both of us lost our jobs we've got enough saved up to make it about 6 months before we'd have to start doing things like liquidating retirement accounts.
I don't understand why people can't just live within their means.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2019/01/11/live-paycheck-to-paycheck-government-shutdown/
CareerBuilder found that 78% of U.S. workers are living paycheck to paycheck.
This number may be further exacerbated by the recent federal government shutdown, which has resulted in more than 800,000 federal employees not receiving paychecks.
So, what can you do to battle financial pressure?
Here's what you need to know and how to improve your financial profile.
Living Paycheck To Paycheck
According to the 2017 survey, CareerBuilder, a leading job site, found some startling statistics related to debt, budgeting and making ends meet.
For example, here are some findings from the survey:
Nearly one in 10 workers making $100,000+ live paycheck to paycheck
More than 1 in 4 workers do not set aside any savings each month
Nearly 3 in 4 workers say they are in debt - and more than half think they always will be
More than half of minimum wage workers say they have to work more than one job to make ends meet
28% of workers making $50,000-$99,999 usually or always live paycheck to paycheck, and 70% are in debt
The survey also found that 32% of the nearly 3,500 full-time workers surveyed use a budget and only 56% save $100 or less a month.
I don't understand why people can't just live within their means.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2019/01/11/live-paycheck-to-paycheck-government-shutdown/
CareerBuilder found that 78% of U.S. workers are living paycheck to paycheck.
This number may be further exacerbated by the recent federal government shutdown, which has resulted in more than 800,000 federal employees not receiving paychecks.
So, what can you do to battle financial pressure?
Here's what you need to know and how to improve your financial profile.
Living Paycheck To Paycheck
According to the 2017 survey, CareerBuilder, a leading job site, found some startling statistics related to debt, budgeting and making ends meet.
For example, here are some findings from the survey:
Nearly one in 10 workers making $100,000+ live paycheck to paycheck
More than 1 in 4 workers do not set aside any savings each month
Nearly 3 in 4 workers say they are in debt - and more than half think they always will be
More than half of minimum wage workers say they have to work more than one job to make ends meet
28% of workers making $50,000-$99,999 usually or always live paycheck to paycheck, and 70% are in debt
The survey also found that 32% of the nearly 3,500 full-time workers surveyed use a budget and only 56% save $100 or less a month.
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I see young couples buying a normal size home,$125000-$150,000,in this area,payments on 1 vehicle,Honda,Toyota,regular vehicle. A couple of kids in daycare so mom and dad both work which cost about $1000. a month.One of them pays health insurance through work that is about $600. a month plus homeowners and auto insurance.No cable,no boats,motorcycles.The make about $100,000 a year and are struggling.Im an old man and thought anybody should live well on that kind of money but I also did not take into account how much prices for everything has gone up in the last 40 years.My wife and I had everything that the young people are buying now,but we could do it on about a third of the money it takes now. 0 -
A local furniture store has an ad on tv that offers seven year financing for a mattress.
Seven years. For a mattress.
Yes, I believe most people are living paycheck to paycheck, otherwise they wouldn't be financing beds..0 -
Dad taught me to believe buying everything with cash. If you cannot afford it wait till you can. 0 -
quote:Originally posted by select-fire
Dad taught me to believe buying everything with cash. If you cannot afford it wait till you can.
Finally figured that out around 1980. Surprising how many purchases NEVER get made if you've saved the cash before buying.0 -
I remember when $15 a pay day was all I could add to my 457. but I kept uping it with each raise, and it eventually paid off. I can certainly sympathize with living pay day to pay day, I did so for a lot of years, but as a kid my dad told me, "if you can't afford to pay cash, you can't afford it." Sometimes that did not work, and loans were always paid off early, same with mortgage. One day you wake up and say hey, "we can afford to go to Australia to look at birds." 0 -
Struggling at $100K? I wonder what that's like? Are they struggling like folks who makes minimum wage with nicer things to look at? 0 -
When we moved to SW Va, all we heard was crying that, "You Yankees have all the money." So, I told them the secret; "We go to work 5 days a week. And when OT is offered, everyone volunteers and all the wives understand as it means more money." When they stop booing, my wife adds that, "they must be truly rich as they take a day off without pay when ever they want." They try, but they have no comeback. 0 -
quote:Originally posted by Rack Ops
A friend of mine is a loan officer at a local bank. She said it's almost impossible to believe how much people will finance.
Guys will come in and finance a loan on a bass boat, then realize their car or truck won't pull it.....so they go buy a new full size truck, rolling their old loan into their new one.....and suddenly they have $100,000 in debt because they want to go fishing on the weekends.
It's insane.
I learned the lesson the easy way. Shortly after I got out of the Army I went to work for a finance company. Didn't take long for me to learn to avoid debt like the plague. I use credit cards for everything I can to get the rebates but I have always paid them in full each month. The only times I have borrowed were for the first three homes I have bought. The last two I have paid cash. Most people here have bigger homes but I would hate to see their utility bills.0 -
One HUGE mistake people make is they think of their minimum credit payments as part of their expenses when they think of what they can live on.
If they pay just the minimum payments on everything they think they have LOTS of extra money.
"I'm not living paycheck to paycheck because at the end of the month I still have money." (While their debt is not getting any lower.)0 -
We are currently living paycheck to paycheck, but our short term future looks good and long term future looks bright.
What I mean by that, is we currently have a house payment and 2 car payments. We also have a credit card payment each and then our regular monthly bills and cost of living of course.
That being said, at 25, I tired to put our future plans in "5 year increments." Obviously, you will always have unexpected expenses to plan for or make work when they come up. At 25-30, we spent a lot on travel, a house, cars, our dogs, etc., so I knew that would be an expensive 5 years. I figured 30-35 would be a buckle down and get er' done 5 years, and 35-40 would be a start to get back to even. We should have 2 fairly new vehicles that are both paid off, little-to-no credit card debt, no school loans, and very little work that needs to be put into our house. The plan at that time, is for us to have 1 non-living expense payment....our house.
I guess we both chose to put some money away(mainly our retirement), but also do, see, and buy things. Neither of us wanted to just put money away all our lives and then when were getting close to being able to reap our rewards, get cancer or something crazy like that. I guess we have tried to find a balance between debt and living.
Obviously, there are a lot of factors that have already and can/will play into modifying or changing our plan, but we have some blueprints at least. [:D]
Jon0 -
When I was in business for myself My wife and I went for months without pay at times. Had to sell off part of the inventory to survive. My heart Bleed for those poor over compensated gov. employees with their $100,000.00 RVs and all their toys. All they ever did for me was make my life miserable with regulations, permits. taxes and fees. wonder how it feel to be on the other side. The VA is the only one who ever did anything for me. They are Great. 0 -
quote:Originally posted by Toolman286
When we moved to SW Va, all we heard was crying that, "You Yankees have all the money." So, I told them the secret; "We go to work 5 days a week. And when OT is offered, everyone volunteers and all the wives understand as it means more money." When they stop booing, my wife adds that, "they must be truly rich as they take a day off without pay when ever they want." They try, but they have no comeback.
Yeah, but you?re still a Yankee.0 -
We are a consumer culture. These folks living pay day to pay day are just doing their part to be good consumers. 0 -
quote:Originally posted by us55840
quote:Originally posted by jerrywh818
When I was in business for myself My wife and I went for months without pay at times. Had to sell off part of the inventory to survive. My heart Bleed for those poor over compensated gov. employees with their $100,000.00 RVs and all their toys. All they ever did for me was make my life miserable with regulations, permits. taxes and fees. wonder how it feel to be on the other side. The VA is the only one who ever did anything for me. They are Great.
AGREE 100%
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Amen!0 -
quote:Originally posted by jimdeere
quote:Originally posted by Toolman286
When we moved to SW Va, all we heard was crying that, "You Yankees have all the money." So, I told them the secret; "We go to work 5 days a week. And when OT is offered, everyone volunteers and all the wives understand as it means more money." When they stop booing, my wife adds that, "they must be truly rich as they take a day off without pay when ever they want." They try, but they have no comeback.
Yeah, but you?re still a Yankee.
[:D][:D]0 -
I've been paycheck to paycheck in my youth. By not being stupid I managed to pay off my house when I took early retirement from AT&T at age 50. Always lived decently and living well in my old age at 74. Younger people today spend every dime they make. If a problem comes up just set up a go fund me account. People don't have life insurance any more. Local family had a child die of cancer a while back and had a go fund me account that came up with enought money for a super delux funeral. I was raised to pay my own way and that family took care of family. Accepting chairity was frowned on. Poor people used to be ashamed to accept charity. Now they expect it or the government to take care of everything. 0 -
The paycheck to paycheck issue is just a symptom of far larger problems that have been festering in this country for decades. Outsourcing, stagnant wages, inflation (real inflation not the phony numbers reported), and the ever growing debt problem. Debt at every level starting with personal debt all the way up to the national debt with it's 500 billion dollar a year interest hits. The debt train is careening out of control and it's going to eventually wreck. 0 -
And the ones who live off the Government are in for a rude awakening. My wife works for the State of Washington DSHS. Notices just went out yesterday to people on the food program to be prepared that Federal Money they will get their February money this weekend early because they will not be getting any money in February. So budget the money on the food card wisely as there will be no payment after this unless the shutdown ends. And HUD will not be paying landlords for Section 8 after February. Layoffs of State workers are coming soon too. If a shutdown gets to that point and people start to lose their homes because they were out of work for too long and couldn?t find anything will have wished they had put away 6 months of bills like Dave Ramsey talks about. And today I saw on the news Pelosi doesn?t want Trump to do the State of the Union address because of security concerns or he can submit it in writing. He SHOULD do it live and make that witch sit through it. 0
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