Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
My grandfather a lowly factory worker who retired with a defined benefit pension which for him was a lifesaver. He had very little savings. Today there are no pensions, and a lot of people aren't making enough to save anything substantial.
I fear what is going to happen when Gen X and Millennials are ready to retire.
I fear what is going to happen when Gen X and Millennials are ready to retire.
My real fear is that these generations may end up having to "retire" even earlier than the boomers. The trend nowadays is to axe older workers in favor of younger and cheaper ones. Retirement may come sooner than one thinks!
I'm firmly ensconced in retirement math. I shudder to think about the economics of a non-working wife when you get to age 65 if you haven't been economically successful yourself. With two Social Security checks and a modest IRA/401(k) portfolio, it wouldn't be awful. With one Social Security check and no savings, you'd have to find a trailer park and eat beans & rice. That Harvard Med School daughter is going to be supporting them. They're going to be right around the poverty level.
I don't believe it will be an issue if a wife did work. According to my SS benefits reports that got mailed to me I would qualify based on the points I earned, this was before I even hit 30. So I could've quit work and stayed home the rest of my years and qualified for SS in retirement.
Technically they can sell the phone and get 200-300 out of it and sell something else to come up with the money. So its not all lost cause. I know if today i needed to come up with some urgent money that is not covered by my saving, I might go out and pawn off my jewelry or even sell my car.
Most pawn shops give you about 10% of the actual value and if you want the item back at some point you are going to paying much more than you originally got from them unless you come back within a certain amount of time (30-90 days?)
When my husband died I had to pawn my diamond wedding band a few months later before his VA benefits kicked in. By the time I started getting the pension the ring was too expensive to get back. It still breaks my heart when I think of it.
I'm almost 30 and have a good job with a lot of savings.
My personal opinion is that if you can't pay for something in cash without a significant change in your lifestyle, you can't afford it and shouldn't be buying it.
Exactly! This is why so many people are having financial difficulties. If you purchase something with a credit card and don't pay it off within the first month you are paying interest. If you pay the minimum amount every month by the time you are done paying for the item you have probably paid 3 times the original price. But unfortunately these days most everybody wants instant gratification. Years ago people know how to stretch a dollar and only rich people had credit cards.
I see the same thing with my oldest son. He is paying $1600 a month for a condo (he has a roommate) plus he has a car payment, a motorcycle payment and student loans. He takes regular vacations. He has a little money in savings but not sure if it is enough to keep him going for 6 months if something happens to him. I'm going to suggest he buy some disability insurance which is helpful to most people without a serious medical condition.
On the flip side, wages, especially minimum wage, have not kept up with inflation. I think if you work 40 hours/week, you should be able to afford an apartment and groceries. For people in that boat, of course they don't have any savings. They can barely feed themselves.
their skill set has also not kept up with "inflation" either. why should someone get paid more today as opposed to last year if they are still doing the same thing? if they dont learn anything new, dont make more sandwiches, dont take on additional duties?
even if the minimum wage is $50/hr, by staying static in their skills when they are directly in competition with technology, that leaves them open to being fired when someone walks in and says they can operate the machine quicker, better or when someone can sell them one that eliminates the job altogether.
so what is the point of "helping" them with a higher wage if they dont bother improving themselves at same time? they will still be out of a job soon enough and earning $0 no matter what the current wage is
a lot of college grads that got out of school in years past is going to face this if they dont figure out how to apply what they learned in school to their job. the knowledge they got will become outdated or forgotten. employers will just hire a new grad over one from a decade ago that equally has no experience in the field. and the economy will just brush those people aside and keep on ticking.
The things you mention are short-term problems that don't crop up every year, or even every decade. If people just make payments into an emergency fund instead of to a credit card balance, they will have 18% more money to spend. I won't say your hypothetical "virtuous poor" don't exist, but they are pretty rare. Mostly they are broke because they piddle their money away.
As mentioned in the economy magazine Duh. Sometimes you can be frugal, but the first major car repair, home repair, or medical bill comes along and wipes out your savings. It's tough to build it back up when groceries and other necessities cost a fortune.
I don't see many comments sympathizing with the writer of the article, who lives on the east end of Long Island and hit a home run with his daughter's education/career choice. It's a long personal profile without much context on why 47% of people can't immediately come up with $400. You can probably split these people into three groups.
1. People who don't make enough money to keep up with the rising cost of basic needs.
2. People who took on large debt, either by choice (education), or by misfortune (health).
3. People who make enough money, but have no financial discipline, no concept of want vs. need.
I don't really sympathize with the writer but I don't think he is looking for sympathy. He seems to acknowledge he is largely the reason he finds himself in this predicament.
Quote:
Originally Posted by emm74
So yeah, I guess I am being a little bit judgy, but I would certainly have felt more sympathy if this situation had been as a result of some unforeseen event outside his control rather than a series of choices to live beyond his means.
^This.
I also grew up in NYC (albeit low income) and my parents at the time probably bought one of the cheapest houses in the neighborhood so that they could live in a decent area. (They borrowed the d/p from my grandparents.) My parents never moved to a bigger house even though they wanted to---we had six people at one time living in less than 800 square feet. They did not send us to private school that they couldn't afford like the writer of the article, who could have bought a coop in an area with decent schools in Brooklyn as there are MANY of them. They didn't pay for college---I had to go to the local city college. They didn't pay for my wedding---I had to pay for it myself.
Yet here I am, much younger than he is and somehow my husband and I can afford to live on probably much less money than he makes. We live in a very small coop and as much as I don't like it, I focus on the fact that it will get me to where I want to be, someday. I am stashing money away (while still enjoying my life) because I want to buy a house one day where I put down about 50% and keep the mortgage payments very low. I would love to run out tomorrow and buy something with at least a second bedroom but it is not time yet.
Honestly, I am more worried about our parents, probably somewhere around the writer's age, because I look around and I see my MIL living on SS only and she has ZERO money saved and is always living paycheck-to-paycheck and my parents who will inevitably be doing the same. And I worry that it will turn into both sides needing financial help constantly, when I sacrifice a lot to be in the position that I am currently in and when I am working so hard toward my goals.
People are reading the article wrong. The author is by all definitions a VERY successful person. He's doing better than the overwhelming majority of writers in America. He's had scripts bought by TV shows, film studios, gets large advances for books. He has more than enough money to take care of himself. He has more than enough money to keep his smartphone connected to 4g and his LED TV connected to cable.
People are confusing things. POOR PEOPLE can afford a 60 inch TV these days. They sell them for a few hundred at Wal-Mart. POOR PEOPLE can afford a smartphone plan. It's not like communication was ever free... I remember my parents baby bell telephone bills back in the 1980s - they were easily 40-50 back then to keep a phone in the house and talk to the relatives long distance once in a while. $45 in 1985 is equivalent to $100 today - so we're paying about the same for our phones.
The point is that our wages have stagnated and our costs have gone WAY up - especially college and health care.
It's the costs of being "middle class" that he can't afford. It looks like the big killer for the author was his daughters' college. He could "choose" not to try to send them to the best college possible.... but then his daughters will be worse off than him.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
