How are the people in your world doing financially?

This is a tough economy ever since Biden took office and the COVID fiasco/lie/"never let an opportunity go to wast..AKA Barrack". I have two jobs now. Fuel prices are double, groceries are up almost double. And salaries and wages are up but not anywhere close to what inflation is. I want to go back to Trumps economy. No war. Gas was $2. Groceries were way cheaper. The young kids working in the company I work at, both companies, are all living at home or are moving back home with family. All are making due with used automobiles and all of them cannot afford health insurance. I hope they all go out in mass and vote for anyone other than Biden and all the baby boomers that helped get him elected. The boomers time is over. Time to pass the torch you ball hogs.a reply to: JAGStorm

I'm not sure how it is everywhere. All the "kids" in the family are doing well. Mine in their early 20s are all doing well in their positions, they have significant others that are doing well also. They've both purchased houses in the last year, take vacations and save. At 19, the youngest works at a law firm during her college summer break and got a raise this year to 17.00, which is good at her age. Their slightly older cousins, work for a city, one worked her way up to Director of Risk Management of a hospital, one is in corporate of an auto company in the cyber security area as she also speaks Mandarin fluently. Others are in the auto manufacturing area, working lots of overtime. Some went to college, some didn't. However, my brothers and sister and I all worked ourselves as soon as we were able and all of our children did too. I think parental influence is a big factor. Of course something could happen with any of their jobs, but I think they would have no issue finding another if so. So far we've all been hard workers and it has worked out.

The toughest time for me was around 2008. Only time in my life my company closed and it took almost a year to find another position that was relatively the same.

a reply to: JAGStorm

As far as kids go, back when cost of living was good and inflation wasn't out of this world, we still couldn't afford our own place even with full time jobs. Our only shot at that was finding another roommate, preferably two. I'm an 80's kid and lived at home until I was 21 and got into the oilfield working from 2am to 6pm Mon thru Sat, that's when I was able to purchase my first home.

Today, my oldest is 21 and works a full time job with his GF, they shared an apartment with another couple until that couple got married, then my son and his GF moved in with my son's grandmother because they can't afford a vehicle note, insurance, utilities, AND rent. Inflation has decimated this country and the younger generation is suffering the most because of it. They're learning the hard way about the impact of far left policies.

a reply to: frogs453

I think parental influence is a big factor. Of course something could happen with any of their jobs, but I think they would have no issue finding another if so. So far we've all been hard workers and it has worked out.

All my kids are workoholics, I think it runs in the blood. I feel really bad for people that have parents that have issues.
The amount of addiction issues I've seen with some of these parents is....sobering. It's interesting how it plays out with their children. Some follow the exact same broken footsteps as their degenerate parent(s)... but every once in a while you'll see one that wants to be the exact opposite. What a hard road that is...

originally posted by: ancientlight

originally posted by: NorthOfStuffx2
a reply to: ancientlight

Your post reminded me of a posted video that has a twenty something woman complaining about not being able to live on under 100k per year.

I couldn’t find the one I was looking for but found other examples.

Here’s one…

twitter.com...

It seems that some people have lost perspective and don’t quite understand what broke is anymore.

Exactly. My income is nothing near that and I have no debt and savings. All about priorities

Me as well! Good for you!

Todays kids won’t learn how to do that in today’s education system.

Heck, I didn’t learn how until I was in my 40’s.

This is the guy that put me on the right track, and it works.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Oh for sure. My kids know kids who didn't have the greatest upbringing and even though they were doing well in HS, they all fell apart after and are not doing well at all now. I tried my best to be a house they could hang out at, have a good meal and talk back then, but my girls had to maintain a distance after, as they wanted nothing to do with the drama the others had. They keep in touch though and I feel awful at the lost potential. So far none of them have succeeded yet. It's a shame.

Then on the other hand my youngest works with a girl who's working full time, going to school and her parents kicked her to the streets for a time because she came out as Lesbian. Here's a kids trying to do her best to better herself and they tossed her aside and preferred she go back to her previous somewhat abusive boyfriend, cuz "Jesus does not approve".
It's tough out there all the way around. I can only imagine what you see. It's probably tough.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Not personal acquaintances.

But lots of motorcycles, collector cars, recreational vehicles FOR SALE.
Small businesses continue to be newly empty buildings. [counter that with some new businesses starting/opening]
Starting to see more and more rental vacancies for living quarters.

originally posted by: DontTreadOnMe
a reply to: JAGStorm

Not personal acquaintances.

But lots of motorcycles, collector cars, recreational vehicles FOR SALE.
Small businesses continue to be newly empty buildings. [counter that with some new businesses starting/opening]
Starting to see more and more rental vacancies for living quarters.

I think people went a little crazy during Covid expecting it to be like lockdown for ten years or something.
Lots of insane purchase, wonder if there are a lot of regrets?

I too looked at RVs but i'm not an impulse buyer at all, i'm the research for a few years type of buyer.

So housing prices are high to the point no one can afford them unless they have equity from another house. I'm moving and selling my house but I'm going to rent the next two years to see if the housing market corrects back 20 or 30% with such a fast rise in value these last 5 years. I will put my current equity in a growth fund account and revisit buying a house in two years.

Rent is also crazy where I live as it seems it's been going up 30% or more per year.

The minimum wage here is over 15 per hour and that might seem great, but a pizza and a few beers is like 80 bucks now. So what you get one way you lose another. Workers in the lowest level jobs get more money, but the middle-wage groups get hit with more cost in everything as there are no upward adjustments to account for the increase in minimum.

Gas is over 5 bucks a gallon where I live...

originally posted by: ancientlight
a reply to: JAGStorm

Living within your means , makes a huge difference, especially now. Many want the latest phones, take outs , eating out, newest appliances, holidays , a bigger place than they can afford etc. It all adds up. I used everything until it stops working. I drive a 2005 car , my phone is second hand galaxy s9, appliances are 20+ years old , always cook from scratch etc.

I would love to get take-outs , a newer car , shiny new things off course, but I make sacrifices. Constantly , every day.
Sacrifice now and feel better later.
Saving and investing (real estate, index funds etc) are esssential . Also an emergency fund.

That’s good advice. It’a lot harder to accomplish these days.
That is, in order to make ends meet, just basic ones, more hours are required.
If more hours are required, there may need to be daycare, or some take out meals.

Companies are offering contract 1099s and part-time in order to save payroll.
No benefits are offfered with either. Which can mean higher medical costs and no pension or 401k matches.

why cant you or your husband work? a reply to: GENERAL EYES

originally posted by: JAGStorm
What a rollercoater these last few years have been.

I'm around a lot of young people and the only reason many of them are floating is that they have parents helping.
Multi generational homes are going to be here for a while.

These kids are no freeloaders either. Almost all the kids I'm talking about have a more than full time job, and many have second jobs. Many are hustling even doing those things, and it's not enough to afford a place of their own.

This isn't a discussion so much about wages, but more so the cost of living. I'm talking about the US, but I hear similar things from places like the UK, Germany, France, etc. Some Americans are choosing to permanently leave the US for Southeast Asia, or Central America just so they stand a chance at a normal life.

I personally took a financial hit. I work in mortgage business and went from 2.5 years of record business during pandemic to basically zero overnight with highest rates in like 25 years or so. Fortunately, I have 20 years in the industry and have done well enough that we have money saved. The business is cyclical and will pick up sooner or later. I have co-workers that went from making say $500k+ (some well into seven figures) to barely $100k if they are lucky.

Good thing my wife is an executive in tech and has been doing really well. She gets recruited all the time.

We can live off her income fairly easily with no real impact on our lifestyle. However, we are cutting back on some frivolous spending like travel that we used to do quite a bit. Trying to eat out less.

a reply to: JAGStorm

My wife and I are both professionals.

But we budget based on just one salary. Our house, our lifestyle, our vacations. . . .

We're each others insurance policy.

That way our lifestyle doesn't change if one of us isn't working.

originally posted by: DBCowboy
a reply to: JAGStorm

My wife and I are both professionals.

But we budget based on just one salary. Our house, our lifestyle, our vacations. . . .

We're each others insurance policy.

That way our lifestyle doesn't change if one of us isn't working.

Not trying to keep up with the Jones is the secret to low stress living. It is hard though, especially if you live in an urban area among other professionals. Everyone has nice cars, certain level of house, private schools, vacation homes, etc.... all the trapping of success. The problem is you get on a hamster wheel. I think I've heard it called lifestyle creep. Income goes up and you start spending more and more.

We've been in same modest house for nearly 20 years and have focused on our retirement savings. We do enjoy some of the finer things in life, but definitely live way below our means compared to households with similar incomes. It is stressful though seeing income drop substantially even if you don't technically need the money....

a reply to: Edumakated

We may not have the newest cars in our driveway but we have no car payments.

Our house suits our needs.

We don't eat out much or buy a lot, but when we flew to San Antonio a couple weeks ago to see our son graduate from Air Force basic, we flew 1st class and stayed at a nice hotel.

So we "spend" but we try to be reasonable about it.

What we don't have going into our other property we own, (again no mortgage) we do buy gold and silver.

We're always thinking "worse case" scenarios.

Seems like people's personal debt is increasing around here. I think that after the lockdowns, people went way orerboard with their spending. Even with prices way too high in restaurants now, people are still going, they got worse at living within their means now instead of better.

The cost of everything is going up so much these days, look at the regular prices on the shelves in the supermarket. Most have a little sign on them stating a cost savings price, that is because if another pandemic hits, they can go up to the full price if needed and avoid price gouging charges to the store. The government can lock them into that price even if costs of goods to the stores go above that point and a store cannot lose money for months and stay solvent.

We are doing about the same as before now, we have been living within our means for years now and it is nice not having a house mortgage or balances on the credit cards. We do have about four grand or so left to pay on our car, but the payments are way ahead of schedule and we should be done paying it off in about ten months...two years ahead of the loan date.

But the stocks we still own dropped quite a bit in value over the last three years, just as a lot of our friends portfolios. I know guys who were supposed to retire that kept working because their retirement accounts took such a hit.

Wages here did not go up nearly as much as the cost of living since Biden took over.

This is only the beginning.

sailing close to the wind but then the uks always inhabited that space throughout my life

this is like my 70s childhood a time of extremes, filled with cold, worry and driven by an establishment that cares more for the look of the thing that reality and unable to think for itself..

a reply to: HODOSKE

That's between me, him and the Federal Government.

Not good if they were struggling before.

Our cities in canada are filling up with homeless camps and there are homeless camps out in the bush near our village as well as many elderly people living in cars and vans.