“It feels like I’ve been working harder and harder and sliding backwards down the scale,” she says.

Making $50k in a small town and still “scraping by” is scary. Maybe I’m just old, but I’d hoped that kind of income would be enough for some kind of comfort.

  • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    15
    arrow-down
    17
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    Really? What do her bills look like? Is she ordering DoorDash for every meal?

    Give me a free house and car, and I could easily live on half that much money.

    EDIT: Here’s what the article says. This looks like a pretty random budget, and the house was not free as the headline suggests.

    Her typical monthly expenses:

    Investments: $0

    Savings: $0

    Pensions: $0

    Taxes: $415 in monthly tax deductions

    Household: $2,175

    Mortgage: $1,162.70

    Utilities: $233

    Hydro: $165

    Internet: $135

    Property tax: $216

    Property insurance: $184

    Phone bill: $80

    Transportation: $384

    Car repairs: $50

    Car insurance: $184

    Gas: $150

    Food and drink (total): $520

    Groceries: $400

    Eating out: $60

    Coffee/tea: $20

    Alcohol: $40

    Miscellaneous (dental, clothing, other shopping, nails, hair, spa etc) - $680

    Her cats: $350 (food, meds and litter)

    Haircuts/cosmetics: $150

    Prescriptions: $100

    Dental: $0 this year

    Clothing: $50

    Apps: $30

    Vacations: $0

    Hobbies/recreation: $0

    • SkepticalButOpenMinded@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      35
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Maybe you agree with this, but where’s the fat? Is a vet not allowed to have pets? It’s still a barebones budget.

      And the thing to realize about high stress professional jobs is that you have to eat out more and make use of services to save time and energy. It’s a tough demanding job, especially for the pay. There’s a reason why vets have amongst the highest suicide rates of any profession.

      • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        13
        ·
        1 year ago

        Vet techs too (family member manages a vet hospital) with the suicide risk.

        There are so many frustrated, worried people coming in who don’t understand the vet is busy doing so much with so few staff and the reason your appointment has been bumped is because the vet is gone, either left the city, the profession or this plane of existence. All too often the last option, and everyone’s working through the fall-out.

        And vets largely don’t see people unless during the exam with an animal; the rest of the time its vet-techs or reception/admin staff. And people lose their metric shit at appointment changes, bad news, or even the bill (because it’s always high; get insurance, kids). Admins and techs take the full Karen tornado, which while understandable is still not justifiable. Not cool.

        So they shed a customer and sometimes they lose staff too. And they’re no longer losing the slackers who don’t care about animals: they’re losing the animal nuts whose hearts used to be in it. Sometimes those people leave this life as well. It’s that bad, that often, for that long.

        So yeah, they blow off a lot of steam and leverage those social peer bonds, and I don’t see that pressure valve here. You’re either gonna spend money on frivolity, psyche sessions, or worse. So those numbers need to be higher for the short term.

      • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        17
        ·
        1 year ago

        Her utilities are higher than my 3 bedroom house’s. Phone bill is a bit high, Internet bill is double what it should be, property tax and insurance are high, haircuts, cosmetics, shopping all could be reduced. The cat bill is ridiculous, unless those are some sick pets with long term illnesses or she has about 30 normal ones.

        Bottom line is that is not the budget of someone who’s “Struggling” in life. Struggling would be not having the money to do half the things on that budget.

          • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            10
            ·
            1 year ago

            Whatever, I’m the one who’s out of touch but I have a very good budget and all my bills are paid. Do you own a house? Because I do and I manage all the household bills and I do know how to make ends meet on a budget.

            You are free to ignore my info at your own risk.

    • baconisaveg@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      1 year ago

      $135 for Internet and $80 for mobile is criminal. I pay $130/month for internet, but that’s for high speed fiber, because I work from home as a software engineer. I also only pay $35/month for mobile after switching to Virgin because Telus’ prices are insane.

      I miss living in California and paying $20/month for Google Fi.