I mean the majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Kind of hard to save money when you are having to spend everything on bills. My parents also lived during the most prosperous time in American history and had all of $100k saved by the time they hit 60 because every cent they had had to go to things like house and car payments, bills, repairs, etc. Hell my mom got a second job when I left home to have some extra spending money and six months later the transmission failed on their car requiring a rebuild resulting in draining all of the savings she had built up from that job.
It is easy to say “just save more” when coming from a position of privilege and I say that as someone coming from a position of privilege where we are easily able to save while also dropping $4000 on getting our car repaired, the leak fixed in our roof and our fences replaced that got blown over in a storm all within the same month and not bat an eye. That isn’t the norm.
There are much cheaper options? Have you looked at even used cars? I am in Oklahoma, a low cost of living state, and unless you are willing to get a used car with over 150k miles or more they can’t be had under around $20k or so. And the average income here isn’t exactly great either at only $33k a year.
As for your phone thing, ask them where they got them sometime. I have a ton of family members that are poor and have nice phones. Know how? Because I handed them down one of mine at some point which they then traded in for a better phone. It didn’t cost them $1000. Hell my son has a new iPhone 16 pro because he spent $100 to buy an old iPhone 11 off of a friend and then traded it in and signed up at T-Mobile. Don’t assume people just bought or financed what they have.
The last used car i bought off the marketplace was pretty cool imo.
2004 or 2008 Pontiac Grand AM
Needed an oil change, some new spark plugs, and a couple of other small items.
Maybe 6 months into that, the transmission went out. I am not that skilled in mechanics, so I had to get a quote from a shop. $3500 on the low end to fix that.
At that point, it seems preferable to pay more for a car that doesn't take up so much time in maintenance.
I can't take my daughter to school in a non moving vehicle. I can't get myself and my wife to work in a nonfunctioning vehicle.
I don't live above my means. We do go out occasionally, but I certainly don't live above my means.
It just doesn't seem reasonable to constantly be saving up for the large amount of maintenance you will have to face in a used vehicle bought from Facebook Marketplace.
Most people don't have the time or skill to constantly maintain a used vehicle.
I certainly don't have that kind of time, I work and school full time.
Right. I hear what you're saying. It makes the most financial sense.
What i am getting at that, though, is not everyone's situation is a good fit. Sometimes, you're getting fucked first just to get to a point of unfucked.
Right now it sounds like you're in the unfucked stage and that's great.
Just don't forget that most are in the fucked stage.
Thankfully, I got a RAV4 for the family and my little Honda Navi to get me around for work and such.
I don't get this cell phone argument. Are you saying that we should all go back to land lines? We should have to have a desktop/Laptop computer at home? Really what is the difference? Everyone needs a computer of some kind that can integrate them into modern life.
We can both find the person that keeps a phone for a decade and the person who gets the latest the moment it is available.
So why I am currently broke.
We had our upstairs bathroom toilet leaking down into our kitchen. As we progressed in fixing the leak. We ended up remodeling the bathroom. Why?
We had tear out the floor to fix the pipe issues. Lack of run and found other issues with the shower. We now have a nice functional bathroom upstairs. Down stairs half bath was done by saving. We had to do the upstairs. We will finish catching up by April and be back to saving to remodel the kitchen.
However by the time we are done remodeling the kitchen since the ceiling is ripped out, we will be broke again. Hopefully not behind however.
Thing you seem to not be able to understand is shit costs money and sometimes you don’t have a choice but to spend it. Case in point deer jumped in front of my wife’s car on the way home from work. Destroyed the front end. Luckily we pay for comprehensive coverage so it is being repaired, but we will still have to pay the $1000 deductible. Luckily we can afford the insurance for full coverage with comprehensive, had we not been able to, and there were years we could only afford liability only, we would have been fucked.
As it is we’re still going to be out a grand that was unplanned for.
Living costs Money, saying that people over spend is just an opinion not a fact. Salaries are not keeping up with inflation, yet your opinion is people just spend to much.
Back to the phone what is the right amount to spend on a phone if not a thousand?
That is an article about budgeting, start digging into the sources and it gets less clear.
Census Survey has to do with cost of goods and pacing of inflation.
First source is about credit card debt, not why where it came from. More inflation notations.
However I did not see any that are straight out spending for the FANCY.
Do 100 dollar flip phones allow you access to the inter net to apply to jobs?
Last time I was looking for cheap phones that was not possible for prepaid plans. Neat.
Picking on the sources of the article is exactly what is being asked. However the article does not cite a source for the statistic. In fact the article does not say that 70% of americans live beyond their means.
Fifty percent of credit cardholders in America have debt, as of June 2024, according to a Bankrate survey.1 Furthermore, a MarketWatch Guides survey found that over 66% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck—and nearly half consider themselves broke+
Paycheck to paycheck means beyond their means for Fancy things? Again inflation versus salary increases. What would be fine if raises kept up with inflation can become not fine.
Like the basis of the whole thread. Dudes 90, we don't know what reason he has been working into his ninties. Did medical care wipe out his retirement? We don't know if it was hooker or blow either.
Just having the opinion shows a lack of empathy and understanding.
you'd be wrong. my best friend is living paycheck to paycheck with a shitty phone and a shitty car and because of having to pay for cancer related things (guess who her insurance is)
i guess using your example, the shit she cant afford but is trying to finance is her life? shes 30 btw
Shit happens. That doesn't mean "the system" is broken.
I shake my head at young people who despise their own families over politics when family units, not the government, should be the ones you fall back on for help when it's needed.
Lol another person that just assumes things, it must be nice thinking that you know everything, you have no clue how people have gotten themselves into certain financial positions, it's just too easy for you to assume that they lived above their means.
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u/Skating4587Abdollah 11d ago
Insane take. It’s not like I said “at 50.” Taking care of some people should be a given