
So, I’m surfing the web the other day and come across this article on Market Watch: The title is, ‘I’m paycheck to paycheck.’ I make $350K a year, but have $88K in student loans, $170K in car loans and a mortgage I pay $4,500 a month on. Do I need professional help?
"'I'm paycheck to paycheck'" I make $350K a year"https://t.co/r3kFWpwigz
— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) October 10, 2022
I said to myself, “Self, don’t read that. It’s just gonna piss you off.”
Don’t doooo it…
But alas, I read it anyway.
The chick who is asking the Internet for financial advice admittedly says how “blessed” she is to make $350K before taxes, being the sole breadwinner for her family. And that’s great – good for her. AMERICA!
My first takeaway from the article, though? It’s remarkable to me how many people with ZERO common sense are making so much damn money. Truly. Amazing.
So, first off, she has “two auto loans totaling $170K for two electric vehicles at 5% interest.” Apparently, being a person who believes in stapling money to the clouds is more important than having money in the bank for her family. ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY GRAND FOR CARS, y’all. I’m no financial planner, but if she was asking me specifically, I’d say that she doesn’t need “professional help” as much as she does a dose of FREAKING REALITY OMG WTF LADY. When your car loans are HALF of what you make in a year? You should probably think about maybe getting different cars. I haven’t driven a new car since 2003. It’s just a mechanism that gets you from point A to point B. And here’s a tip: used cars don’t depreciate like new ones do. Bonus. Used NON-ELECTRIC cars are always a lovely option. A lot of us out here in Reality-Land have them. She may need a few minutes to digest that earth-shattering information.
You’re welcome, lady. I just saved you tens of thousands of dollars.
The other doozy for me? That $4500 mortgage. Holy crap, that’s a lot of money. I know, I know, rents are insanely high right now and so are mortgages, but $4500? She doesn’t have to be paying this much. That’s legit a choice. I lived in a four bedroom, three and a half bath home in Indiana, and my mortgage was nowhere NEAR that amount. Just seeing that number gives me heart palpitations. Of course, that was Indiana. But if she REALLY WANTED to, she could make this number go down. Does she work at home? Could she move? Does she need as big of a place as what she currently has? I feel like she could change this number without question, but then again, this chick sounds like she reeeealllly has expensive taste. Just a hunch.
And the savings piece is interesting, too. The fact that she’s saving at ALL means that she ISN’T actually living paycheck to paycheck. If she wasn’t saving, she could say that out loud with a straight face. But when you have any money left over at the end of the month? You don’t get to say that.
Another thing that made me say “hmmm…”? What do you want to bet that this chick is going to be FIRST IN LINE to get her loans “forgiven?” You know, by YOU AND ME? All while she’s raking in 350K a year and pissing it away on 170K worth of wind-up cars and a house she can’t afford, bitching to people on Market Watch that she’s living “paycheck to paycheck?”
This is where my blood pressure started to officially go up.
Basically, this article was annoying AF and I couldn’t know it alone – so you’re welcome! It shines a spotlight on so much of what’s wrong with our society today, and I wanted to punch the entire article in the face. For crying out loud, Market Watch. Maybe learn to read the room.
2 Comments
Yeah. This lady clearly had no idea how to save money.
That isn’t an article, it’s an advertisement masquerading as an article.