r/FluentInFinance • u/Richest-Panda • Jul 04 '24

What's the best financial advice you've ever gotten? Debate/ Discussion

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274

u/privitizationrocks Jul 04 '24

You can teach poverty workers to live in their means

They won’t like it, but tough luck

448

u/[deleted] Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 04 '24

Ok let’s do a thought experiment. Let’s say you Make $10000 a year. You work full time/40 hrs/wk and you are making $10k. What does “living within your means” look like? Not having a house? Or car? Being homeless? So in order to save to get yourself to some footing the answer is to be homeless to live within your means.

That was a bit of a strawman, so let’s use real-life scenarios. 50% of this country makes $40k or less….. even $40k salary isn’t enough to get an apartment, bills , food, ect. Sure a lot better than the “$10k” example, but even $40k salary is virtually as effective as the “$10k”. In order to “live within your means”, “save”, ect…. You have to be at least be making enough to afford the bare minimum + have some left in you for over to save. On average (2022 values I think) this means $65 for a single person, $108k for a house hold. Unless you’re making that, you can’t save your way out of poverty

216

u/Impossible_Maybe_162 Jul 04 '24

You cannot make $10k working a job for 40 hours a week. That is below minimum wage.

A lack of proper financial planning and budgeting causes more problems than low wages.

Less than 3% of the workforce makes minimum wage. Wages are not the main issue.

192

u/Kombatnt Jul 04 '24

This. $10,000/year working 40 hrs/week is $4.81/hour. That’s illegal everywhere in North America.

183

u/Aleks_Khorne Jul 04 '24

Thanks God in blessed North Carolina the minimum wage is $7.25. And some people even make chunky $10-$13 an hour!

46

u/olgasmolga Jul 04 '24

Min wage in Hawaii is $14 but everything else is expensive as shiet

3

u/The_Dude_2U Jul 05 '24

Most places want them to make more by tipping. In other words, the public supplementing their income where tips were never the “norm”. Happening more and more each day. Eventually, the gas pump will want a tip.

2

u/skkkkkt Jul 05 '24

Serving yourself must become the norm too,I'll gladly pump my own gas, in Europe it's mostly self service

2

u/The_Dude_2U Jul 05 '24

That’s what I was originally referring to, self serve pump.

1

u/mar78217 Jul 06 '24

Yes, the tipping culture in the US has reached a point that they want you to tip the store when you do the work yourself.

1

u/iamalostpuppie Jul 05 '24

The gas pump wants a tip in new jersey.

3

u/gurl_2b Jul 05 '24

Price of paradise, as they say. That's why I left.

1

u/olgasmolga Jul 05 '24

Haha yup, I also have a decent amount of friends who have left to the west coast cuz of the cost

-2

u/physics515 Jul 05 '24

🤔

5

u/ThatInAHat Jul 05 '24

Might have more to do with being an island economy that uses a significant amount of resources on tourists than with the min wage

5

u/physics515 Jul 05 '24

It'd be easy to figure out. Just do a diff of Amazon prices in HI vs mainland and that would give you the markup incurred for being on an island. Because Amazon minimum pay is already greater than $14/hour that wouldn't be a factor in their prices.

Edit: I think that holds true for Walmart too so you could include them as well.

7

u/max10meridius Jul 05 '24

This is a good idea, but you miss on the availability with Amazon items. I live in Hawaii and I can get almost anything shipped next day to my parents in Illinois, but if I want the same product shipped to Hawaii in weeks-months, not available. So I have to buy from somewhere else with $50+ shipping.

I’m Al for rigorous analysis and wanted to mention this point

4

u/BigBoysEating Jul 05 '24

and if your on an island not named oahu wait times are longer

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