Kids are too expensive anyways.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/CollegeAndFamily/RaiseKids/RaiseKids.aspx?GT1=8385

MY url didn't work again, so here is the web address above.

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lab mom

try using www.tinyurl.com. it converts these big long urls to tiny ones.. its quite good

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I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone

Lord, what fools these mortals be!
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene ii

Voltaire said: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

H.L.Mencken wrote:"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Albert Einstein

Here is something I don't understand. I really hate MSN. They are always telling me that on my ~$30K income, I should be living under a bridge, because obviously I can't afford to live. However, they have no shame in suggesting that people spend $20K on a wedding, $10K on the "right" engagement ring, have a litter of kids (because somehow God will provide or money will rain from the sky), and buy a McMansion with all of the "right" frills (soccer-mommy SUV or two, all the kiddie crap you can stuff in your McMansion, etc). If the average household income in the US is about $50K, then how the hell are people able to own all this crap? I know they can put it on credit, but what about those expensive interest fees?

MSN is one of the most breeder-pleasing sites in the world. I hate them, too.

I guess it's only okay to buy things on credit if it is *for the children*. That way, the breeders can play the child card when they can't make the payments. If a CFer falls on hard times and can't make the payments, well, there is just NO excuse, now, is there?

Never mind that breeders usually get over their heads in debt due to their own stupid choices. CF can make dumb money choices, too, but it's still always the breeders who manage to get a *get out of jail free* card.

I made a few dumb money choices re: credit cards! I could have been a walking advertisement about what NOT to do in life. I just paid off a Citibank debt. The collections lawyers and the courts were not going to give me a "get out of jail free" card. Yet, I am sure the debt would have been absolved somehow if I had been a dumb single moo. Moos get "free passes" all of the time! All they do is cry their crocodile tears only to do the same thing over again.

However, I am glad I had to pay for the past few years because I learned a huge lesson. There is NOTHING that I need so badly that will go on a credit card. One moo at work asked how I could live without charge cards. Dumb moo! I will buy ramen noodles even before putting food on credit. I live within my means. How hard is that??? I don't need to buy something from the mall or visit the salon to feel good about myself as a person.

I am right there with you India. College freshmen should not get credit cards. Now, I've kind of got to get one because I want to buy a house in the next few years as I am really sick of renting and not having a yard or anything. Apparently you can't get a loan for a house unless you've got a credit card, but I'm procrastinating until we move -again- into our new apartment, because I HATE the credit card industry. It's a huge scam that takes advantage of people's lazyness and need for instant gratification.

I love my credit card. I pay that sucker off every month and it has no annual fees, so I am using it for free. Plus, it's a Discover platinum card that gives me money back. Right now I have a $100 credit sitting out there, just waiting to be applied to my balance. Credit cards are neither good nor evil - they are simply tools that can be used or misused.

Pirate Jo - I agree with you. You have to know how to use credit cards to your advantage. I have been on both sides of that fence. When I was unemployed for several months many years ago, I was really STUPID and took out cash advances to pay my rent. BAD IDEA. I am still paying off that card today, even though I have not charged anything to it in five years. However, I do have a credit card on which I put all my utilities and groceries - and try to pay off every month - because it gives me airline miles, and it paid for my trip to Europe last month.

I also don't mind having a little bit of debt, because the way I see it, I am saving about $200K by not breeding. So if I have a few thousand that I owe, and can afford to pay it off over time, why not?

Credit cards are fine for responsible people, but too many folks act like it's free money. Everyone I know is up to their eyeballs in debt- just because they have to keep up with the Joneses. It's insane...

what i do is, i save up, and have the money there, and then use my mums credit card, and give her the cash, it gives extra security, and insurance, so.. its better that way. but if i cant afford it today, i will save up for it tomorrow..

remember the story about the parents getting a card in the kids names and maxing the credit..

i think the current credit debt in the uk is £1 trillion, i wonder what the credit debt is in america..

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I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone

Lord, what fools these mortals be!
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene ii

Voltaire said: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

H.L.Mencken wrote:"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Albert Einstein

I''m right there with you, India. My dh and I live within our means. I've seen several breeders that think their children need all the latest crap, get into serious debt over it, and then file for bankruptcy. Then they whine, bitch, and moan that they have no credit. Well gee, ever heard of saving money????

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lab mom

GreenGrass Wrote:
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> Here is something I don't understand. I really
> hate MSN. They are always telling me that on my
> ~$30K income, I should be living under a bridge,
> because obviously I can't afford to live. However,
> they have no shame in suggesting that people spend
> $20K on a wedding, $10K on the "right" engagement
> ring, have a litter of kids (because somehow God
> will provide or money will rain from the sky), and
> buy a McMansion with all of the "right" frills
> (soccer-mommy SUV or two, all the kiddie crap you
> can stuff in your McMansion, etc). If the average
> household income in the US is about $50K, then how
> the hell are people able to own all this crap? I
> know they can put it on credit, but what about
> those expensive interest fees?
>
>
You are so right. My teacher's salary was 32K and that was after working 15 years. My starting salary was 21K. The media is designed to make those of us with low incomes feel like crap. Truthfully though we can all live without the "right" diamond or the 20K wedding. I got married at the courthouse for free, and my diamond was 1K. I bet my DH and I stay married longer than most of those materialistic 20K couples! At least we won't be paying of a wedding and rings for forever.

I only use my credit card so I don't have to carry a lot of money around. Whatever I'm buying, I already have the money for in the bank. I always pay the full amount every month.

Wow Sherz, that is low pay for a teacher. I just read that brand new teachers without experience where I live are earning $39,500. I don't live in New York or LA either. Where I live is considered one of the cheapest places to live in the U.S.
I work in a particular health care field where the average pay is about $40K. However, to hear these people in my profession talk about their pay, you'd think they were living in dire poverty. I managed to get by for years on less than $20K, so these people must just either be entitlement minded or stupid with money.

Sherz wrote:
----------------------------------------------------
> You are so right. My teacher's salary was 32K and
> that was after working 15 years. My starting
> salary was 21K. The media is designed to make
> those of us with low incomes feel like crap.
> Truthfully though we can all live without the
> "right" diamond or the 20K wedding. I got married
> at the courthouse for free, and my diamond was 1K.
> I bet my DH and I stay married longer than most
> of those materialistic 20K couples! At least we
> won't be paying of a wedding and rings for
> forever.
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Those with the most expensive and wasteful of weddings do not stay married. You'd guess the debt got to be too much. Some idiots think that getting married means you have to have the fanciest of weddings. Um, no, you don't. It's not all about the wedding, it's about the marriage part that is most important.

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lab mom

I did not have my first credit card until I was in my last year of medical school, and my dad insisted that I have one in case of emergencies. It had a small limit of $500, and I only used it to charge for books, supplies and other things when I didn't have the cash. I paid it back, fearfully and diligently every month and never carried a balance on it. Come to think of it, I still have that account and I still don't use it that much.

Mom and dad raised me to hate debt, and I do. We have a mortgage on our farm and on our one car, but other than that we are not in debt. Fujiko would like to pay off the mortgage but that interest is one of the few deductions we actually get.

I recently interviewed a candidate for medical director who told me that his total educational loan burden is $160,000. I just can't imagine that kind of debt outside of a mortgage. It scares the living hell out of me!

I read the msn article and thought, wow, when I was a child, keeping up with the Joneses didn't involve the children the way it does today. I grew up in the 70's, in a working class family. My mom worked for doctors, and I recall that the doctors and their wives did NOT purchase luxury items for their children. Their kids wore the same JCPenney clothes that my brother and me wore. Of course, the doctors' kids grew up in nicer houses and took nicer vacations, but they did not otherwise enjoy the luxury items that their parents did. The doctors and their wives simply didn't believe that they owed their children more than basic food, clothing and shelter. This was in the 70's, and the idea of buying designer clothes for children or spending tons of money for a child's party or buying a teenager a brand new luxury car was considered wasteful. Actually, I don't think it was considered at all, except maybe by the very wealthy, because children weren't consumers back then, and luxury items were marketed for adults. The difference today, is that children are consumers and they grow up feeling entitled to have everthing they want. It's all financed with credit cards, of course. College students use credit cards to maintain the lifestyle that their parents provided for them or to keep up with their fellow students. All the debt is generated by feelings of entitlement. I think that luxury items, like new cars, designer clothes, cell phones and notebook computers are for adults. Marketing these items to children is just a way of increasing the number of consumers for such products. Of course, this strategy works because parunts are too weak and dumb to just say no.

I remember my Mom having adults over, and I was to entertain myself in my room. No problem. But I guess that would be chyld abuse these days.

I think that whole, "everyone wears JC Penny" thing changed in the mid-80's, at least that's when I remember there suddenly being a huge disctinction between the kids who wore JC Penny, and the kids who wore "designer" clothes. Up until the mid-80's everyone I knew got their clothes from reasonably priced stores, poor and rich kids alike, because what's the point of getting your kid something expensive, they'll only ruin it. All of a sudden the rich kids were going to the boutique shops in the mall, while the rest of us shlubs were making do with our snappy department store-wear. Come to think of it, that's also around the time when us middle income kids discovered Ragstock and thrift stores, where you could get really weird stuff for really really cheap.

Sherz and Waterlily, I've found that people who have the expensive weddings are the ones who follow the Life Script (TM), only to be divorced years later when they realize they could have avoided heartache and bullshit from their lives by not having kids.

All the friends of mine who had expensive, fancy weddings have loaves and are divorced. The ones who had simple weddings and no loaves are still married.

Feh Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think that whole, "everyone wears JC Penny"
> thing changed in the mid-80's, at least that's
> when I remember there suddenly being a huge
> disctinction between the kids who wore JC Penny,
> and the kids who wore "designer" clothes. Up
> until the mid-80's everyone I knew got their
> clothes from reasonably priced stores, poor and
> rich kids alike, because what's the point of
> getting your kid something expensive, they'll only
> ruin it. All of a sudden the rich kids were going
> to the boutique shops in the mall, while the rest
> of us shlubs were making do with our snappy
> department store-wear. Come to think of it,
> that's also around the time when us middle income
> kids discovered Ragstock and thrift stores, where
> you could get really weird stuff for really really
> cheap.

I agree. In my neighborhood, you could get away with JC Penney clothes (barely), but the thrift store kids were mocked as being "poor white trash." Luckily, my mom was sensitive to this, so I had a few designer things, but preferred my Penny's clothes. They fit better...

I don't think it's a good idea to start out a life together under the burden of immense debt accrued by your humongous wedding. That seems like starting things off on the wrong foot.

I've never wanted that huuuuge expensive wedding, anyway. I don't care about any of that. Like someone already said: it's the marriage that counts, not the wedding. Just bring a couple of rings and an official to perform the ceremony, that's all. We could even be wearing jeans, for all I would care! How ironic that I can't even find anyone worth dating, since I'm sure most men hate that whole Bridezilla bullshit too...

I am very excited about my child free friend's wedding coming up in Vegas. She specifically requested "no pants". I am so down with that.

Feh Wrote:
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> I am very excited about my child free friend's
> wedding coming up in Vegas. She specifically
> requested "no pants". I am so down with that.
>

No pants? Ya'll will be nakeed? :yr