{"id":1284,"date":"2014-12-27T18:59:00","date_gmt":"2014-12-27T18:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/12\/27\/theres-this-great-myth-out-there-that-we-call-the\/"},"modified":"2014-12-27T18:59:00","modified_gmt":"2014-12-27T18:59:00","slug":"theres-this-great-myth-out-there-that-we-call-the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/12\/27\/theres-this-great-myth-out-there-that-we-call-the\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"
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There\u2019s this great myth out there that we call the \u201cOver-consumption Myth,\u201d which goes: If you earn a decent income, and you\u2019re in trouble financially, it must be because you\u2019re blowing all your money at the Gap, and TGIF. The myth is so powerful, it almost seems like heresy to question it. But when we actually looked into the data on what real families actually spend, it\u2019s just not true. An average family of four actually spends less on clothing than their parents did a generation ago, adjusted for inflation. That includes all the Tommy Hilfiger sweatshirts and all the Nike sneakers. How does this work? Well we forget all the things we don\u2019t spend money on anymore \u2014 how many kids have leather shoes for Sunday school anymore? How many people dress up in wool suits for work everyday?<\/p>\n

The point is that families today are spending their money no more foolishly than their parents did. And yet they\u2019re five times more likely to go bankrupt, and three times more likely to lose their homes. Families are going broke on the basics \u2014housing, health insurance, and education. These are the kind of bills that you can\u2019t just trim around the edges in the event of a downturn.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

Amelia Tyagi<\/strong><\/a> (via moontyger<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Yes. This. I can\u2019t tell you how many times I have been around and around and over and under our budget, and there\u2019s nothing else left to cut. I shop carefully \u2014 my son\u2019s summer clothes come from thrift stores because he grows so fast, his school clothes come from Old Navy, bought on sale a season ahead of time with coupons and during \u2018clearance even on clearance.\u2019 <\/p>\n

My groceries are healthy but careful. <\/p>\n

My only indulgence is my tablet, and that\u2019s $23 a month until it\u2019s paid off. Hardly a bank-breaker.<\/p>\n

(via vaspider<\/a>)<\/p>\n

A minimum of 50% of the expensive, nice, electronic things in our home have been gifts from one parent or another. Including one of his cars. We’re shaving so finely in the budget I’m nagging him about the $5 he spends on a drink and snack when he buys gas, and worried about the $5 I spend on lunch at work.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s this great myth out there that we call the \u201cOver-consumption Myth,\u201d which goes: If you earn a decent income, and you\u2019re in trouble financially, it must be because you\u2019re blowing all your money at the Gap, and TGIF. The myth is so powerful, it almost seems like heresy to question it. But when we … Continue reading <\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"quote","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[51],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1284"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1284\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}