@Chrissy Page, no defense is necessary; you’re lucky. For most people housing (rent/mortgage) is their largest expense. True, some people have large cable bills, and that’s their choice. Still, just giving up cable in and of itself isn’t going to solve serious financial hardship problems. For people having serious financial problems, cable – be it AT&T Uverse, Time Warner, Comcast, or whatever won’t solve the problem. If someone is facing electric/gas shutoff and foreclosure/eviction, I would think watching cable would be low on the list of priorities.
Maybe I am lucky if that is my biggest expense. All my other bills are utilities and car ins. But in my younger life there have been times where we downsized because husband got a different job with less pay, or I took a part time job. Whatever the situation called for we did it and somehow survived. I was also pretty good at making meals out of nothing. There were times when food was so little that I made sure my kids and hubby got their portions and I ate what little was left. I was always on a diet anyway.
Well let's hope nothing happens to any of us and we all have financial security. Here are some helpful hings to know of: *foodstamps *rental subsidy *welfare that's limited these days *low income housing At least you'll have a roof over your head and something to eat. Library has internet computers and netbook borrows locally here on Oahu, I know for I save money going to the library to use the internet computers. There is nothing like having your own computer though! I'd live with relatives too if it got too bad.
There are a lot of qualifiers for getting anything if you are low income. I live on SS, but own a house.. so no matter how low the SS monthly benefits are, no assistance with food stamps. ..falls under TOUGH! .. They want you to sell, and go rent. Also I checked into Internet service fees .. I pay over $50 monthly for AT & T Internet only. They have a special fee for Seniors on SS, something like $10 monthly .. but you must be raising a school-age child.
Yes, I only have widows benefits but it's too much for almost any service. My income is above poverty level. I pay $155 for my internet, phone (just local) and the 200 channel pack. It used to be $180 but I got them down to $155. I watch one channel basically, never use my phone at all since I pay $85 for my verizon cell phone service. Only thing I use is the internet. Most benefits do require you have a child. At 53 I wasn't eligible for widows benefits or anything when my husband died unless I had a child living at home. I didn't.
I understand about paying $180 a month cable .. that is exactly where we were at when my husband died. He had all the premium channels and I think he was recording 10-12 shows a week!! I freaked out about the bill, and canceled all TV out immediately. .. my knee jerk reaction. AT & T went easy on me for a few months ... gave me Internet for $25-30 monthly. (My phone isn't involved) Of course, that didn't last long ... it was 30, then 35, then 42, 45, etc. Now $52 and change. Everyone wants to play a game with you ... trying to find your breaking point!
Yep and it's all so good and enticing when you first join. For a year I paid only about $100 for all three services and then even had unlimited phone plus HBO. Then after a year it goes way up! One time I did manage to get them to give me the original promotion pkg for $100. I threatened to leave them and maybe cried a little too. But it never worked again. I think they've put a note on my records....watch out, she'll cry to get what she wants.
I have been self employed since about 1990, so I have often experienced financial hardships. Until I sold my part of the business in 2001 in order to move to Maine, I was part owner of an ambulance company. Since we were located on the Texas-Mexico border, many of our patients had no money, no insurance, and didn't qualify for public assistance, which meant that we ate those bills, including the actual costs of anything that we used in caring for them. So while others might think that the owners of a company would be the wealthiest, there were times when our employees were doing better than we were, since they had a paycheck every week and we didn't. When money was coming in, we'd spend it on a new ambulance, new equipment, or other upgrades. During that time, an old student loan came due. Actually, it was well overdue since I had taken it out in the early 1970s, made a couple of payments on it, and forgot it. Since it was a federally guaranteed loan, it eventually found its way into the hands of the IRS and the $400 that I owed on a $500 loan had grown to $4,000, and they reminded me of it by putting a hold on my bank account and taking fifty percent of my wages. They hadn't put together the fact that I was part owner of the company, which was good because they simply sent a notice to forward 50% of my wages to the IRS. Because they didn't realize that I was a part owner of the company, I reduced my wages and, instead, had the company pick up my house rental, my utilities, and my car payments. Still, it was difficult because it didn't leave me a lot for food and other expenses. Interestingly, someone from the IRS called to say that they were concerned that they may not have left me with enough money to live on, and offered an alternate payment plan. Of course, it would have simply resulted in more interest being due, so I opted to get it over with. I was single then, or it might have been a bigger problem. Then when Clinton took office, he enacted a retroactive tax that apparently didn't effect a lot of people but, besides the ambulance company, I was working as an EMS instructor and as a skills examiner, with wages coming in from four sources, so it hit me hard. Suddenly, although I had paid all of the taxes that were due according to the tax law that was in effect at the time, Clinton raised taxes and made it retroactive to the previous year, and I got a bill for a few thousand dollars that I didn't have. If I liked everything else about him (and I didn't), I would hate him forever for that alone. In 2001, my wife and I opened a cafe here in Millinocket, thinking that we could continue to run our online business while running the cafe. However, one of our biggest clients was in the Trade Towers when they came down in September and, overall, online advertising took a fall after the Trade Tower attacks, so we were left with the cafe as our main source of income. That same year, the mill closed and even businesses that were more well established failed, so we didn't have a chance. Hoping that things would get better in the spring, we ran the business on credit cards for the last few months of the winter, but things didn't get any better in the spring. We filed for bankruptcy but we held some of our local debts off from bankruptcy protection so we still had those debts. Eventually, we let a friend of ours live in the house for nothing in order to make sure it was heated and that someone would be there, and we moved to North Carolina for a couple of years sometime in 2003. Shortly after entering North Carolina, we were struck from behind by someone who had apparently passed out in the 100 degree heat, and the insurance didn't even pay what we still owed on the car, which was totaled. We were able to buy a car on credit from one of those places that give anyone credit as long as they will accept a very high cost for a used car. We each found a couple of jobs and since they were in different places, we bought a second car, eventually being able to trade up for better cars. I'm still driving the 2002 Chevrolet Tracker I bought in North Carolina. In time, we were able to build up our online businesses enough so that we could afford to move home again. At this point, if we were to fall on hard times, I suppose I'd have to sell the hundred acres of land and camp that we have up north, although I'd try a lot of other things before going that far.
Good Grief ! .. as Charlie Brown would say. Ken, if I had been knocked down that many times, I don't know that I would have enough energy to get back up!! The Texas-Mexico border is a strange place to me .. every time I've ever been down there, it just looks sad, dried up and 3rd worldish.
No personal story to offer (for now), but serious financial difficulty would certainly present itself in our case, should staggering medical costs arise. Example, my wife's Mother's 3 hip replacement procedures, the first botched, then fixed, then a broken hip on the "good" side, total cost: about $230,000.