How to live on $600 per month

What is in the vacant 300 mile of the panhandle? That would mostly be Elgin AFB. Last time I was TDY up there, I couldn't find any $100 trailers. Maybe a $100 a night hotel....

And if you've driven up I-4 lately, please tell me the part of Central Florida that isn't metropolitan Orlando. About 30 years ago some existed, ( before Martin sold the test range to Arnie ), but now I can drive from Clermont to Titusville and the only open country is the St Johns flood plane. I've got to go south of St Cloud or north of Deland to fine enough grass to feed a cow.

When I got here to work for Martin, we had about 3 million Floridians. Now we are over 18 million. The rent was about $400 a month for a nice apartment. Now the same apartment is $1200 and a single studio in a depressed neighborhood is over $700. I bought a trailer for one of my kids about 15 years ago but he struggled to pay the $400 a month lot rent, only 1 hour and 15 minutes from his job.

Oh, and since the NASA layoffs, the Treasure Coast is the cheapest cost of living in the state. Enjoy!

 

Anyplace out of sight in that would do in my area I can find many spots on public land out of the way, on unused property in brush and the like if I had to rough live. I did when I Busked in Europe awhile ago but I was younger. The main trick is live light, hide at night and have some ways to make cash that is legal enough to get by and I could do pretty well on $600 a month if I had to.

 

Do I deserve more? Hmm, it is not really that. I certainly do not have aspirations to live like a rich person or anything.

My beef is that my dollar is worth less and less each year. It will soon come to the point where I will have NO luxuries and will only make enough to live off of. My raise this year barely covered the money I lost when they raised the social security taxes.

I'm not looking to improve my lot at the expense of others, I'm just looking to not lose any further ground.

 

Thank you. For now, the most risky thing I am trying to do is move up the career ladder at my call center. I have most of the stats I need to get a promotion, but for some reason management seems to just 'glaze' over me when I tell them I am interested. I am not really sure why they do this, and once I have a answer at least I will know what to work on.

 

Is this how you live or are you just running your mouth about how other people should live? If you really believe that this is a good way to live then march right in to your companies payroll office and announce that you now insist on recieving minimum wage. I'm sure your company would be glad to hear that you are willing to take a pay cut. If you are not willing to make minimum wage for yourself then maybe you should shut your mouth about the people who do make minimum wage.

It's funny how the few productive people left in this country, those who produce actual products, are forced to live on minimum wage while listening to some clown who sits in a cubicle and works on his fantasy football team tell them how they should be happy living a destitute life.

 

There is no money for clothing, soap, detergent, haircut and shampoo included. One would have to shop mostly at the Salvation Army store or other thrift stores.
Cooking on a wood stove would be cheaper, I think, as one could always find wood or used lumber.

I would love to try it!

 

I was born in NYC, lol. But I lived in Virginia for a long time and in Norfolk, nothing below $500 which is equally abysmal.

Lol. It's funny to imagine that, but there are poor people everyday. Doesn't mean people are out there robbing banks, or would rob a bank, and if they had a gun they would have likely sold it for some food. I have heard some other things like that, like "If I was poor I'd walk to where it was warm".

That's how imagine it. Putting rent aside, a really low budget would have you eating out of cans, soon enough. I did have to budget at one point and while I found that some things like bread and eggs didn't taste that different getting cheaper brands, the meat and vegetables and canned food...yuck. In Virginia, there was deer so cheap living took on a whole new meaning. There's deer right on the side of the road, too. Way better than beef.

 

You mean roadkill? Sure, it would be cheap and healthier than commercial meat, which is full of antibiotics and hormones. Yuck!
For a salad one could pick dandelion leaves.

 

No, I mean live deer on the side of the road. I lived on the Eastern Shore by the swamp so if you went outside it's almost pitch black except for your road lights. You drive slow because they often in or by the side of the road.

 

You have ignored healthcare. Perhaps you want to include that, unless you think that the poor shouldn't have access to it.

 

How utterly tragic that minimum wage in the US is no more than $600 a month, yet minimum wage in Australia is around the same amount, per week.

I would never survive in the US.

 

that is a horrible quality of life, what about HBO and cable tv expenses?

trailers have lot fees and that alone would be the 250 a month, that means barely using the utilities which will cost more.

50 dollars a week in food is atrocious, some people have bigger bodies that must be sustained.

finally the mechanics will eat up any savings, all old cars have heavy repair bills no matter the make.

these are all arguments to increase the minimum wage or welfare for people who live on these meager incomes, it is truly the edge.

 

^no one needs cable TV when you can make do with normal TV

 

cable TV is an important part of improving the quality of life, the bundle package of Internet TV and phone should be included as a legitimate expense.

it wouldn't a concern if the minimum wage were increased anyway, the poor should have freedom with their disposable income

 

A full time minimum wage job in the US would be twice that amount.

Plus, you have to consider that it costs a lot less to live in the US than it does in Australia.
http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/rankings_by_country.jsp
Consumer goods in AUS on average are over 20% higher than the same goods sell for in New York City. Comparatively, the average price of consumer goods in the US is 20% lower than the same goods sell for in NYC. The average Australian rent is 57% higher than the average US rent. Australian groceries cost 46% more than the same groceries in the US. You want to go out to eat? You'll pay 58% more than I will for the same meal.

Then there are taxes. I don't know how much a minimum wage earner in Australia pays but in the US, they would pay little to nothing and many actually get back more on their tax return than they paid in.

 

*shivers*

I'd rather watch no TV than normal TV.

 

Minimum wage after taxes is a little over 600 a month, but even with end of year tax credits for the poor it does not equal 1200 a month.

Europeans have a better quality of life than Americans, those higher tax rates help build their communities to not look like the third world as many parts of America

The OP mentions living in a trailer, many Americans live in trailers that is why their cost of living is lower but their quality of life is also lower.

 

I spend $600 a month on mixed drinks, breakfast and lunch ! I'm in Costa Rica where it's actually fairly inexpensive ! In Miami I spent $600 a week on the same sheet ! Life is TOUGH !
OTOH most people here live pretty well on $600/mo. That's what most of the laborers earn, plus free health care (actually 90% is paid by the employer to the tune of $150 a month).
If there is more than 3 people in the house and less than $530 coming in, electric is free.If someone is disabled(not drunken drug addicts like in the empire or negroids who think work B depressing) local telephone is free in case of need of assistance. We have special services buses free for the disabled.Socialism. A quite beautiful thing if managed properly(60 years and counting---no military)

 

A person may be able to survive on 600 a month...maybe...but I wouldn't call that living.

 

But no one claims that a minimum wage job is a goal, it is just where you start. The person earning minimum wage should be developing skills that will let them get better jobs.

Most of the people earning minimum wage are high-school kids working part time anyway. They don't need a living wage.

 

A significant portion of kids at the high school I teach need to be making a living wage to help support the family and/or younger siblings.

 

I would bet mostly because the mother is unmarried and the father won't support the kids.

 

I read an article a few months ago that the poor in America are better off than most Middle Class in Europe and Japan. More own theiir own home and it's bigger, have washers and dryers, a car, air conditioning, dishwasher and etc.

 

Census officials continue to grossly exaggerate the numbers of the poor, creating a false picture in the public mind of widespread material deprivation, writes Heritage Foundation senior research fellow Robert Rector in a new paper.

“Most news stories on poverty feature homeless families, people living in crumbling shacks, or lines of the downtrodden eating in soup kitchens,” Rector says. “The actual living conditions of America’s poor are far different from these images.”

Congress is tying itself in knots figuring out how to cut spending and bring down a $14 trillion national debt. Lawmakers might well take a much closer look at the nearly a trillion dollars spent each year on welfare even though many recipients aren’t what the typical American would recognize as poor and in need of government assistance.

What is poverty? Americans might well be surprised to learn from other government data that the overwhelming majority of those defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau were well-housed and adequately fed even in the recession year 2009. About 4 percent of them did temporarily become homeless.

Data from the Department of Energy and other agencies show that the average poor family, as defined by Census officials:

● Lives in a home that is in good repair, not crowded, and equipped with air conditioning, clothes washer and dryer, and cable or satellite TV service.

● Prepares meals in a kitchen with a refrigerator, coffee maker and microwave as well as oven and stove.

● Enjoys two color TVs, a DVD player, VCR and — if children are there — an Xbox, PlayStation, or other video game system.

● Had enough money in the past year to meet essential needs, including adequate food and medical care.


See the full Heritage Foundation paper, including downloadable charts, here: “Air Conditioning, Cable TV, and an Xbox: What Is Poverty in the United States
Today?”

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/272081/modern-poverty-includes-ac-and-xbox-ken-mcintyre#