Rock and a Hard Place

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-12-2003
Rock and a Hard Place
1524
Thu, 11-20-2003 - 10:45am

There's something on this board that has been bothering me, and I hope I can articulate it.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:00am

"I think a lot of people don't budget enough to know whether they are making sound financial decisions enough to be able to afford the standard of living they are LIVING."


Well then, there's no hope for them if they don't even have a budget.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:05am
Didn't say it wouldn't be a good idea. (I ran across someone once who was pretty obsessed with EARNING $ that kept 6 figures worth of $ in a non-interest-bearing checking account.)
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:06am
Absolutely no comment.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:11am
Nothing.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:11am
Why would a persons salary have anything to do with financial savvy? I've known many people who *make* lots of money-but spend it as fast as they make it. On paper, they have a high SES, but no tangible assets to speak of.

dj

Dj

"Now when I need help, I look in the mirror" ~Kanye West~

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 10:39am
Yaay, got your 'testing' email.

BTW I did check out the picture of you that you mentioned. Any idea why it looks like a 'painting' on my screen and if there's anything I can do about that? I'm a gumby with online photos - I can see it well enough to tell you're lookin' great, and just about what I had pictured. (Except for the dress!) ;-)

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-12-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 11:08am
So what?
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-12-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 11:11am
You don't need to have a lick of financial sensibility to make a lot of money, but you do if you want to have any later on!
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 11:15am
My point is, no wonder some posters criticize dual WOHPs as working for the SUVs and lattes.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 11-24-2003
Mon, 11-24-2003 - 11:16am
Well. women and men I must say I am rather annoyed with the bragging nonsense on this board. The women who clock seven or eight hours a day "with" their kids --what is the purpose of sharing this? I think that's great for them if that's what they want to do, but I do take issue with the people on the board adding up hours with their children like it's a notch on the crib post or something. Everyone is different. I assume that many people of the upperclasses who hired nannies, everyone, it is to be presumed, from all of the queens and kings from antiquity to the present, along with power broker NYC couples in million dollar lofts today, thought that their chocies were just as valid.

It is an accepted social more of cicilized society that one allows other people to help raise one's children. The child-obsessed culture we live in today has created too much guilt for those of us who have to work, or worse, choose to work, and much too much smugness from those who choose to stay at home. I have done both as a mother of a 13 year old and 11 year old. I believe it is my right as a woman to decide how to raise my children. As long as I am comfortable with my choices and as long as I am an involved parent I am happy with things as they are. I know myself---I am not a good parent when I am cooped up in the house all day, or when I am fully dedicated to the house and kids. I need a lot of intellectual interests and adult interaction --a job helps me get that, plus money, too. But if you are a different breed of cat, more power to you!

I think that the 7 or 8 hours claimed by these folks is exaggerated. If it's not interaction time, it doesn't count. If the kids are plopped in front of a video while they wash dishes, it doesn't count. I am pleased that they have chosen a 12-18 hour day that includes childcare, domestic servitude, and what I consider boring, repetitive tasks as your career. I respect that choice and admire anyone who can do it. I have about 8 hours a day of something else that I like to do (unfortunately I have issues with domestic tasks, can you guess?) and then 4- 10 hours of the same thing you do all day. There are some of us who choose to or have to work. Justifying one's choices by making ridiculous claims for interaction time with your kids is divisive. We're all women, we need each other to support each other's chocies. Life is hard enough without having to listen to other women crow about their imagined victory over a social order that requires most women to work outside the home during childbearing years. These women should be using their energy to change the system so that the institutions that promulgate the poor daycare choices and other un-family-friendly policies have to change. We are powerful enough to do this. 52 percent of the people int he workforce are women. If we all mobilized we could effect some real change. What about a nationwide women's strike to protest the U.S.'s backward social policies for working moms? We could shut down the entire country! Now that would be 8 hours to brag about.

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