Posted A Low Paying Optical Tech Job And Received 75 Applications In 24 Hours

[Jluke]

Chem was a BA, not a BS?

I don't think it's a science degree that Singuy is referring to when he talks about liberal arts. I think he's talking about philosophy and social work and gender studies and other "non-professional" degrees.

Yep. BA. I had to take the core liberal arts classes. I don’t think any BS degrees were issued.

i just wanted to point out that you can major in other “useful” subjects at a liberal arts school. Makes for a well rounded educational experience and forced me to take subjects that were non-science related.

[disneysteve]

Yep. BA. I had to take the core liberal arts classes. I don’t think any BS degrees were issued.

i just wanted to point out that you can major in other “useful” subjects at a liberal arts school. Makes for a well rounded educational experience and forced me to take subjects that were non-science related.

Understood. I also attended a liberal arts college. I have a BS in Biology but also had to meet requirements in Art/Music, Philosophy/Religion, History, etc. I don't want to speak for Singuy but I don't think it's the liberal arts education he objects to; it's the actual degree. My Bio degree or your Chem degree is likely a lot more marketable than an Art History degree or Music Theory degree.

[disneysteve]

Interesting article about the value of a liberal arts degree:

https://www.bestvalueschools.com/faq/what-is-a-liberal-arts-degree/

Be sure to follow the Forbes link and read that article as well.

[Singuy]

I like your imaginary scenario. This person will save 5k pre-tax and 10k after tax
on a 20k salary. That leaves what 3-4K for expenses even though they are living at home? Car, car insurance and gas alone could cost that much. Oh and don’t forget about taxes. Probably closer to 3k or lower for what is left.

they will also live at home and do this for 8 years but somehow manage to date and be in a serious relationship that doesn’t cost money either.

If it were that simple and easy more people would do it.
.

What car? You should still be driving the hand me down your parents gave you. 300 dollars a month is plenty if you work out this master plan with your parents. I'm sure they'll throw you a bone by subsidizing certain things so you can succeed.

Also the imaginary scenario will work easier if it becomes the social NORM. Meaning people you date are also doing this and have a mutual understanding vs thinking you are some sort of loser living at home. The Chinese culture is pretty much exactly this. No one really moves out until they are married anyways, and the parents subsidize everything while the kid saves every penny. In fact my parents subsidized me even when I was making over 100k/year out of school. I then subsidized my wife after she's out of college. No one really needs it, but damn everything shoots up like a rocket after the first few years of grind.

[Jluke]

What car? You should still be driving the hand me down your parents gave you. 300 dollars a month is plenty if you work out this master plan with your parents. I'm sure they'll throw you a bone by subsidizing certain things so you can succeed.

Hand me down car?

ok I set you up to mention that. Just not realistic for most people.

I lived at home for a couple of years. It greatly helped my financial situation.

It is not for everyone.

[Singuy]

Hand me down car?

ok I set you up to mention that. Just not realistic for most people.

I lived at home for a couple of years. It greatly helped my financial situation.

It is not for everyone.

Well your financial need shouldn't change just because now you go work at star bucks down the street every day vs going to HS everyday. Again, we are not talking about every kid here. We are talking about those who have the opportunity to go to college right after HS without the need for a second job. This means your family is financial stable enough for you to be subsidized(since you were going to be subsidized by your parents anyway in college).

[disneysteve]

What car? You should still be driving the hand me down your parents gave you. 300 dollars a month is plenty if you work out this master plan with your parents. I'm sure they'll throw you a bone by subsidizing certain things so you can succeed.

You are making some HUGE assumptions here, first and foremost that parents are willing to "subsidize" their adult children. And that they are giving their kids cars. I don't know where you live but that is absolutely not a safe assumption. This is actually something that was a big wake up call to our daughter when she went off to college. She made numerous friends who were on their own financially, whose parents were not supporting them.

I recall one of my friends in college back in the 80s having a ton of trouble with financial aid because the forms required parental data and her parents were not supporting her in any way, shape, or form. She saw no reason why she was required to get their info, and her parents refused to provide it. It was quite a battle between her and the school.

Heck, we didn't give our daughter a car. We did help her get one but the car was 5K. We paid 1K. Her grandmother (my mom) gave her 1K. She paid the other 3K herself. And most of her peers paid for their vehicles completely on their own. The parents didn't help at all.

[Singuy]

You are making some HUGE assumptions here, first and foremost that parents are willing to "subsidize" their adult children. And that they are giving their kids cars. I don't know where you live but that is absolutely not a safe assumption. This is actually something that was a big wake up call to our daughter when she went off to college. She made numerous friends who were on their own financially, whose parents were not supporting them.

I recall one of my friends in college back in the 80s having a ton of trouble with financial aid because the forms required parental data and her parents were not supporting her in any way, shape, or form. She saw no reason why she was required to get their info, and her parents refused to provide it. It was quite a battle between her and the school.

Heck, we didn't give our daughter a car. We did help her get one but the car was 5K. We paid 1K. Her grandmother (my mom) gave her 1K. She paid the other 3K herself. And most of her peers paid for their vehicles completely on their own. The parents didn't help at all.

Correct, which makes it difficult for anyone to do what I said if their don't have supportive parents who are on the same page. The money is there, the compounding interest is there, the 401k is there, and the job opportunities are there. It's a matter of how to manipulate it with optimization and mathematics to get you where you need to be. If your parents couldn't wait to kick you out then yes..you'll be at a huge disadvantage. But when you're like every Asian parent ever, this wouldn't happen.

I'm sorry, but the culture of kicking kids out or having them pay for rent/car or whatever produce just more poor kids. If you set your kids up to follow exactly a master plan, the child can be a millionaire some day even by just working at McDonalds (simply because all the tools necessary are there to make this happen). These tools does not exist in third world countries. No master plan unless luck is a huge part of the plan can someone in Bangladesh work a near min wage job and become a millionaire some day.

My parents did exactly this at a huge disadvantage of not knowing the language, having to raise me, and no free rent. They were dumbfounded at why Americans are so poor when they make so much money(and by so much money, they were looking at how much they paid min wage compared to a third world they were from). People are like...well you know it's hard to survive when you only make min wage..my parents would just look at them with a blank stare..because it does not compute.

[prosper]

Because they rob you of your time. In my opinion, the majority of Americans are financially unstable because they can't get their sh$t together before their first child. The average age for the first child to drop is 27. So you have a finite amount of time to get ready for a disruption in earning potential and expensive purchases such as a house/daycare. Either you go to college only for high paying jobs to make up for the lost opportunity time vs someone who didn't go to college or you don't go to college, live with parents, save your ass off and ends up ready for the family ahead. Don't follow these steps and you'll end up like the rest living paycheck to paycheck for life. Notice I didn't blame taxes, income inequality, Mexicans, globalization, liberals and conservatives as a barrier to financial stability. The only real barrier is the lack of optimization for the use of time.

Facts: I'm a musician. Im doing ok. I know plenty of other musicians who are doing pretty well. I hired four musicians for contract work for $100 an hour. Last year, I paid a producer to arrange a song for me. He charged me $350 for 2 hours worth of work. I met a photographer for a gig that got paid 3k at a wedding. I got turned down by illustrator because they are backlogged with 6 months of work. Another illustrator quoted me 6k. Two years ago, a videographer shot a $1k video for me. I once played in a band that gigged every Saturday for a minimum of $5k for 4 hours. I had an editor (writer) charge me $75 for 30 minutes worth of work. Etc ect ect

[bjl584]

I don't agree. I think there are plenty of jobs where a specific degree isn't required but having a degree is required, or at least greatly preferred.

Bottom line is that I don't think you should force your kid into a field they aren't the least bit interested in just to hope that they grow to like it and get a great job after graduation.

I wonder how many people with "good" degrees aren't working in the field of their major. Surely a lot of them are in that 73% figure.

It probably depends more on your personality than your degree in a lot of cases. If you are an outgoing, Alpha type person who can network, make fiends easily, and can take charge, then you could have a degree in anything that you want, and you will still end up being successful.. A friend of mine didn't go to college, but he knows sales and how to influence people. He is making 6 figures.

[amastewa93]

I won't quote anyone because there are too many responses here I'd like to reply to... However, a few points I'd like to make...

First - A liberal arts degree is NOT trash or a waste of time. I got a "generalized" BA in Communications four years ago and I have been gainfully employed since I graduated college (though the first 3 months were waiting tables). My first year out of college, I made around $30K (not a ton) but have been able to double that in four years. While I was in college, I hustled. I always worked 40+ hours and went to school full time so I could graduate on time.

Second - Not everyone has the option to stay home and not everyone's parents give them that option (or a hand me down car). I've had to work for every single thing I have. My sophomore year in college I bought a $1,000 minivan that carried me through the rest of my college career, a period of homelessness, and one year after. I paid for my own housing and even housed my mother at one point in time because that's what I had to do.

And that's typically also why you'd see so many "overqualified" individuals applying for a $10-$12 receptionist position. Because it's what they have to do.... or maybe it a set of new, educated moms looking for PT work... or any other scenario. But it is definitely interesting to see how some of these assumptions can be made just looking at their resumes and experience. Will you even be considering any of these folks with "trash" degrees? Haha.

[Singuy]

I think there is misunderstanding of what my point is.

The point of this post is to discuss why 78% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. It's not a systematic problem only the government can fix in my opinion. My point is that this problem is cultural since if you give an Indian or a Chinese child the same opportunity to make 10 dollars/hr with a stablized society and great infrastructure, it's almost incomprehensible to have 78% of these kids living paycheck to paycheck as adults.

This is because most of these family's have supporting parents who culturally takes care of their adult children till marriage. This is common practice vs here. There's no negative stigma for wanting to live with parents, or negative stigma to save money. My argument that it's completely cultural that creates so many Americans into paycheck to paycheck living when you don't see such a thing in other cultures.

So yes, we can discuss how every one of you savers made it with a college degree in x, y, z..but you guys are not the general population. The general population cannot afford 500 dollars for an emergency. The discussion her is to find out why. Yes it's about staying below your means, but when the household income is 53k/year and houses being 180-300k each, staying below your means is not the only answer.

[disneysteve]

I think there is misunderstanding of what my point is.

The point of this post is to discuss why 78% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck.

People live paycheck to paycheck, for the most part, because they live beyond their means. It doesn't matter if they make 30K or 300K. There are regulars on this board like corn18 who made a huge income and were still living paycheck to paycheck.

The vast majority of the people living paycheck to paycheck could fix that tomorrow if they wanted to. It has absolutely nothing to do with what college degree they earned (or didn't earn) or whether or not their parents gifted them their first car.

[Thrif-t]

I get what he's saying because its how I grew up, although not Chinese, Italian. I wasn't allowed to move out till I got married, just how it was. I lived at home, worked and commuted to college. Although I bought my own car and insurance and paid my own schooling, but I've always been a worker and had a savings account. Graduated at 21 got my first real job paying peanuts continued to live at home, and got a better job 2 years later. Saved up a few more years, got married at 25 and finally moved out. Just how it was. Plus I recognized how good I had it at home with good food and free laundry service. I was able to accumulate a good chunk for someone who made such a paltry sum, 18k in 1990. I put 10% in my 401k right from the get go. Of course I was extremely lucky and quite blessed to be able to do so. Life is so much easier if you start out with a wad of cash and have a bit of luck along the way.

I'm hoping to provide the same start to my kids. My oldest is graduating in May and I pray she can get a job in the area so she can live at home, get her 10k in loans paid off, and pile up some money to start her life. That's my plan anyway, we'll see what actually happens.

[Singuy]

People live paycheck to paycheck, for the most part, because they live beyond their means. It doesn't matter if they make 30K or 300K. There are regulars on this board like corn18 who made a huge income and were still living paycheck to paycheck.

The vast majority of the people living paycheck to paycheck could fix that tomorrow if they wanted to. It has absolutely nothing to do with what college degree they earned (or didn't earn) or whether or not their parents gifted them their first car.

There's an ocean of difference Corn's 500k salary vs a family making 40k/year. Corn can cut out the boat and 2 cars and all of a suddenly he becomes a millionaire in a matter of a few years.

What are you going to get a struggling family making 40k/year to cut? Diapers? Cellphone?

It takes this family a month to make as much as corn in two daya . This is why I am emphasizing that TIME is way more valuable for low income earners because the only way they can dig themselves out of a bad position is to use more time to make the money, and more time to earn that compounding interest. Wasting precious time in college is not something the average American can afford but ends up doing. It all contributes to their failed financial situations. It's not just one thing that explains it all.