Welcome to my rant. I've tried to keep at least a little quiet about the current economic situations we're facing today, but darn it all...we're just so LAMBASTED with it all the time, and this morning a story on the Today Show had me absolutely livid. I really need to quit watching that morning show.
The Today Show did a story on "boomerang kids", which are adults who move back with their parents, and how now with all the foreclosures, the trend is for even older alults (past the 20's) to move in with their folks in the wake of the housing crash. This morning's sob story was about a man and his fiance (and two large dogs) who moved in with his mother after they lost their home. This is where it got ridiculous. The guy was whining that he was used to living in a 5000 square foot home, and now he's living in a mere 1400 square foot home. Hey buddy...that's more square footage than me, my husband, a cat, a dog, and a snake are used to...and we're just fine. Then the show boo-hooed right along with him, lamenting that though they used to have good jobs in mortgage lending (um...the cause of this whole problem?), now the fiance works at a home improvement store, and he's unemployed. They cut back to him, where he says, "I'm used to making half a million dollars a year...what am I supposed to do now, work for $10/hour?"
Um...yeah? Snobby much? I dunno...but when you're unemployed and can't find a job that pays the same as your old salary, shouldn't you drop the pride a little and stop whining? The 5000 square foot mansion is already gone...do you have to make as much now? How was Mom able to stay in her house? Did she maybe live within her means? Here's a novel idea - get a shovel and dig yourself out of your own hole. Take that $10/hr job and get yourself an apartment. Or, if Mom really doesn't mind having you around, take the $10/hr job and help out with the bills maybe? Take all the crap that was CRAMMED into his Mom's garage, plus the numerous full storage buildings he mentioned, and sell some of it?
I dunno, maybe I'm old fashioned and believe in a little self-help here. So you have a job in an inflated market, live beyond your means (think with just one person making over half a million, they might have put some in savings), and expect taxpayer help when it all comes crashing down? How does that even make sense??? How about the Today Show do a story on people I know - how about the sergent who my husband was told to fire because of absolute slashings to the National Guard budget by the current administration, who has a wife and kids, and who is now doing everything he can - including cleaning up ice storm-damaged yards - to make ends meet.
I'm just sick to death of seeing these people with such an entitlement attitude doing all the whining. Yes, I have a college degree, and I'm used to having a good job. But now when we're a little short, I'm not too proud now to so some substitute teaching (talk about a pride-swallowing job), or to save money by clipping coupons, or saving even more money by growing my own food. Luckily for me, the depression-era attitude my grandparents passed to my parents of working hard, reducing, reusing, and recycling (not a "new" idea by the way), and just using common sense sunk in a bit. I wonder where it got lost when I see some of the people who can't seem to make the connection.
1 comment:
I KNOW. These stories make me so angry. We saw one where the wife had lost her $150k job, and now they had to live on only half what they were used to. And I'm supposed to cry with them?
The only story like this I've seen that really made me sad was an elderly retired couple who had both worked and saved all their lives and then lost their retirement because it was invested through his former company which is now worthless. They'd done everything right, and were now really suffering. My heart really went out to them.
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