Life on $30K a Year

Can You Support Your Household On $30,000 A Year?
Guest Blogger: Marilyn Katz

You may be shocked by the thought of having to support a family on thirty thousand dollars a year. However, that is all that many American families make these days.

Statistics can be misleading and confusing, but more people live on $30,000 a year than you think! The US likes to publish a a statistic that the median family income is almost $50,000. This is a number that we tend to associate with being middle class. But you need to remember back to your high school math class. The median is the number you get when you throw out the top and bottom half. The median number is the number in the middle of other numbers.

Actually, $30k is not an average US household income. But it is the average when you throw out the top 10 percent of household incomes. But when you throw out the income figures for the wealthy, the number really gets a lot lower. The family average income for the lower 90% is only about $30,000. This number is a little alarming for a variety of reasons. However, it should also be examined as a way to change our perspective about our lifestyle and our retirement planning.

A lot of us are very concerned about our retirement plans. They had savings and assets. But the stock market went down. After that, house values were reduced. The savings and assets they counted on for a comfortable retirement have been reduced and lost value. We did make some bad mistakes. This means we have to be very careful to protect ourselves from now on!

It is helpful to examine the lifestyles of other people who make do with less money. There are some common themes. A lot of these people have something that they find satisfying. This passion does not cost them a lot of money, and sometimes it even helps generate an income. The do not need to fill the void with "stuff" because they have satisfaction from their hobby, work, or home life.

While it is nice to think about being happy without material things, we know that we need to pay some bills. Another common practice of people who can live well on lower incomes is that they avoid debt and find comfortable housing that does not cost a lot of money. If you are trying to figure out how to retire on a lower income, these should be your priorities. You need to figure out how you can find affordable housing and manage your debt.

A good credit score helps to. If you can raise your credit score, you will find that a lot of things are easier to do with less money. If you do need credit, it will be cheaper to get. Even some services, like auto insurance, are cheaper when you have great credit!

We would all like to retire with a comfortable income. I cannot tell you what income will make you comfortable and secure. If you can plan to retire well, the actual number will not matter as much.

Author Resource:-> Do you have The Bad Credit Blues? Learn how to improve your score so your life can be easier. Also learn more about average US incomes.

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Investment Alert: Gold in IRA - A Better Alternative

Question: What investment increases in value during times of war, inflation, high oil and gas prices, budget deficits and most economic turmoil?

No, that is not a trick question. While paper investments like stocks depreciate during negative conditions, there’s an investment vehicle that increases its price: GOLD. Historically, gold has been a valuable commodity and even up to this point in time, it is still considered precious. This probably explains why more investors are rolling their IRA, 401k, 403b and pension plans into IRA gold, specifically 401k gold account.

Since 2000, gold 401k’s performance has surpassed almost every other asset that can be included in a retirement account. A report said that a $25,000 investment in the year 2000 had grown to $26,853 by 2002, $40,817 by 2004, $50,289 by 2006, and $74,777 in 2007.

Currently, the US government allows Gold American Eagles and Gold proof American Eagles in gold IRAs. However taking possession of your IRA gold is qualified as a distribution and may require you to pay a possible penalty and the taxes to the IRS. This is the reason why it’s advisable to have your IRA gold stored at a depository who offers secure safekeeping service.

Other assets can be held in your precious metal IRA and it’s best to inquire about gold IRA transfer and related stuff from a gold investing company if you are contemplating to try it.

Angry Bank Customers Flock to Twitter!

Chase Bank's entire U.S. online banking system was down all day tuesday and most of wednesday. It was a huge digital mess that drove customers to vent on twitter! Chase (NYSE:JPM), the second-largest U.S. bank by assets, has more than 5,100 branches and 15,000 ATMs. Chase has 16.5 million online customers.

This kind of glitch comes just as financial firms are finding it easier to get customers to go digital. Hope it doesn't turn into a major setback for the process!

Don't Underestimate The Importance of What You Earn

I joined MyLot recently. It's a forum where you get paid by posting. One of the questions that I answered was posted by a guy who was offered two jobs and he chose the higher paying one. He said his father advised him that "it's not what you earn really that is important but what you save". A lot of forum members agreed on that. I begged to disagree (and earned $0.01 for posting my reply).

Now, why didn't I agree?

When I was still working in a manning agency, there's this seaman with the rank of Ordinary Seaman or OS. He earns roughly $500 per month. He has a wife and a seven year old daughter and he is proud of his wife because she manages to save 20% of his monthly allotment.

Then, there is this vessel master whose position is more popularly known as the ship's Captain. He earns $6,500 monthly. He's got a wife and a seven year old daughter too and just like the seaman's wife, his wife also manages to save 20% of his monthly allotment.

Which family do you think has a greater savings? The captain's family, right?

What you earn is a great factor in determining how much you can save. All things being constant, the bigger your earnings, the greater is your chance to save more.

More points tomorrow.

Making Money on Twitter

The only social networking site I'm active on are Friendster and Facebook, although I'm more into Facebook (because I have my farm at farmville and cafe world business to attend to, LOL!). I've heard of Twitter and even based my blog's title on it but I've never been into tweeting.

Until yesterday.

I was "promoting" my blog to my friend over YM chat when the topic of Twitter (as in the real site) came up. She's one of those people who can't seem to let a day (or even an hour) pass without tweeting her whereabouts or anything she fancies (peace Shine!). And guess what, I was surprised to learn that she's earning A LOT from her twittering (not millions though, just three figures but that's a lot considering that all you have to do is tweet and gain followers)!!!

Oh well, so this was what happened: I was planning to invite her to read "The Twitterer" but she had convinced me to create a twitter account instead. Then she said that I have to register at Adly as a twitterer and hopefully get a lot of advertisers to sponsor my feeds depending on the number of my followers.

So there I was opening a Twitter account and Adly account too. If you're into Twitter and would like to earn from twitter too, here's the link of the site that my friend suggested to me: Adly.

My problem now is how to gain followers... Oh-uh! Care to follow me?

Hope to see you there!