“Don’t Have Children You Can’t Fully Afford”: 40 People Share Their Most Controversial Money Tips
Esther Mukumbo is a mom from South Africa, trying to find her way toward financial independence. She has over 10 years of experience in Development Finance and Banking and is a director at a black women-owned investment company she co-founded called Malkia Invest.
While trying to achieve her goals, Esther also regularly posts on social media and one of her latest tweets has gone viral. In it, the woman asked everyone to share their most controversial takes on personal finance, and people happily obliged.
This prompted an interesting discussion on money, a subject many often avoid in the real world, fearing making a fool of themselves or saying something that would trigger those around them. Yay the internet!
Image credits: EMukumbo
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HA!!! HERE IT IS!!! The Terry Pratchett Sam Vimes Boots theory I mentioned before!
However, let's challenge this thread from a different perspective. Not because it's inherently wrong—it might allow us to get a better understanding of what these people are talking about. As Kristin Wong pointed out in The New York Times, traditional personal finance advice is often tossed around in blanket statements. While there's nothing wrong with the actual advice in theory, the way we deal with money in reality is often much more nuanced.
Consumer spending is increasing and unemployment rates have fallen, but wage growth has been slow, and income inequality is still very much a problem. With the situation changing so fast and drastically, what can we actually do about money?
How is this controversial? They absolutely should not exist. You don’t become a billionaire by paying people fair wages and a fair amount of tax. You become one by playing the system and cheating people out a liveable wage.
This is true. Terry Pratchett's Sam Vimes had a GREAT little commentary on that.... too darn true.
"I'm interested in the causes and consequences of inequality, particularly from a labor market perspective," Kate Bahn, director of labor market policy and an economist at the research organization Washington Center for Equitable Growth, told Wong. Dr. Bahn argued there's not enough emphasis on the larger structural barriers that make people's financial lives difficult. Personal finance might sometimes even further de-emphasize these barriers, she said.
There is, for example, a concept called labor monopsony, which is what happens when a single hiring entity gains control over the workforce.
"So employers will take advantage and pay workers less because there's nowhere else to go," Dr. Bahn said. "It's geographically remote areas where there may be only one big employer, and there's no other company to work for, so that company can pay whatever they want because workers can’t say, 'Screw this,' and go somewhere else."
Or better yet: Don't police how other people spend their money. Unless they ask you directly, it's literally none of your business. How would you like it if people commented and judged you on your purchases? Don't do it to others.
Get rid of religion, it is only about control and money. Controlling YOU and YOUR money.
Dr. Bahn's argument is that personal finance is necessary, but not quite sufficient. It's put forth as a solution when what we really need is policy, she said, and places priority on personal choice over issues that are ultimately out of most people's control.
But there are still plenty of folks who think that personal finance remains helpful because it is a way to share information that many are discouraged from seeking. "People have criticized financial education, saying it doesn't work because people are still making mistakes," Billy Hensley, president and CEO at a private nonprofit, National Endowment for Financial Education, also told Wong. "Education can't help access jobs, but it can help people navigate the system as it exists."
You also can't buy in bulk, transport far for savings, or afford an annual subscription for discount stores or Prime.
In... the USA... yes. I remember well the incredulous conversation I had when I was in my early 20s with an American friend. I laughed and asked him something like 'Ha ha.. yeah, sure, so what happens if you break your leg on vacation?" and he said "I dunno... pray... and beg?" - then I realized he was serious. And... the conversation got worse from there... it took me a WHILE to truly accept he wasn't exaggerating.
But when you think about it, how do you even measure the effectiveness of personal finance? After all, so much of it is... personal.
Rachel Schneider, a researcher and co-author of The Financial Diaries: How American Families Cope in a World of Uncertainty, tried to look at how people handle money in the real world. She and her co-author, Jonathan Morduch, a researcher and professor at N.Y.U., worked with over 200 families for a year, gathering information on every dollar that went in and out of their homes.
Our job offered " free 30 talk with a financial planner" He determined that I would have to put 1800 a month towards retirement to make the magical 1 million mark. That would have left me with $800 a month to live. And why do i need a million if i am living off 45,000 a year now ?
True. Very true. We don't own a car. There was a time we had to take the bus home from a big grocery haul. It was cheaper to get a ton of food all at once than spend bus/cab fare multiple times. So I'd be waddling down the block from the bus stop carrying 6 bags on each hand. Sometimes having to go back and forth up and down the block lol. Laundry day meant gathering up 3 large bags, putting them on the wagon and walking it all down to the laundromat. There was no car to just drive the kid to school. Rain, sun, ice and snow we had to walk her there and back, sometimes using the wagon or sled. Cleaning meant actually scrubbing and dusting, not using all that fancy stuff. We had slumlords so we had to do a lot of repairs ourselves or wait until a cheap, careless contractor came to do a temporary patch job. I was in way better shape back then than I am now lol.
"A huge finding was the level of volatility people experience in their financial lives over the course of a year," Ms. Schneider explained.
Although she expected to find income volatility year to year, she was surprised to see how widely income varied within the year, too. A subject could be above the poverty line for the year overall, but that same person could fall below the poverty line in any given month.
My mom has a serious problem with this. She's super finicky about interior/exterior appearances and every boyfriend she's moved in with, she's "helped" with redecorating and renovating. Each time I just shake my head and roll my eyes when she's not looking. Keep telling her to just stop and stop moving in with men just because she doesn't feel comfortable being a "single woman living on her own".
This is a personal matter between the family. There are some well-to-do parents who have no problems kicking their 18 year old to the curb without anything to survive on. And then there are the other parents, regardless of how well-off or not, who know how hard it is for the single, young folk to get by on their own and are okay with letting them remain at home to save money. It's no one else's business. You do you, people. If you're okay with your kids living at home, then that's you're business. If you want to kick them out of the nest, that's you're business.
"This has a huge impact on how people deal with money," Schneider said. "The economy has been growing and the unemployment rate is relatively low and declining, yet we’re not seeing that growth and prosperity getting distributed down to the bottom."
While Schneider agreed that financial education is necessary and can be useful, she also worried that overemphasizing it as a solution to financial challenges shifts responsibility away from our economy's major players (like banks that offer subprime predatory loans or companies that take advantage of workers).
Unless you have been in those shoes, you can't know how to advise someone on living in them.
I get frustrated at people saying it's inexpensive to cook healthy stews with cheaper cuts of meat and veg. The ingredients might be less expensive but having the oven on for 2 hours is more than many can afford where I live.
Seriously, and when you're working two jobs and raising kids, who the entire hell has time?
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Nothing wrong with stocking up on frozen veggies and frozen fruit, a bag of potatoes, a bag of oatmeal and learning to make your own soups.
This is not true for every meal. I eat rolled oats for breakfast every day, and it's one of the healthiest foods out there. A large container is $3.50 and will feed me for a couple of weeks. I can add whatever I want to make it taste good, too, so no, I'm not eating something that tastes like cardboard. Other meals, yes, I agree, but this one I can say is cheaper than even the store brand breakfast cereals.
Having IBS means my food options are quite limited; I have Asperger's Syndrome, so I have sensory issues with food, I also have CFS/ME so I don't have the energy to cook everything from scratch. I buy frozen ready-chopped veg, frozen mash, oven chips (my bf loves his chips). I can't eat anything overly processed, nor can I eat legumes (lentils etc), cabbage-family (broccoli etc), mushrooms (and Quorn), soya, linseed (often in healthy bread), bananas (allergy) artificial sweeteners, preservatives... We eat well enough, but neither of us has much appetite so only eat once, maybe twice a day; no junk food. We eat mostly chicken and fish, and pasta. I would love to make everything fresh and from scratch.
Again, only in the US. I live in Greece and healthy food is the cheapest. Prices go up as foods get more unhealthy.
Not in my area. Frozen fruits and vegetables are cheap and abundant. The stores are loaded with dry beans and cheap rice. Day-old bread is easily had. Cereals not loaded with sugars are bargain-priced. Now the price of milk has skyrocketed, but alternatives to milk consumption are available.
Healthy food is cheap, it just takes work and time to grow it. Nobody wants to take the time.
Exactly, I had a simple hanging planter that I got for free that I grew lettuce in... There's plenty of YouTube videos on people with disabilities or people in apartments growing and supplementing their own diets. Local Extension agents may have seed libraries and seed libraries are popping up everywhere.
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It depends on where you live. I live in rural area in a tropical country, fresh veggies are so cheap (less than 1$ per kg).
That depends heavily on what the buyer thinks is "healthy food" and where the buyer can shop. I buy "healthy food", meaning good quality (often organically produced) raw ingredients and cook from scratch. Good food doesn't have to be fancy or contain exotic ingredients. However, the US of A has 'food deserts', neighborhoods and towns where the only groceries are neither 'healthy' nor reasonably priced.
Healthy food doesn't have to be expansive, but you have to go to some farm and buy it there. And that is sometimes a huge problem, especially if you live in a city where are no farms around selling their produce to random people. I live in small village but I work in the city and my colleagues are amazed by how cheap meat, milk or vegetables from farm can be, in general about a third of the price of the city.
It's not the food that is expensive, it's the time and energy it takes to prepare it that is expensive. It is easier to go to a drive thru and grab food on the way home then it is to figure out meal plans and groceries, go grocery shopping, prep the meal, cook the meal, and clean up after the meal.
Being poor costs time as well as your energy levels. I totally agree with your comment.
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Sadly, eating healthy foods is often out of reach for many, especially those in food deserts, who have to travel a long way to find a grocery store. It is possible to eat healthy foods, but it is very labor intensive and time consuming for those without money to pay for convenience. My town has food pantries and donation points, but without a car, it's difficult to take advantage. When I was in college I took a nutrition class that required students to create a model of a successful food program. My theoretical worked best of the class, because I based it on the community, rather than individuals: those who could drive traveled around to do the shopping; those who could cook, cooked, and those who couldn't do either would help with the cooking, cleaning and delivery. It worked on paper, but some principles might work IRL, families joining to buy larger cheaper packs, sharing effort, etc.
It depends on what you eat. So for example, meat is cheap here but meat substitutes for vegans/vegetarians are not. Similarly, if you're single, most things are sold in packs, so you buy some fruit for example and it goes off before you finish eating it all, so effectively it's more expensive than its price tag suggests. Take a lettuce for example. It's about $1-$1.50 here. That's pretty expensive. But if a single person buys one, they might use 2-3-4-5 leaves, max, for their salad. Unless they commit to eating salad for every meal for a week, they won't finish it. Same for a bag of potatos. $4-5 or so. Chances of finishing: 5%. Chances of them rotting before they're finished: 95%. Suppose you want a meat stew. Meat: $5. Potatos:$5. Random veg: $2. Total: $12. Energy to cook: 4 hours @$1/kwh say. Total cost: $16. Food for a week, sure. If you don't mind eating the same thing every day. Cost of a single stew premade meal: $3. Much cheaper to just buy premade.
If it is available at all. No fresh produce in poor neighborhoods.
Rice, legumes, potatoes, pasta, veggies aren't expensive and they are healthy! Meat and dairy plus processed crap is expensive!
Money spent on supposedly 'healthy' food is often wasted unless there's a specific medical condition involved. Ordinary food in every supermarket may have been produced by agribusinesses, be canned rather than fresh, be non-organic or biodynamic, but life expectancy increases nevertheless. A lot of the popularity of organic foods is more fad than fact. Poor diet, overeating and stress are the real; killers, not agribusiness broccoli.
Yes! There are six kids in my house, and while I try to be as healthy as possible sometimes it can be hard. We have one grocery store in our town who takes full advantage of being the only place within 100 miles - they have rotten produce, meat that goes rancid in a day and prices that border on predatory. We have to drive 100 miles to shop at a super walmart for the month - and then people b***h at us for "supporting awful corporations instead of local"
I kinda understand this one but I think its an individual definition thing to what you define as 'healthy'. Like is it enough for you to buy fresh fruit/veggies in your local supermarket? Do you prefer to buy local grown food from farmers in your area? Bc last thing IS more expensive. And also I feel like cheap white bread is cheaper than healthy, dark one what will keep you full. The difference will be about 50 cents or something but these 50 cents make a difference when your poor.
There are some places where this is true, and others where it is not. For me, it is way cheaper to buy lots of fresh vegetables and frozen ones too, More processed an item is the more expensive it is. One of the big problems is America is the huge monoculture farms. Food often has to travel huge distances. Things like fresh salad items have a very short time between picking and going off. If all of that time is spent in refrigerated transit it will really increase the price of the food, and decrease its quality. Food miles matter.
I agree whole heartedly. In Australia a punnet of raspberries is $5, while a big mac, large chips, large drink is about $6. A salad sandwhich is $7 in the supermarket compared to a full meal at the local McDonalds which is less. Sigh, people who are low income are being forced to eat from these places because the healthy stuff just doesn't stretch as far and costs double.
The notion that basic human rights are a somehow a privilege is one of the reasons we have such inequity in the distribution of basic human rights.
I got sick this week so I bought a ton of fruit and veg for juicing. Ended up spending $70 on two grocery bags full. Should have just bought a bottle of multivitamins.
A better way to look at it is sometimes "the same raw quantity of healthy/better quality calories are more expensive". We all have calorie and nutrient needs relative to our lifestyle/goals/demands etc and if you're someone that has an intensive life/job burning through 4000+ cals a day, if you're poor it can be pretty hard to get all those calories and nutrients in from top of the range best quality food.
Actually. Healthy food is cheaper than paying exorbitant health costs due to ill-health. Give up salt, sugar and fat laden foods.
Fruit, vegetables, pulses, grains... you can eat for SO cheap if you cook for yourself and eat plant based. Healthy eating does not mean matcha lattes or whatever currently trending on instagram.
Not true. I used to shop at small farmers markets because their produce was cheaper than the grocery store. And better quality.
Disability benefits are there to cover the extra costs associated with having a disability/being disabled. Do you have to keep the heating on 3/4 of the year because of kidney failure, because there's a cost to that. Do you have to eat food without certain niche ingredients and therefore spend additional money covering the cost of that. I spend additional money each month on petrol so I can get to places because the bus isn't suitable. Disabilities cost more.
One thing that both proponents and critics of financial education seem to find common ground on, however, is that if we're going to help people navigate the current system, the way we talk about money has to evolve.
Financial education should not be telling a person to do this and in this exact way or you’re a failure. We need to humanize the topic and try to acknowledge the individual.
Anyway saving is a myth, that is NOT how rich people get rich. Source: I am in the 1% in my country, own 3 cars, paying off two properties, have two servants, private schooling, etc. How did I do it? Sheer luck, and playing the stock market with spare cash.
Ex-Credit Union manager here. If you're married, you should at least tell your spouse you have your own acct. Most honest couples disclose that ahead of time. AND don't ask anymore questions. If they can't accept that then they have issues that will probably ruin your relationship eventually anyhow. In the event of death the spouse is usually the beneficiary anyway.
This. I keep saying to people let's say "he is paid X" instead of "he earns X". Generally a person in management or above does not earn anything, they are more or less email forwarding devices that forward instructions between upper management and staff. That's not work.
a child's happiness depends on money I would feel better (and the people at school insulting me too) if I coul take a shower when I want instead of "water is expensive and we only have one hot water balloon-storage/day so we'll have to take turns : for a family of three max MAX is 1 shower every three days :(
I love my credit union. Still some fees but not nearly as bad as banks!
"Financial literacy" is code for rich people wanting to believe that poverty only happens due to personal faults and not systemic injustice.
Youtubers and other platformers get a lot of help from friends and family to advertise, and those who really did it themselves took a lot of sacrifices many of us aren't willing to risk. All these ones saying they quit their jobs to focus on their channel for a couple never tell you how they were able to do to that. Same with the ones saying they tried working one office job, quit and vowed to never work for someone again. HOW?
I think it should be taught in secondary school, as not everyone goes on to university
I never knew how true this was until a year ago. If I end up not being able to go back to work (currently on leave with a medical issue), I may or may not get social security benefits. They say that I can work, even if it's a job with less pay and less hours. How am I supposed to live on working 20 hours a week at $10 or $15 an hour?? If I don't find the right treatment, I'm poor no matter what.
If you have dyscalculia that is a very annoying statement to hear. It's not like we can't learn it just takes longer, and not a lot of people have the patience to take the time to teach it to someone with math dyslexia. It's frustrating and easier to just give up. But it's not that we're ignorant. We want this knowledge.
Note: this post originally had 113 images. It’s been shortened to the top 40 images based on user votes.
Being poor is not a moral failing, but not giving a s#it about the poor is.
My financial advice to my fellow Americans: STOP voting against your own interests! If we would all do this then UNEARNED income wouldn't be taxed at a lower rate than earned income in this country.
Absolutely. I'd vote many time more UP if I could
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Other advice to not take from Twitter: who to vote for; whether to get vaccinated; whether the earth is flat; etc.
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Most poor people are doing everything they can to get out of poverty. You can actually do everything "right" and still be poor. All you need is bad luck. You cannot change what country you come from, wish parents you have, etcetera. And even if you start out well, an accident or a serious health problem can tank your economy for life.
I think mine would be that high-speed internet is not a luxury. Even if you don't use Amazon or have a streaming video service, having high-speed internet at home is necessary for any number of reasons: job hunting, having school-age kids, working from home, the list could go on.
Everyone should be able to live a normal life an have a family. Instead of shaming poor people for having kids we should change society so kids don’t grow up in poverty.
Poverty is actually avoidable if you graduate hs, always have a job, don’t have children until you’re married. Literally the formula that will make poverty disappear And your problems are not solved by trying to vote for the government to steal from “the wealthy”. Stop obsessing about “the wealthy” and focus on your wealth. Free healthcare is a lie. Pay your own medical expenses and be an adult.
My rule always was, if I have to wear Walmart shoes I'm damn sure not buying you a pair $250.00. I told my boys if they wanted them I would pay 50 and they had to earn the rest. Same thing with phones. But our kids didn't get a phone til the turned 13. These 9yr olds with the latest iPhone makes me cringe! I grew up poor.. I mean poor! It shows lol but my kids work there buts off now at 19.20 and 22! Proud momma!
If you are unskilled labor, it doesn’t how much money you make, eventually they will find a way to pay you or someone else less because there are no barriers to someone entering the job. Always have a skill and continually upgrade your skills to stay ahead of automation and cheaper incoming labor.
a justice system but the game ended. Attitudes after the game ended: the "rich" who all thought they were smarter and more deserving of everyone else. It was by f*cking chance (or the organizers) that they got the gold tokens. The poor understood that the game was rigged and were quite vocal about how it was rigged. Those who represented the middle class really thought they stood a chance of being the winner and were totally clueless as to what the game was all about. They were mostly bewildered at all the fuss made by the poor.
Played a "game" one time. Class was split into several teams of 5 people. Tokens were handed out "randomly". Different colors were worth different amounts. There were a very few gold tokens that were worth a lot more. The object of the game was be the person who ended up with the most points from their tokens. Scores were posted. Token handouts happened more than once. Takeaways from the game: In the two teams with the least scores (the poor) would race back to the others with their hands open. What have we got? Then one person was selected by the team to get all of the tokens for the team, the rest got 0. Those who got the golden tokens each stood alone, peeking at their hands. Those who thought they were still in the running to win, but really were not, each played their own hands but stayed with their teams. Cheating was rampant but those running the game said, we can't interfere, the game has not mechanism to deal with it. The "poor" were starting to talk about
Can we please stop using the term canceled please? No one gets canceled you get held accountable to the words you say or write. I'm not sorry your opinions are not viewed by the masses as acceptable and maybe just maybe your views are not acceptable are wrong.
What is true, and what is POPULAR often have no overlap. This little corner of the internet is a prime example of that. Say anything at all that 10 or more people don't LIKE and away you go. Doesn't matter if it's true, doesn't even matter if it's offensive. That's the problem that people have with "cancel culture" not being held accountable for your actions or words, but being held accountable for what some random stranger parses your words to mean or assumes to be true. There are countless examples over the past several years, the most recent example of course being Johnny Depp.
Load More Replies... So glad you shared! I'll be well on my way to my Caribbean retirement in no time with that advice!
Load More Replies... Being poor is not a moral failing, but not giving a s#it about the poor is.
My financial advice to my fellow Americans: STOP voting against your own interests! If we would all do this then UNEARNED income wouldn't be taxed at a lower rate than earned income in this country.
Absolutely. I'd vote many time more UP if I could
Load More Replies... Other advice to not take from Twitter: who to vote for; whether to get vaccinated; whether the earth is flat; etc.
Load More Replies... Most poor people are doing everything they can to get out of poverty. You can actually do everything "right" and still be poor. All you need is bad luck. You cannot change what country you come from, wish parents you have, etcetera. And even if you start out well, an accident or a serious health problem can tank your economy for life.
I think mine would be that high-speed internet is not a luxury. Even if you don't use Amazon or have a streaming video service, having high-speed internet at home is necessary for any number of reasons: job hunting, having school-age kids, working from home, the list could go on.
Everyone should be able to live a normal life an have a family. Instead of shaming poor people for having kids we should change society so kids don’t grow up in poverty.
Poverty is actually avoidable if you graduate hs, always have a job, don’t have children until you’re married. Literally the formula that will make poverty disappear And your problems are not solved by trying to vote for the government to steal from “the wealthy”. Stop obsessing about “the wealthy” and focus on your wealth. Free healthcare is a lie. Pay your own medical expenses and be an adult.
My rule always was, if I have to wear Walmart shoes I'm damn sure not buying you a pair $250.00. I told my boys if they wanted them I would pay 50 and they had to earn the rest. Same thing with phones. But our kids didn't get a phone til the turned 13. These 9yr olds with the latest iPhone makes me cringe! I grew up poor.. I mean poor! It shows lol but my kids work there buts off now at 19.20 and 22! Proud momma!
If you are unskilled labor, it doesn’t how much money you make, eventually they will find a way to pay you or someone else less because there are no barriers to someone entering the job. Always have a skill and continually upgrade your skills to stay ahead of automation and cheaper incoming labor.
a justice system but the game ended. Attitudes after the game ended: the "rich" who all thought they were smarter and more deserving of everyone else. It was by f*cking chance (or the organizers) that they got the gold tokens. The poor understood that the game was rigged and were quite vocal about how it was rigged. Those who represented the middle class really thought they stood a chance of being the winner and were totally clueless as to what the game was all about. They were mostly bewildered at all the fuss made by the poor.
Played a "game" one time. Class was split into several teams of 5 people. Tokens were handed out "randomly". Different colors were worth different amounts. There were a very few gold tokens that were worth a lot more. The object of the game was be the person who ended up with the most points from their tokens. Scores were posted. Token handouts happened more than once. Takeaways from the game: In the two teams with the least scores (the poor) would race back to the others with their hands open. What have we got? Then one person was selected by the team to get all of the tokens for the team, the rest got 0. Those who got the golden tokens each stood alone, peeking at their hands. Those who thought they were still in the running to win, but really were not, each played their own hands but stayed with their teams. Cheating was rampant but those running the game said, we can't interfere, the game has not mechanism to deal with it. The "poor" were starting to talk about
Can we please stop using the term canceled please? No one gets canceled you get held accountable to the words you say or write. I'm not sorry your opinions are not viewed by the masses as acceptable and maybe just maybe your views are not acceptable are wrong.
What is true, and what is POPULAR often have no overlap. This little corner of the internet is a prime example of that. Say anything at all that 10 or more people don't LIKE and away you go. Doesn't matter if it's true, doesn't even matter if it's offensive. That's the problem that people have with "cancel culture" not being held accountable for your actions or words, but being held accountable for what some random stranger parses your words to mean or assumes to be true. There are countless examples over the past several years, the most recent example of course being Johnny Depp.
Load More Replies... So glad you shared! I'll be well on my way to my Caribbean retirement in no time with that advice!
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