ABOUT ME

It all started one day when my husband came home from work and was telling me about how he was listening to co workers saying how much debt they had. Both spouses worked full time, they had to rush their young children  to daycare every morning , they were late for work because they had to wait in line to get a breakfast sandwich at the drive through and the list went on and on…..Does this sound familiar?

Many people ask how we do it. A one family income in today’s world. This made me realize that there are many people out there who just do not know how to do the math or do not know how to live frugal. They were brought up this way or are custom to living like everyone else. Wanting to be like the Joneses.

Lets Do the math…
Position:  Bank Teller at Bank of America
Hours Worked: 38-40 hours week/no overtime
Hourly Wage: $11/hour Bonus: $1000/quarterly
Average Monthly Gross Income: $2,100 (including the bonus)

An extra $2000 a month was very attractive, especially with a child in diapers. But now let's calculate this cost of working.

$325         Day care
$160         Transportation (not including payment for car #2)
$125         Lunch expenses
$75           Clothing/Dry Cleaning Expense
$200          Dining Out Expenses
$1,200       Miscellaneous Expenses (diapers, formula, gifts)
$52            Hair care/nail because no time to do it yourself


This brought my monthly expenses to: $1,312.00

So, my income, after taxes, was $1,575 and my expenses for working were $1,312.00 That left me a profit of $263 a month, or  $1.52  a hour!

For working mothers, the cost of paying someone else to take care of their children is skyrocketing. In many states, like Connecticut, Minnesota and New York, the annual cost of day care for young children exceeds the cost of college tuition and board.
In the most expensive state-Massachusetts- day care sets parents back $19,000 a year on average. If a woman earns the median salary of $36,931 for women working full time in the U.S., those costs can take up half her annual pay.
So regardless of whether the value of a mom’s work has fallen in this economy, her sacrifices certainly haven’t.

Western wages have plummeted so low that a two-income family is now (on average) 15% poorer than a one-income family of 40 years ago.” — Jim Nielson | The Street

Getting finances in order means overcoming bad habits.
"It's easy for us to expand our spending habits when income goes up," he said. "But when we have a cutback in income, it is much harder for us as individuals to cutback and stop spending as much."-VanderToolen

Two income families are going to spend far more on housing and their second income usually generates the second income.They are going to pay higher taxes (because they earn more) They may tend to "treat" themselves more.....

I am a stay at home mom and I want to give you  every tip on how to live like a frugal royal family in today’s world and be able to stay at home with your young children. This is Our ABC’s of living frugal:

More great links!

http://homeparents.about.com/cs/familyfinances/a/oneincome.htm 

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/765556846/Staying-at-home-How-to-downsize-from-dual-to-single-income.html?pg=all

http://lenpenzo.com/blog/id5773-are-two-household-incomes-really-better-than-one.html

http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/08/15/raising-a-family-on-one-income-part-two/ 

http://www.markrubinlawyer.com/the-two-income-trap/

Read more: http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/05/04/What-Are-Stay-at-Home-Moms-Really-Worth.aspx#page1#ixzz2M3H6RzAX

http://swz.salary.com/MomSalaryWizard/LayoutScripts/Mswl_MomPayCheck.aspx 

http://www.anycalculator.com/costofworking.htmhttp://www.anycalculator.com/costofworking.htm