Portraits of an Economy

Portrait: Delaware

2010-01-19T21:41:00.000-08:00

My wife and I have been married for coming up on 16 years and have three exceptionally brilliant children (mostly her doing.) For the better part of 20 years after college I sold commercial printing in the DE, PA, NJ area and lead a successful, yet very boring career killing trees for the purpose of telling you, how you can improve everything about you and your life through junk mail. Nonetheless I was quite successful and the income was enough to have Susan stay at home and raise the kids (this is very important to both of us.)

But low and behold my fidgeting and over thinking things would get the best of me and after a dinner out and doing the Madlibs in the back of the kids menu, I had an idea (not uncommon but this was actionable.) The next morning, at 6:30AM, in the shower (sorry for the bad visual) I realized I had never seen language as a game before and I even knew the name would be called You've been Sentenced! I quickly ran out of the shower and woke Susan with “Honey I have an idea!” in a very excited tone to which she rolled over and replied into the pillow “No not now!”

In a slightly less excited tone I explained my idea for the game to which she more eagerly replied “I haven’t had my coffee yet but that sounds like a good idea.” Together we searched the net on December 29th of 2004, and found hundreds of word games but no sentence forming games and one particular site where a teacher wrote a scathing letter to the toy and game industry stating that she was upset that every year there would be a hundred new word games but that no one had ever made a good sentence forming game. That afternoon I called my brother who has two patents to his name and his response…”That is the most incredibly brilliant idea I have ever heard!” I now had my marching orders from the king.

After about 5 weeks of trying to figure out the game play I understood why there had never been such a game – It didn’t WORK!!! With a little prayer and a decent night’s sleep I figured out the math and geometry that would make language playable. By this time I also had developed a team of people to help me, all working for part ownership in the company. On 5/5/05 we launched the world’s first pentagon shaped game – A game that is now a business that is surviving the world’s worst economy in 70 years.

I had stopped selling printing by March of 2006 as orders were coming in from independent stores but the change came with an order from B&N to fill their 650 super stores. By August I had landed Borders as well and we were now off to the races, constantly raising money from investors and growing the business into a real company. We launched more products, hired 3 people, won multiple awards and sales grew to over ½ a million. Now we needed real money and in May of 2008 launched a Private Placement Memorandum to raise 5 million dollars. By august we had 6 investors in and in September were expecting our first big investment for over a million when… I called my future big investor on the day of the crash to which he replied “I’ve lost 200 million this afternoon and I am going to hold off on any other investments right now. That was the mantra I would hear over and over again from investors for the next year.

By March 1st of 2009 my employees basically let themselves go for the potential survival of the company. It was back to me and Susan and the help of a part time book keeper. 70% of our sales come in the 4th quarter so survival until then was imperative. Susan helped fill in my weeks without pay with her freelance writing and even took on a larger client with the launch of a new jewelry line. www.whimsyworldwide.com We cut many of our activities, travel, and other expenses so we could survive to see if sales for Christmas 2009 could help us recover. I am happy to say that we are still here but in a different shape then we were before. But we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the mommy blogs who have been so tremendous in their reviews.

This economy has been brought on by the greed of a few who took advantage of people, loop holes, and the dreams of many. All of us have been affected and hopefully we will learn from our mistakes…only to repeat them again 70 years from now. I am not trying to sound pessimistic but truthful. Our greed drives us and can be the most motivating factor of change in our lives but it also deceives us when we refuse to look at the past. History does repeat itself.

Susan and I look forward to another great year with hope. Hope that our leaders can change the mistakes we have made and correct our vision for the future.

-Donald, Delaware

Portrait: Central Coast, CA

2009-12-12T00:32:00.000-08:00

submitter's note: trigger warning

I managed to score a wonderful job just as the recession hit. I am employed by a non-profit organization, and happily took a slight pay cut in order to regain a sense of personal satisfaction with my work.

My non-profit assists survivors of sexual assault in various aspects of their lives - we advocate for their rights when dealing with police or employers, provide one-on-one and group therapy, maintain a 24 hour hotline, and much more. We also provide educational programs, trainings, and presentations for the community in an effort to prevent sexual assault. Like all other non-profits in this day and age, money is a problem. Federal and state funding has floundered for countless social service organizations.

What has been even more difficult for us is the lack of donations and support from the community. As people scale back their expenses, charitable causes are one of the first things to go, and we have certainly felt the hit. We have also seen interest in volunteerism decrease, despite the high level of unemployment. I personally believe that the fear and dread people feel is overwhelming their ability or willingness to give back to their community, especially when they feel they have received nothing themselves.

We have far less than ten employees, and we have been forced to lay one off and give a pay cut to another. Both women go above and beyond in their efforts to educate and assist sexual assault survivors, and neither deserve to be without adequate income.

Ironically, the stress of the economy and loss of many social service organizations has significantly increased the need for our services. Money problems and other economic fears have "triggered" many sexual assault survivors, bringing back memories and feelings they believed to have been 'resolved' or 'over' years ago. Furthermore, people who were receiving support from other social service agencies that were forced to close their doors are turning to us for help. While we do our best, it is increasingly difficult to meet the varying needs of our clients. For example, we have a lot of mentally ill survivors turning to us for support after their mental health agencies had to close their doors or turn them away. We are simply unable to give the survivor what they need (medication or mental illness-specific therapy) in order to even being the healing process, but as I said, we do our best.

Though we are all being told to "do more with less," that is simply NOT an option when you provide face-to-face, human services. Our counselors cannot counsel two survivors at once. Our advocates cannot be present for one survivor's police report and another's forensic exam simultaneously. Therefore, we will have to begin turning people away.

Turning a sexual assault survivor away is more painful than you can imagine. It usually takes a survivor months, if not years, to get to a place emotionally in which they are ready to share their pain and begin the healing process. To struggle to that point, and then be rejected from the one local organization that can provide you with the healing you need, is indescribably horrible. But we cannot meet the needs of our community without community support, monetary and otherwise. And frankly, our community has completely failed us while expecting our level of services to be maintained or improved.

To conclude, none of us are unaffected by the economy and alone in their plight. For the under- and unemployed - think about volunteering some extra time to a local non-profit. To those struggling to hold onto their jobs, or unsure about their future - think about the consequences of losing some of your most vital social services, and see what you can personally do to help prevent that. I believe that one can find a healthy balance for taking their of their personal struggles while helping to curb larger issues as well. Though everyone needs money, we all need support and a sense of community as well. Ask yourself what you can do to build that sense of community, and help us all emerge from this experience in as good shape as we can hope.

Anonymous

Central Coast, CA

Portrait: Prince George's County, Maryland

2009-10-22T19:46:00.000-07:00

Last night my husband and I broke down and tapped into our very last resort. We emptied my 16 month old daughter’s piggy bank for money to sustain us for the next 10 days until our next paydays.

Despite the dire straits that we might seem to be in right now, we are both in high spirits and counting the many blessings and graces that we have both been granted. All of our bills are paid and we are both gainfully employed in jobs that are definitely not known for being financially lucrative (teaching). We are all healthy but if that fails us, we have amazingly comprehensive health coverage provided by our employers with little to no possibility that it will be taken from us. We have plenty of food in the refrigerator and pantry of more than just the staples and we’ve got a washer and dryer that we don’t have to feed with spare change to work. We both have reliable cars and one was even just able to be paid off. The debt that we do have has been significantly reduced within the past year due to our own diligence at paying it down and eliminating it all together. And to top it all off, we are one of the many American who were lucky enough to buy our first house in one of the most expensive regions of the country and at a price that will not fill us with regret or lead us to foreclosure later.

A part of me has been hesitant to share our experience in this time of recession because our story is so far from being the nightmare that I know others have endured and will continue to endure. I’m certain that plenty of people will read what I’ve detailed of our life and feel it has no place within this collective and also ask what we’ve done to be able to make it through mostly unscathed. The fact of the matter is that our success hasn’t come because of some great big secret though. It’s come from our willingness and commitment to living as simply as possible, understanding and accepting what is no more than just enough, and commitment to living in faith that we will never be given anything that we can’t handle and everything that might seem to come beyond that will be taken care of God alone.

I’m sure that at this point I’ve lost a number of people but I can’t lie and say that our happiness, peace, and joy comes from any place other than a belief much greater than ourselves. Because though we’ve lived a good life, understand that it’s not been easy for us and has definitely included major sacrifices and hardships. Before we were here in life, we lived in a neighborhood where you couldn’t walk around outside at night and you could regularly hear gunfire and see drug dealing. Before we were here in life, there were weeks on end when we trained ourselves to be able to live on maybe one meal a day that was understatedly meager. Before we were here in life, we had to learn to swallow our pride and understand that accepting handouts when they were truly needed didn’t mean an acceptance of the life that we had or an acceptance that things couldn’t or wouldn’t change.

So what’s our secret to “making it” in a time like this? It’s our belief in God and the power of prayer. It’s our commitment to banding together rather than tearing each other apart the way it feels like the world around us is. And it’s our willingness to let go of the life that we once thought we were due so that we can have a life of exactly enough but somehow filled to the brim of everything we ever wanted in the first place.

Despite our differences, our story is as much a portrait of this recession as everyone else’s. Yes, we’ve gained plenty and have succeeded in much. But understand that we’ve lost things as well. However, the things that we’ve lost -pessimism, hopelessness, anger, selfishness, overindulgence, and fear – are things that anyone in this world would be so blessed to lose as well. Because losing all of that will only give way to a strongly rooted belief that hope and faith can and will spring eternal. If only you let it.

-Anonymous
Prince George's County, Maryland

Portrait: Puyallup, Washington

2009-08-31T10:07:00.000-07:00

My husband and I have spent our entire young adulthood making what we thought were the "right" choices. He got me through nursing school so I could get a good job and I could, in turn, get him through chiropractic school so he could get his own great job. We moved to Vancouver, WA and he started school in Portland, OR. We had our daughter while he was in school and I was working a job that was less than ideal...we just knew that after he was done with his program, we could move home, he would be hired on in a thriving practice, and I could drop back to part-time work. My dream is to work only a couple days a week so I can primarily be home with our beautiful two year old. 2009 was going to be the year our "real life" started--great jobs, the stress of student life behind us, maybe our second child?? Back in March, when my husband graduated and we were moving home, life seemed exciting and without limits.

Fast forward to now, nearly six months later. Shortly before moving home, we made the stupid, stupid decision to buy a house we can't afford, assuming (stupidly) that a chiropractor and a nurse combo team would make excellent money and an outrageous mortgage wouldn't be so outrageous after all. We were lured by the promise of being able to refinance in a year...which hasn't happened, despite my husband's repeated efforts to contact our bank and inquire about our refinancing options. He is continually told to call back in a month, maybe then a new opportunity will come available.

I immediately went back to the job I had before we moved. At first, my husband got a job in a clinic as an associate chiropractor and for a month (maybe six weeks?) things seemed like they were settling down. We were paying our bills and trying to pay off our credit cards, I was working three days a week, we enrolled our daughter in a fantastic (if very, very expensive) daycare. But then my husband suddenly just...stopped making money. He was never hired with a salary, only on a per-patient-visit basis. And let's face it, people. Chiropractic care is not a necessity, it's a luxury. People weren't flocking in to see him, and the insurance payments on the few people he was seeing were taking weeks and weeks to roll in. First, he went two weeks without a paycheck. Then three, then four...we were able to piece it together during that time, eating up what was left of our savings, but eventually we realized he was essentially working for free...not the plan we had in mind when we were struggling all those years to get him through school.

He quit working at that clinic, after going six weeks with no paycheck, and the owner of the practice still owes him money. Apparently, it is still tied up in insurance payments. Let's hear it for insurance companies, yes? We went on an uber-budget immediately while he started pounding the pavement looking for a new position as a salaried associate chiropractor. I went back to work full-time. He finds odd jobs working for family, a paint job here, roofing a barn there...all while still trying to find work in the field he loves.

And I am feeling desperate. Like so many other Americans, I am just trying to hold it together and praying that my paycheck will cover all the bills this month. I have $2500 in credit card debt and it eats at me. I have never carried such a high amount on my credit card and I am ashamed to even type in the amount, but there it is. I make payments every month and I feel like the balance never changes.

I try to focus on the positive in my life, but that, along with my faith in my small family, is starting to unravel. I am grateful for my job and bitter at the same time that I have to spend 40 hours a week there. I am thankful we have enough money to spend on groceries each week but growing weary of the stress that goes along with trying to make only $100 per week feed three people. I remind myself that we still have extras...a great daycare for our daughter and a membership to the YMCA, but I am filled with sadness and dread that these extras might have to be cut in a month or two, if my husband still can't find work. And I am constantly humbled, and flabbergasted, that things like quality daycare and a gym membership have shifted from the "necessary" to the "extra" category in my budget and my mind.

We are not where we thought we would be in 2009. We have no savings, we are (still) living paycheck to paycheck, and my husband has no job. At least I know we are not the only people struggling. Thank you for keeping this blog...I am hoping to email an update in a month or two saying my husband is employed and things are turning around. I guess we'll see.

Amy Murray
Puyallup, Washington

Portrait: Vermillion South Dakota

2009-08-24T17:13:00.001-07:00

A few years ago, I was 22 and enjoying my own quiet riot of excess and stupidity. I was mindless about everything. Mindlessly dating and sleeping with a man that didn't love me and vice versa. Mindlessly wracking up thousands in stupid debt, living off of my mother, and just sort of bouncing from idea to idea of what I wanted to do with my life. I didn't really care or realize the damage I was doing to my future, until I got pregnant with my daughter. Instantly things changed in my mind and mentality but not necessarily my life. I broke up with my daughters father, he terminated his parental rights, and I realized how desperately I needed to get myself together.

So, I took a short break (so I thought) from school, got a full time job and bought ridiculously expensive things for my baby girl. I had no idea of the actual needs for an infant nor of how drastically your finances change with a child. I was suddenly dead ass broke and desperate. I met and married my husband in a fiery hurry and realized he was even worse off than I am financially. We were both stupid and excessive- having drained our savings accounts, lived off of plastic, and not caring at all. However with a baby and a tender new marriage we had to face facts- no one was going to save us anymore. It was like looking down the barrel of a gun.

Between our two short lifetimes of collective financial stupidity, he and I had managed to accumulate well over $20k in debt, not including student loans. We had to borrow money from both of our families to get rid of as much as possible but a funny thing occurs with debt- it never really goes away. There's always more of it popping up everywhere in your life once you get the vicious cycle started. Ever heard of zombie debt? Well, apparently debt collectors can sell your debt files to other companies before you pay it off and they dont have to tell the new company that you paid it off. So you can get hit up for repayment on your debt several different times.

Isn't that swell?

Then this recession hits. We were not even living paycheck to paycheck, that wasnt even CLOSE to covering everything. We both were in school, working, getting government aid because we're parents and still couldn't make ends meet. We were also painfully awful at budgeting. It's so embarassing. I can barely even face myself in the mirror sometimes, I'm so embarrassed by my own financial stupidity. We've cut back and don't live glamourously by any means but still cannot make ends meet.

We just had our second child and I got a tubal. We talk daily about the dreams we have of financial comfort and stability and the life we want to give our kids but honestly, I wonder if we really actually can give them anything other than poverty. I'm going back to school to become a nurse, my husband wants to design software and do web development, so he's in school for that. But we still have the rain cloud of debt, bad credit scores, and unsteady finances over our heads.

I know there's more we can do to cut back in our lives and we do try. Somehow money flows out of our fingertips faster than we can hold onto it. Every time I blink there's some new expenditure. Our cars are barely standing or driving but we have no cosigners or ability to get new ones on our own. I'm bitter and ashamed and hungry for more. In my world, true success comes in quality not quantity but that doesn't always put food on the table and pay the rent. We need a break to eliminate the money owed from past mistakes so we have more in our pockets to contribute to the future.

Around here, right now, people have money. We seem to be in a strange little microcosm- here in South Dakota people can still afford things. When we have to go to buy the bare necessities at Walmart, there are the plastic wives with their pink polos and frosted hair with their 2.5 children and tiffany chain link bracelets jingling on their teeny wrists. They have carts loaded and overflowing, they own Sam's Club memberships they don't need, and they load all their purchases into shiny yellow SUV's. Their kids come away with the big toys like Wii's, etc. We're lucky to buy our daughter a $5 barbie once in awhile. Around us people are snatching up LCD flat screens, new vehicles, boats, clothes, etc. The few times we've been to a mall lately- it's always teeming with hundreds of people loaded down with shopping bags. How lucky for them. People are building hugely expensive houses and enjoying the good life.

I lie awake at night worrying about money and the reality of our future. We want so desperately to leave this place, despite the low cost of living and seemingly good employment rate. The thing is, we don't have the skill sets to get long term good paying jobs here. I have nothing against small town living but I'm a loner at heart and a bit of a wanderer, so I want to take my children to cities and other countries. How will I ever be able to do that? We are in our late 20's, in debt, with two very small children, and neither my spouse nor I have started our careers yet. This sounds so whiny and I do accept responsibility for my actions. But I can't help the fear that creeps over me when I stare at my checkbook and think about how to pay electricity next month.

However, I get incredibly angry at the people who bash our presidents desperate attempts to save our country's economy. We've been spiraling downward for close to a decade and he's got to undo that or basically lose his job. All the negativity and hatred directed towards him saddens me and has made me lose faith in America. People's belligerence and denial of our the reality that is America Today has disgusted me so completely. I cannot even say I am patriotic anymore. I have so much faith in the man that leads our country but absolutely no faith at all in the people who live in it. I see no way we can release ourselves from the recession without him and some very serious changes in our lifestyle that is so devoted to consumerism.

Signing off-

Sara Rose

Vermillion, South Dakota

Portrait Update: St. Louis Missouri

2009-07-19T21:49:00.000-07:00

You published my story on Portraits of an Economy on Mother's Day. My husband and I were in the middle of what felt like a never ending adoption limbo, waiting to find out if we could keep our daughters and sacrificing everything we could to continue channeling money at our lawyers. We were waiting on consent from two of the three biological parents involved (while fighting the third) and honestly, even though we knew we were the best thing for those girls, we also knew the law doesn't really care when it comes to adoptions. The law cares more about whether or not you can prove the neglect that stipulates the disruption of parental rights.

Rereading my portrait, I can tell that I was angry. Or maybe just incredibly frustrated with the whole situation. I'm not entirely certain. I do know that the whole thing had worn me down to the point that I could actually see myself saying goodbye to my daughters. I would be folding laundry and wondering what we would send with them and what we would keep for those inevitable hours spent sobbing on the floor of my closet. I detached a little, not in any desire for freedom but more because I knew that this was going to hurt. I knew it was going to cut me to my soul and I would never recover from the loss of my children. Everyone told us to be patient, that obviously no judge would award an ex convict custody, that no judge would take them away from us. But some days it was really hard to believe those people. Most days it was impossible to see that this would ultimately be over, that we wouldn't live in limbo forever and we wouldn't always be letting go of everything else in pursuit of our family.

I had lost my ability to believe in miracles. I let go of a belief that I had always held close to my heart - that when things are meant to be, the Universe or God or fate or whatever would deliver the right conclusion and it would fit perfectly, even if it was a smidge uncomfortable at first.

Over the past several days, we have been gifted so many miracles I don't even know how to begin to describe the cloud of happy I am on. We received the consent papers from the two biological parents and they were filed without a hitch, meaning we are completely free to adopt one of our daughters. We finally, FINALLY, are paying off our lawyer in full tomorrow and should be finished paying him for good. But most importantly, the judge denied a request from the biological father who had been causing so many issues and requested that our lawyer and our children's lawyer (guardian ad litem) set up a court date so he could issue a final adoption decree. Remarkably enough, the court date is exactly 41 weeks from the day we recieved our daughters. I am shaking my head at the fact that we can't seem to make a pregnancy last longer that twelve weeks but we will 'birth' a family in a normal gestational period.

I don't know that this is in any way fitting with the theme of Portraits of an Economy and so I understand completely if you don't publish it, but I just...I have hope again. I have faith that everything will work out and that life will carry on. I'm not naive, I know that a whole host of things could happen between now and then and we might still walk out of the courtroom without being declared a family. But I can face it now with the knowledge that perhaps a pessimistic outlook is not going to carry us as well as being hopeful, blindingly hopeful, over the potential of our happily ever after. Mainly, I can hold my daughters and kiss them and love them and I'm not secretly wondering how many more times I'll get to do it. I get a lifetime of being their mom. I no longer fear the potential of waking up one morning and my house being empty because someone has taken my children away.

I know with the economy the way it is people are losing hope left and right. They are drowning in bills and facing unemployment and wondering how they are going to get everything handled and still feed their children. There is so much to be afraid of and worried about. But there is also still so much hope and potential for great change, for miracles, to surprise us. I am hoping for the best for all of us, hoping that everyone gets a chance to see a miracle happen in their life and feel unabashed joy again.

Portrait: Johannesburg, South Africa

2009-07-07T23:30:00.000-07:00

I was laid off at the end of April. I am yet to find a job. I am married, I have a house and a child. Thank goodness my husband still has his job. I don't want to think about where we would be should he lose/have lost his job. My husband and I had good jobs, earning good salaries, with a lot of left over debt from our student and childless and plainly reckless days. I have been unemployed before, for 3 months about 4 years ago- but it was easier then. We lived off our credit cards, and were in the process of paying off that debt when I was laid off this time. I have no idea how we are surviving, but we were - except never in our lives have so many of bills not been paid. Thankfully we are still able to meet our commitments to the medical aid, bond (mortgage), and car repayments, even able to buy food. Everything else is maneuverable - dodging here, paying there occasionally. But I don't think we can last another month like this.

For the first time, I am really scared. There are hardly any positions in my field, and I have been to too many interviews where at the last minute the position is withdrawn.
Over 200 000 people have lost their jobs since 2008, in a country where unemployment is over 30% - this is terrifying. I know too many people who are unemployed, normal everyday people who have lost their jobs due to the recession. South Africa thought we were immune to the effects of the economic downturn. We had tighter banking laws, corporate laws - but the long fingers of the recession have finally grasped us - hard.

I am a positive, optimistic person. I always see the good side of things. I knew I would be working by June, and May could be looked upon as a holiday. I mean I got to spend time with my son on a daily basis. I got to sleep in (we're in the middle of winter here - so this should be a very big PLUS hehe), I've learnt to recognise the tricks supermarkets use to get us to buy what we don't need. I got to watch as much tv as possible - till we disconnected our satellite tv when it became quite clear that I would not be working by June. We have cut down on everything. Except we still have our son's nanny working for us. I cannot bare to think of her as a 'luxury'. She is a mother too, a single mother working her hardest for her family, she is a person not a luxury. If we 'let go of that luxury' - that means she can no longer put food on her table at home, she cannot send her child to school, how can I do that to another mother? So we scrape and scrimp to pay her salary too. And my positivity is dimming. When I didn't get a job in June, I was convinced I would be working by July. Well, I'm writing this to you on 1 July. I keep doing therapy on myself, reminding myself that worrying and stressing won't change anything except my health, repeating the positives, the silver lining. But there is a voice that is becoming increasingly loud, a voice that cannot be argued with as it speaks with pure logic.

I have applied for EVERY kind of job. But if by the middle of July, EVERY kind will really mean every. I've never worked in retail before - this could be my chance :) I'm good with people, I should make a good waitress. These are not jobs I look down on, not in the least. But I had a certain idea or image in my head. But like a lot of my perceptions, that has changed too. There is no longer an image other than that of survival.

So, to survival! And to never having debt again!

Anonymous

Johannesburg, South Africa

Portrait Update: Greenville, North Carolina

2009-06-29T22:39:00.000-07:00

Back in February I gave my two cents to Portraits of an Economy. Now I only wish I would have put those pennies in my forever-empty coin jar.

The truth is that five, six, seven months ago I somehow had more money. I somehow had more stuff. I somehow managed to dine out nearly everyday of the week. I somehow managed to do all that and still pay our obscene gas-heating bill. I bought new outfits for special occasions. I thought more about not decorating the Christmas tree than all the gifts I was charging to my shiny new credit card. I went to the movies at least once a week. I got new phones. Quite a few of them, actually. I partied. Often.

Then that big mean bull on the top of Rebecca's blog kicked me right in the ass.

One day I just didn't have any money.

One day my dog ate my power cord. Another day my bank account over-drafted six times in a row (long story). The next day a check bounced. Then I realized my car's loan payments were running low. Then I realized that credit cards REALLY DO accumulate interest. Then I realized my phone bill was late. Then there was a mix up at work with my timesheet and I would only get one paycheck that month. Etc.

I didn't pay much attention to my money troubles. I had my job and schoolwork to handle, and with all the tales and horror stories of the "worst recession in years" plastered all over the media, it was easy to blame the selfish and irresponsible actions of the Wall Street big-wigs. Somehow I thought that because millions of people had lost their jobs and savings, homes and retirement funds, that I was just one of them - part of a crisis. Then, at some point I realized that my financial situation doesn't have much to do with the economic recession at all- it simply rhymes with those that do.

When someone would say, "Money is tight these days..." I could honestly say, "I know the feeling." What I didn't realize is that that person's empty wallet may have been from a job lost or a home foreclosed, while mine was from racing to see the next big 3D movie after dinner at Olive Garden and a trip to the mall for a quick shoe-binge.

I'm still reeling from feelings of guilt and selfishness. I have a job that pays more than enough to live off of. I have a nice place to live. I have more outfits than days to wear them. I have a reliable car with a full tank of gas. I have a fancy phone. I have nothing to complain about except my own stupid spending habits. "Stupid is as stupid does."

I've bucked down.

I cleaned off my bookshelf and started selling stuff on Amazon. My Nintendo DS looks good on eBay, and all my old phones did me proud on Gazelle and BuyMyTronics. I've started "cooking" more than going out, and employ the use of my best friend's food stamps whenever possible. I also joined her wireless family plan, which cut my phone bill in half and got me an even fancier phone (for FREE). I discovered that Netflixpales in comparison to a combination of borrowing friends DVDs, YouTube, and Hulu - and at some point I'm going to approach my roommate with a proposal to cancel our cable TV (we'll see how that goes). My shoe collection is no longer growing at an exponential rate, and it turns out that yardsales are fun (until someone ganks your big-dollar salad bowls).

My plan is to make it through my own, self-made recession, so that when the time comes for me to actually feel the real blow of an economic downturn (let's hope never!), I can make it through relatively unscaved.

I've always been a strong swimmer, but money is murky water with a bitch of an undertow. Even if I have to doggy-paddle, I'm gonna make it to the other side - debt free and kicking my heels.

Portrait Update: Olympia, Washington

2009-05-25T22:11:00.000-07:00

I thought I would send you a little update on what's happened since my first post on Portraits.

I wanted to let you, and the readers know that after almost 6 full months of job searching, I finally was able to find a new job! I start training tomorrow, and for the first time in months and months, I will pack a lunch, get in my car and head to work.

I know there are people out there right now who are wondering if they will ever get a job again. Convinced they will never bounce back from this. Who lay in the dark at night wishing their lives were different, wishing they were different. The only thing I can offer up to people in that dark time is hope. Knowing that if they stay positive, keep trying, keeping going to interviews they don't think they want, eventually something will work out. I went to interviews for jobs I knew would make me want to kill myself. I smiled, and told people that I thought I would love the position, that I would fit in perfectly, that their company was perfect for me... while deep inside I wanted to die at the thought of actually working there. I went to interviews where I was the third choice, the second choice, and never the first choice.

And then, out of nowhere, when I had even begun to get used to being unemployed, I found a job. A job with a company that I can be proud of, a position that I can be proud of.

In what felt like my deepest and darkest moments I looked for beauty in my relationship, in friendships, in small moments that could keep me moving forward. Losing my job taught me patience, the ability to let go of control, and to find happiness in the things I have, instead of focusing on the things I want. Now as I move on into the world of employment, I can only hope to hold onto those lessons I learned these last six months.

And in the meantime, I guess I'll just keep dictating my life to others... The Accidental Olympian: One woman's journey of getting laid off, finding it impossible to land another job, moving to Olympia, and eventually starting over.

Ashley

Olympia, Washington

Portrait: Detroit, Michigan

2009-05-25T22:10:00.000-07:00

I called my father the other day.

Our nanny had quit on her first day - which happened to be my first day returning to work from maternity leave - and I wondered if he could help us out for a week while we found someone else.

No, my sixty-year-old dad said. He had to find a job.

A job? What about your retirement? What about the gunshop?

No, said the man who had always been The Wisest Man In My Life. The shop isn't bringing in enough money and your mother's job is killing her.

My mom is a fifty-nine-year-old registered nurse in an intensive care unit. There are no orderlies and only a few LPN's. She has to lift, tuck, turn, and position patients by herself, no matter how big they are. Last month, a patient went crazy and pulled her across him. He nearly dislocated her shoulder and she still has some bruises from the encounter.

Oh, I said. Is there anything I can do to help?

No, he said. Just don't end up like us - paycheck to paycheck, no retirement, drowning in debt, with no way out.

Oh, Dad, I said. Didn't you hear? That's the new American reality.

Anonymous
Detroit, MI

Portrait: St. Louis, Missouri

2009-05-09T13:57:00.001-07:00

I suppose in the grand scheme of things, I don't really have anything to complain about. My husband has a good job that provides insurance. He just got a raise and will (probably, hopefully) get a bonus in June. We can currently afford our mortgage (although thanks to a shady refinance guy, it's on a balloon and set to go up in November but our mortgage company is trying to help us as best they can) and all our bills. We can even afford some luxuries like going out for ice cream or a movie.

The thing is, in November of last year, the day before Obama was elected, I got a phone call from my cousin who is only a month older then me. We had always joked that between the two of us, we had done it right - I got married, she had kids. I have serious fertility issues, she does too except hers are that if a man sneezes in the same county she gets knocked up and I can't seem to get knocked up for the life of me. So she calls me around midday on the 3rd of November and at four am on the 4th my husband and I pulled in to our driveway with two little girls in the backseat of our car.

She didn't think she was a good parent and didn't want to parent anymore, so she asked us to take the kids instead of her giving them to the state. In a matter of hours we went from zero kids to two under two.

All of a sudden our budget has to make room for lawyers bills and increased insurance and the extra food, clothing, water, diapers (although we use cloth), and other things kids need. She dropped them off wearing shorts and tee shirts (in November in Chicago, coming from Michigan) with one spare diaper, a binkie for each girl, a bunch of half broken toys and some clothes that ranged from newborn size to preteen girl size (the girls were 11 months old and 2 and a half at the time). We had to dig deep in our savings to get them beds, clothing, coats, shoes, bottles, plates, cups, diapers, toys, etc. You never realize how much kids need until you have them on your doorstep and you realize you have nothing for them.

We have gone from barely surviving to almost thriving now although it's taken every bit of the past six months. In the time while we've been trying to figure out how to pay for everything involved in having kids, my cousin has moved to Mexico (with her parents footing the bill), moved to Canada (with her parents footing the bill) and told me today she's going to Hawaii for vacation but will possibly decide to move there (with her parents footing the bill). My husband and I had to stop going to school for at least the next year so we can pay for things like the custody battle for our oldest since my cousin "forgot" to tell the biological dad who was incarcerated at the time that she was giving us the kids and preschool and groceries. We've had to cancel vacations, borrow money from my parents, spend our entire tax return ($6,000) and sell things on Craigslist and Ebay.

I could get a job but it would have to be at nights because I don't really have a skill set that would make it worthwhile to put the girls in daycare, but it's been hard to find something that will let me work only in my available time frame. I do odd jobs when I can - random things like babysitting or petsitting that don't pay much but every penny helps. We went from being carefree twenty somethings who vacationed three times a year and never worried about money because we made plenty of it to being on an uber budget so we can afford food for dinner tonight and to make everything legal to keep our daughters. Meanwhile, she's globetrotting and can't promise she'll be in one place for an entire week so I can send her the paperwork to get her rights revoked and help us with our adoption.

The crazy thing is, I wouldn't trade it for the world. I love these kids so much that I would live in my car and sell tee shirts out of the back if that's what we had to do to keep them. My husband feels the same way. We've given up eating out, going to school, going to movies and concerts, buying books, having our own laptops, vacations, new clothes, and having pets so we could dedicate every penny to lawyer fees. Instead of buying groceries at Whole Foods and eating all organic, we buy from the farmers market and Shop N Save. Instead of going for movies we take our daughters for a walk in the park, instead of going to a bookstore we head to the library. The things we're doing to save money seem so very basic but it's been a huge lifestyle switch for us.

I do get angry when I think about my cousin hanging out in Mexico and Hawaii, living off her parents money and spending all day on the beach. I get angry thinking about how it's going to hurt my girls when they get older to know they were given up because she was bored with parenting. I get angry when I have to decide between paying the lawyer and having a date night with my husband as she's posting pictures online of her sitting on a beach with a margarita.

But really, I know that right now, in this economy, I've got nothing to complain about. We're insured. We have a house that we can afford. We're making it, barely, paycheck to paycheck, but we're making it. And we have two gorgeous, amazing, wonderful daughters who have brought more laughter and happiness and light to our lives then I can ever explain. Someday this will all be done - the lawyers and the budgeting and the worry will be gone. In the end, we'll still have each other and we will know that we're stronger for having figured this out, for thriving under these intense conditions. If nothing else, I keep telling my husband it will be something to tell the girls when they are older, to tell them how hard we worked to keep them.

I just keep reminding myself that it's simply another life lesson, another bit of proof that love will sweep in and leave you breathless when you least expect it, that surprise blessings can bring challenges but that doesn't make them any less of a blessing, and that the look on my daughters faces when their daddy comes in the door at night could never carry a price tag.

K,

St Louis, Missouri

A Small Town West of Atlanta, Georgia

2009-05-07T16:49:00.000-07:00

I’m 21 years old, and I’m incredibly grateful just to have a job, and a place to live. I’m the one and only customer service representative for a small medical supply company about 45 minutes outside Atlanta. My boyfriend also works with this company, and thanks to the economy we have seen our already small staff progressively dwindle in size; he and I are now the only two full time employees. We are overworked and underpaid, each of us carries the responsibility of several different jobs, and every layoff adds more and more responsibility to our positions while adding absolutely nothing to our paychecks. There is no overtime at this company. If you work more than your scheduled 8:30-5:30, you receive no extra pay in return. There are no bonuses, no incentives.

We live frugally, going paycheck to paycheck, barely making enough to squeak by, and have accrued a couple thousand in credit card debt from floating groceries and gas when we run out of money. We share a vehicle that is fortunately paid off, but it’s on its last leg. We have no idea what we will do when it dies, we can’t afford a car payment. We have some meager savings set aside, but it’s hard to save money when it runs out so quickly. Even so, we get by for now, but just barely.

My mother’s portrait is entirely different. She and my father divorced several years ago. In the stress of the divorce she made the rash decision of leaving their beautiful new home and buying a fixer-upper from the 70’s. She lives there with my two teenage sisters, both of whom are still in school. Our father rarely pays any kind of child support, and left her with a massive amount of debt from their marriage. Still, they were getting by.

My mother is intelligent and hardworking, she had been employed with an international company for over ten years, and was the best at what she did. Then the bottom fell out of the economy and her branch of the company was closed. They wanted to keep her, they wanted her to move to Minnesota, or New York, but the housing market was in shambles. She knew there was no way she could sell the decrepit half-renovated house they were living in, nor did she want to move my sisters to state and another school district. So she stayed. She had a great resume and pristine references, she should be able to find another job in no time, right? Wrong.

She searched for 8 long depressing months, and then finally got a job with one of her former company’s competitors. It meant taking a pay cut, but it was something. She was there for four happy months, and then she was laid off with no warning. She was out of work again for another four months, then when things started looking hopeless, she managed to get another job, with another huge pay cut.

The already massive debt from her marriage was only made worse by the months she was without a job. Food, car payments, mortgage payments, it all went on credit. By no means were they living extravagantly, but because of all the debt they barely made ends meet when she was making $30 an hour last year, before the economy went to hell. Now she makes $15 an hour, and she is doomed to be in debt for the rest of her life.

I cried myself to sleep all those nights she was without a job, when it seemed imminent that they would lose their house, and my mother and my two little sisters would be homeless. Now I cry myself to sleep knowing that she will never be able to retire, knowing that she will never get the rewards she deserves for all those years of hard work. I cry myself to sleep knowing that there is nothing I can do to help her.

She wants me to go to college so badly, and I would love to have the opportunity to do so, but it seems so pointless now. A few months back, my company was considering hiring another person to share the workload. They posted the job listing on one site, and within 24 hours they were flooded with hundreds of resumes. People with years and years of experience, with bachelors and masters degrees, they were all desperate for a job that paid $10 an hour. Why would I go to college now? I want this situation to get better so badly, but it’s so hard to be optimistic when the world seems to be crumbling around us. But deep down, I know that there is only one direction to go when life has hit rock bottom. Up. So I’m sitting here, looking up from this pit, waiting.

Jessica

Portrait: Vancouver, Washington

2009-05-06T16:33:00.000-07:00

Sunday, May third, was shaping up to be a typical workday for me and my co-workers at the salon I work at. We'd been steady throughout the day, but as the foot traffic tapered off, my co-workers went home. By 4:30 pm, it was just myself, our receptionist Dede and my last client of the day. Thirty minutes before closing, Dede, the receptionist, began to count the cash from the till for the day when the door opened and she looked up to greet the incoming customer.

He wasn't a customer. He was a man with the only intention of robbing our salon. Though he spoke quietly, he threatened to shoot us all if she didn't obey him and demanded that she give him the deposit for the day and all the cash we had on hand. Disoriented, scared and confused, Dede quickly put all the cash lying in front of her into a bank bag and handed it over to him.

"I normally wouldn't do this," he said as she gathered up the money. "but I have a sick child at home."

He left as quickly and quietly as he'd come in, getting away with four hundred dollars. Dede slipped behind the wall that separated my station from the lobby, her eyes wide and her face pale and panicked. "We were just robbed."

Who robs a hair salon? Who would think to do that? It just speaks volumes to me of how desperate people are becoming. My own husband has been unemployed for six months and we are feeling the crunch from that every single day. But it wasn't until now that I truly felt the sting of it all.

Betsy
Vancouver, Washington

Portrait: Lee County, Florida

2009-05-04T22:48:00.000-07:00

I'm 19 years old, and was born and raised in Manchester, NH. As a high school student, I never thought that I'd experience the face of homelessness, nor did I think that several others would be experiencing this. I also never took the time to think much about how the poor spending that I was doing, and the economy class that I was taking for senior year in high school would really teach me anything--but boy was I wrong!

I moved from Manchester, NH to Miami, Florida on June 16th 2007. This was an interesting experience for me, as I was going to Florida for the first time, and was going to be living with my fiancee and his mother at her house in Cutler Ridge, Florida. I participated in a program called Police Explorers in South Miami. Every Monday, I'd be dropped off by Jason's mother Rebecca, and I remember she used to say "Look at these people, begging for money. Why can't the VA help them if they are Vets of War?" I didn't really pay much attention then, but every week, there were more people in wheelchairs, sitting under the bridge with no legs, begging for money. It didn't make any sense to me, so I called the V.A. who told me that they were simply full, and had no more room for any homeless Veterans ofWar. I remember thinking "How could that be? These people serve our country, but can't get any sort of assistance when they are home? How is that fair"? My Fiancee Jason was at the time working as a manager for McDonalds Corporation, and paid his mother $500 a month for rent, and we were financially stable, as we actually had money to use for our needs at the end of the week. These were when times were okay, and good for us.

In October 2007, Jason's mom determined that since I turned 18, and Jason was 19, and we were both adults, we needed to grow up and live on our own. I was the stupid 18 year old that got offered a credit card from Citi Bank, and it was for a $1000 credit limit, and I thought "hey this is great, money to spend on our needs, and money for the move" We packed all the necessities, and moved from Miami, Florida to Cocoa, Florida, and I used that credit card to help pay for rent--Jason easily transferred to a McDonalds and was hired as a shift manager, and our rent was $550 a month for a one bedroom apartment. We also had no furniture when we moved to our apartment, so we decided to rent everything from a Rent-A-Center, and that was about $300 a month, and then we had cable/phone/internet which was about $200 a month, give or take. We realized that we still hadn't factored in Electricity through FPL, and realized that we had no money left over--so Jason's friend Donald moved in with us, and we were able to make it, but just barely. We had no assistance at the time, and I applied for Food Stamps, and thankfully was accepted, but they only offered $57.00 a month in food, so we had to use our food stamps sparingly..this was based off of Jason's income, and Donald got SSI. We were making it--but just barely.

The holidays came, and I remember that this was the first time in my life that I didn't have an actual holiday with gifts and family, and that was because we couldn't financially afford this. My bank account through Bank of America had gone to crap, and ended up negative, and they closed it, and my Washington Mutual account had also gone to crap because we had bills to pay, and me as a young 18 year old thought that bouncing checks was the way to go when you needed to survive--survival of the fittest in the sense. Bank ofAmerica offered me a credit card of $500.00 and I accepted it, because we were hurting for money--and Capital One offered me a credit card for $300.00 and I accepted it because again, we were hurting for money. My Bank of America Credit Card went to buying a car, because we needed one--we got a cheap 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Calais, and the people who sold it to us, knew we didn't know much about the car, and decided to tell us it was working condition--a month later it went to the shitter, and died on us--Cocoa P.D. told us we coulndt drive the car because of the fumes. We were left with no car--and still struggled. I used the $300 from Capital One to get a Christmas Tree for Christmas--it was a fake one, but at least it would brighten our spirit for the holidays--and Jason, my fiancee cooked dinner with Donald--we spent the holiday the way people who have no money did--with friends and family that love you--and we enjoyed ourselves. We were still making it--but just barely--and I didn't pay any attention to the fact that I had no job and no income to pay off my credit cards--so I let them go.

In February 2008, we got our tax returns back--combined we had over $1500.00 and our apartment complex told us we needed to leave, because of three reasons. A. because of our dog, apparently they claimed our puppy was over 35 lbs, and he was not--we had the vet papers to proove he wasnt that large--B. because of Donald living there--when we told the office that he was living with us to help with bills, and C. because of the plumbing issue that we had been having since the first day we moved in. They told us we could leave willingly, or they could evict us--we decided to be smart, and move so we don't get an eviction on our record--our plans were to move to Orlando, Florida to an apartment complex called "Bella Casa" because they were furnished, with everything included, and between Donald, Jason and I, we could afford the bills and the rent. We also used Jason's last paycheck to get a 1995 Nissan Pathfinder from a buy here, pay here place in Cocoa, Florida and we told him we would mail the payments. We had the car, we had everything ready, and we told the apartment complex we were showing up--doing the paperwork--and moving in that day. We got to Orlando, Florida and the apartment complex, and they denied us--because Jason didn't have transfer paperwork for McDonalds, I had no income, and Donalds SSI wasn't enough to meet the income requirements alone--they kicked us to the street in Orlando, Florida and this was when things started to get bad for us--we were faced with homelessness for the first time in our life--but little did we know, this wouldn't be the last.

We decided to take some of the money, and get a motel for a few days, and try to enjoy ourselves because we were stressed and needed to get a plan together fast--We took two days to figure out what we were going to do--and we ended up deciding that we should move to Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania where a friend, who we thought was a friend would help us. We drove 48+ hours up the east coast through every state on the East Coast, hitting every major city, and finally got to our destination. At first, we thought everything was going good--We had a hotel paid for by this friend, and then when it was a week into the stay, she took off with all our money, and left us stranded with very little money, and homeless in the middle of no where for the second time in a week--we were broke, and depressed--so we paid for a night in the motel, and Jason got on his knees and cried out to God, and said "Please help us" a day later, Jasons father John called us, and told us he would help us--it was the miracle we needed--but little did we know, the situation we would later get ourselves into.

Jason's father John lived in Fort Myers, Florida, in the county of Lee. We didn't know much about this county--though we knew we had two choices--stay homeless, or let his dad help--we chose to let Jason's dad help--so we drove all the way back down the East Coast to Fort Myers, Florida. When we got to our location, the only thing I really noticed in North Fort Myers was trailer parks--I didn't know why, but If it was a place to live, I was content. Jason's dad had a trailer, and he refinanced it in Jason's name--and we were responsible for paying the trailer rent, and the lot rent for $325.00 a month. Everything was included, we were doing okay. Jason got a job at a local McDonalds franchise on Pine Island Road inside the Wal-Mart. He was the highest paying shift manager, and he was making 40 hours a week, $10.00 an hour. We had plenty of money left over--until McDonalds laid Jason off because he was the highest paying manager there and they couldn't afford to pay him anymore--Jason tried for unemployment--but they denied him, and he appealed--and finally gave up--We ended up getting behind by rent and loan for 2 months--I was trying to get a job, and there was no where hiring--we didnt realize we needed to recertify for our food stamps, to continue getting the benefits--and so they were cut--and we had never thought growing up that we would need to go to a food pantry to get food--but we suckered it up and went--and I was shocked to see just how empty the food pantry was.

Eventually, in August 2008 we got kicked out of the trailer park (Rivers Edge on North Tamiami Trail and Callosahatche Bridge), because Jason's dad wanted the trailer back for himself--so Jason and I decided to look for an apartment--we ended up being given a week to find a place to live--and we ended up moving to a place in downtown Fort Myers, Florida named Reflections. We loved it--it was perfect for us--never did we think we would have the day that would come when we had to choose between paying rent, and paying electricity--but that day eventually came. Jason had gotten hired at a newly opened Panera Bread in Page Field Commons, and he was hired for $8.50 an hour, and had 15 to 20 hours a week--it paid the bills--mostly rent, but then the left over went to other bills--Comcast and FPL. Our Rent was $650 a month for a 2 bedroom 2 bath apartment--in October 2008, Donald took off, with our saved rent money--which put us behind in rent--and we had to choose between paying FPL, or Paying Rent. We paid FPL, and then turned our keys into the apartment complex and notified them that we were terminating our lease--but what we didn't realize was that we would owe them a totalof $2000.00 for prorated rent from the months we lived in the apartment complex because the original rate for the 2 bed 2 bath was $950, and they gave it to us prorated on a special--I've never in my entire life thought that I'd have to choose between rent and electricity--this was the first time for me, and this was when I started to realize that the economy was going downhill.

Instead of trying to get a different apartment, we moved in with someone we found off of Fort Myers Craigslist who needed a room mate to help with his financials. His name was Mark Wells. It was October 25th when we moved in. Jason and I no longer had a car, because it was repossessed because we couldnt make payments--so Jason had to take the bus to work. He had to take route 20, transfer at Rosa Parks, and then take 140 to work, which cut his availability down a lot. He was told by the store manager that he might loose his job if his availability couldn't be figured out, so he said the only thing he couldn't do was close--and that made him able to keep his job. November 2008 was what would throw us another curveball.

I found out November 20th 2008, a Friday that I was 8 weeks pregnant from my doctor. I had no pregnancy symptoms, and was just going to his office for a routine physical exam, where he draws blood for pregnancy to be safe from those that are sexually active--mine had came back positive. I didn't know what to do--and so I decided I'd go home to New Hampshire to be with my family and friends for the holidays--I moved from Lee County, Florida to Manchester, NH on December 4th 2008. I stayed in New Hampshire until March 24th 2009--but the economy in NH would throw me a curveball I didn't expect while being pregnant.

I ended up staying with my best friend Kim Beaulieu from December 4th 2008 to January 1st 2009, and on the 1st, I moved in with my mom--this lasted until the 5th, when she kicked me to the street because she couldn't financially afford me living there without help--and I ended up being homeless on the streets, again, while being 3 months pregnant. I never thought growing up that I'd have to live in a homeless shelter--and this was where my reality check began on just how bad the economy really was.

I ended up staying at New Horizons Homeless Shelter in Manchester, NH from January 5th 2009 to March 24th 2009. During my time at the shelter, I was able to get NH Medicaid, Food Stamps, and on the waiting list for Section 8 and NH Housing. I was also able to get seen for my pregnancy--but the waiting lists for housing were so long because so many people were jobless and had children, and they were priority--In the homeless shelter, there were people there for various reasons--some because their parents kicked them out--others out of income because they didn't have a job--and most were Vets of war--again with the Veterans of War--why was there no help for them?? There was little out there for anyone living in a homeless shelter. Why was this? Shouldn't we get some sort of assistance? I started to ask the questions in my head one by one--it just made no sense to me.

March 24th 2009, Jason my fiancee, paid my way back to Fort Myers, Florida. I said goodbye to all my family and friends, and DCF in NH said my services would easily transfer. I was 24 weeks pregnant when I arrived back to Fort Myers, Florida. It turns out this was not the case at all--I came to find out just how bad the economy in Lee County, Florida had gotten since I had left. Mark, our room mate, who worked for Lee County Parks and Recs had been laid off from work, and was moving to another state--we got our own apartment in the apartment complex--but that still wasn't the main issue at hand. I needed healthcare for my pregnancy--because I'm high risk.

I didn't know what Lee County had for services--so I applied for medicaid, food stamps and cash assistance. I was denied because I had my case open in NH, and NH had to fax a closure letter--and then they'd open my case, which could take up to 60 days, and that was time I didn't have. So I started to call around to OB offices to see if they could see me--no luck. I tried Family Health Centers, who said they can't see me unless my pregnancy medicaid was active, I tried Lee Physicians Group who said I was too far along, and I tried Physicians Primary Care of SWFL who told me I was too high risk to be seen at their office. They referred me to an office in Naples, Florida, and the doctor said he would see me, with no insurance because I was high risk, but I had no car and no way of getting to and from Naples--so I had to decline. I was furious--So the wait began and 24 weeks eventually turned into 28 weeks, and then 30 weeks. Finally my medicaid became active, and our food stamps were pending--we had to go to a food pantry once again, to ask for food, because we had none--and I was once again shocked to see how bare this was. By the end of the week, our food stamps were active, and we were thankful that something was going right--but when we asked about Cash, the county denied us--Jason made too much money which I didn't understand? He makes $800 a month, $500 goes to rent, $150 to Electric $100 to Cable, and $70 to bus passes, which left us with no money--and they denied us cash? Why? The questions started to run through my head again--but the one main reason I was given was the economy, which I slowly started to realize.

I had been getting childbirth education in Manchester, NH through Ourplace, Carenet, and Healthy Families. Carenet, Ourplace and Healthy Families were all federally funded--and these programs existed in Lee County--but when I called about services, they told me that their funding was cut and they no longer provided the classes, or the assistance with baby items--I was crushed. So then I realized "Well how am I going to get to my OB appointment?" So I called a few places that were listed to help with transportation, and they told me "We don't provide that service anymore, our funding was cut" which made me realize just how bad the economy was--but why wasn't there anything out there for pregnant high risk mothers who needed assistance? It made no sense to me--and thats when I googled "Why is there no help in Lee County, Florida" and came across your blog.

Jason and I still struggle today--often our arguments are about finances, because we have to sacrifice our needs for bills--like I previously stated, we have no money after we pay Rent $500 (which we have to save Jason's first paycheck to be able to pay on the 1st of the month) and $150 to Electric (Because FPL will turn you off if you don't pay on time--we've had that problem before) $100 to cable (I am on hold for a work from home job--because the economy-they cant hire me right now, but I need the phone internet and cable) and $70.00 for bus passes ($35 each, one for me and one for Jason) we're left with nothing left over--and I still struggle--for example--I got into an argument yesterday because I felt as though I was a bad mother because I couldn't get the baby things I needed for my daughter because we had no money--I called my mom to complain, and she said she can't help--because her finances go to bills too--it made me realize just how bad the economy is, and how much everyone is struggling--but the thing I can't understand is why there is no help for Lee County, Florida? We have the most foreclosures in the country, our homelessness rates are sky rocketing, and their are hardly any jobs anywhere--its pretty sad when McDonalds isn't even hiring anymore..its sad to see so many families--so many people including young people such as myself (19) and my fiancee (21) struggling--its really sad that people have to sell their things to make money--and its sad that the government isn't doing much to help our county either!

So thats my story, and those are my thoughts.

April
Lee County, FL

Portrait: Olympia, Washington

2009-04-24T21:09:00.000-07:00

Unemployment has left me with many dark days. Days where my eyes burn from tears, where I ask myself over and over, “What am I doing wrong?” I have moments where I think I might never find a job, where I will be forced to give in and work in fast food to simply pay my bills. I have days where I doubt my skills, and days where I just want to give up. But strangely enough, unemployment has also brought me extreme joy…

After loosing my job, I made the tough choice to leave Seattle, WA, a city I had grown to love over the last five years, to join my boyfriend on his relocation journey to Olympia, WA. I was packing my bags and moving to a city I had never visited, a city that was smaller, less cosmopolitan, away from friends and familiarity, to try to change my luck. I had used up all my savings trying to pay rent, interviews weren’t producing jobs, and I had run out of options. I was scared, and mostly terrified that my life as I knew it was coming to a pitiful end. I couldn’t find another job, and so I was being forced to leave.

Yet here I am. I have been unemployed for 138 days now, at least a hundred more days than I ever imagined I would be unemployed, and I’m still standing.

I no longer have a beautiful apartment on Lake Washington, but now I have a house that I share with my loving, supportive boyfriend. I can no longer afford to buy myself clothes, but instead, what little money I receive from unemployment I use for flowers in my garden, or home cooked meals on my table. I can’t afford to go bar hopping with friends any longer, so instead I sit on my porch with a cheap glass of wine and enjoy the company of people who care. Now that I no longer spend 40 hours a week at work I finally have time to start a blog (The Accidental Olympian), take more pictures, keep in touch with friends, and enjoy nature. The city I loved so much kept me from having the time, or space to get a dog. Now that I am no longer working, I finally adopted a puppy, and can enjoy being a dog owner once again. I might not live in a bustling city any longer, but now I take afternoon walks along the river and find enjoyment being in nature. EVERYTHING in my life is different after loosing my job, and as hard as it was to take in all these changes at once, now that I’m here, accepting my life, things are better than they were pre-unemployment.

I still get down. Only yesterday I found out that both of the jobs I interviewed for, both of the jobs I worked so hard to receive, selected a different candidate for the position. It’s hard to continue to accept second place, it never feels good to know I wasn’t their top choice, but I keep applying, keep searching. Eventually my life will change, either with a new job, a new opportunity, or a new chance. Until then I’ve learned to live with the uncertainty, accept my life as it has become, and keep moving forward.

Ashley

Olympia, WA

Portrait: Toronto, Ontario

2009-04-20T09:39:00.001-07:00

I spent the last 6-½ years working for a small non-profit organization. The money wasn’t great but there were perks in other areas. My business wardrobe was all jeans and Ts, so I never had the expense of pantyhose or dry cleaning. The benefits were beneficial; I rarely paid out of pocket for prescriptions or visits to the dentist. I enjoyed my co-workers and, for the most part, I enjoyed my job.

Earlier this month I was informed that my position had been ‘restructured’; that I did not have the ‘skill set’ for the new position. I was shown the door. There is money to ease this transition. Twelve weeks of pay and the potential to receive an additional eight weeks of pay if I sign a release that will protect the organization’s ass be beneficial for all involved, seeing as they restructured the position of the lone staff member with a child and no partner, who took eight (8) days of paid sick leave in order to deal with mental health issues. I’ve seen the new position and it is well out of my league, since I’m not one for working 60-hour weeks and need the occasional day off to deal with a sick child.

What may save us is that I have always lived cheaply. But, on the flip side, it means that is very hard to scrimp in order to save money. I don’t think I’ve ever read an article about saving money that didn’t highlight how much can be saved by giving up a latte habit. I have no latte habit. What I do have is the habit of making a thermos-full of coffee each morning (the cheap stuff; not the fair trade coffee I’d prefer to be drinking) that would get me through the day. When I had an office to go to.

Living cheaply means that my daughter and I shop at second-hand stores for our clothes and our books. When I left my husband two years ago, I took only what was mine from our pre-marriage days. I furnished the apartment I share with my daughter with items from Craigslist, Goodwill, and Value Village. When I inventory our space, I can find only two items that came to us new and out of boxes – my bed and the bookshelves. I say to friends that if I cannot find it second-hand, then I likely do not need it. My grandparents purchased my favorite pieces –a rocking armchair and a radio cabinet that our TV sits on – new, but almost fifty years ago. The armchair appears in the background of my mother’s wedding photos, circa 1966.

At the beginning of the winter, I bought a pair of leather boots. New ones. Nice ones. They are likely to last me at least five years and can be worn for three of the four seasons. I see these same boots – smaller versions – on the feet of my daughter’s buddies at daycare. Her same buddies that can grow three inches in all directions, seemingly overnight. The Mook’s boots? $5.99 from LL Bean. Well, via Goodwill. There is enough life in them at the end of this year to be passed onto a friend or a neighbour, most likely a fellow single mom.

We own a car, but it doesn’t get out much. We’re on the transit system for our daily to-and-fro. Although you are supposed to pay 70 cents for a child over the age of two, I’ve not paid once for her, even though it’s been 18 months since we celebrated her 2nd birthday. My brother, who has worked for this same transit commission for nearly a decade tells me that most drivers can’t tell a 2 year old from a 7 year old and that it is not worth their time to request the id of a small child. My transit pass is $100 and allows for unlimited travel, which helps on those days when I was on the streetcar four times daily, doing the shuffle from home to daycare to work to daycare to home. Next month’s pass has arrived in the mail, but I already have a buyer for it and I’ll lose just $10. I am hoping that by the time the April pass arrives in late March I will be back at work someplace that is accessible by our disappointing transit system.

Our daycare costs are equal to rent, but 75% of the cost is covered by the city. This program is in place to enable parents to work and be able to afford childcare and food. Of course, you need to be working in order to receive this subsidy and there is an honor system in place. I’ve left a voice mail message for the case worker that manages our city ward. I need to call her again; I do not want to be accused of fraud. They will allow a twelve-week period of not working before they pull the subsidy. I’m already on week nine and I’ve not received any response to any of the resumes sent.

Of all things, it is the daycare issue that scares me most. Without the subsidy, I would be paying $1150/month instead of $150/month. I can’t afford $1150/month. Five weeks from now, if I am not working, I have to either find the money or pull her out of daycare. Believe me – having a 3 ½ year old at home while I’m job hunting is not ideal. And then, when I’m working again, I have to find a new daycare spot. And re-apply for the subsidy. Both will involve waiting lists of 12-18 months. At which point I would be better off applying for welfare (Ontario Works). And will join the ranks of the other single moms keeping it together – raising happy healthy kids while trying to dig myself out of poverty.

Rebecca
Toronto ON Canada

Portrait: Attleboro, Massachusetts

2009-04-02T22:43:00.000-07:00

I saw a strange man walking up the street Sunday morning. I had already been to Church and back. I was waiting for my boyfriend to call me to breakfast. I heard the strange man before I actually saw him. He was yelling at someone…someone I could not see.

I felt a chill run up my back. I saw my arms break out in goose flesh. This was a big man with very long legs. He was very animated, furiously ranting and waving his arms in the air. He was scary.

He did not belong on my street. We don’t have crazy, yelling men walking on my street. I had never seen him before. He was walking on the ‘wrong’ side. We have no sidewalks and the road twists and turns and cars often drive way too fast on this street. He was actually at risk while he was yelling at his ghost.

Why was he walking on my street? Then it dawned on me. This is a sign of the “economic downturn.” I’m sure he shouldn’t have been out without supervision and at one time he probably would not have been out without supervision. But there are budget cuts everywhere and in my small city there is a hospital that takes care of people like this. My thought is that he came from there, unsupervised, uncared for.

And then two days later, after work, I was driving down my street to go to an afternoon appointment with my doctor. I saw another strange man. He was also tall, with long legs but he was younger. He was walking down the street, with a big long stick in one hand. His jeans were ripped and dirty (not in the stylish way). His hands looked dirty also. He was using the stick to pick out cans from the weeds and the woods. I drove slowly by, watching him scratch the back of his head while he carefully examined a can he dragged out of the long weeds and grass.

And I thought…this is too close to home. This is scary. This is really happening to us.

I am living paycheck to paycheck. I have started a savings plan, and I am praying that it works. I watched my retirement funds plummet while I kept getting my “financial advisor’s” voicemail. I cry when I think about the fact that I will be the Wal-Mart greeter long after age 62, 65 or even 70. Wal-Mart sucks, but it will serve one purpose for me. I will be the greeter, and I will use the discount they offer. Hopefully that will keep me from eating dog food in my golden years.

Last year, in 2008, my 29 year-old, late-to-launch son had surgery on his neck. He is an apprentice in an electrician’s union. He has medical insurance. However, he does not get paid when he doesn’t work. He moved home two weeks before his surgery.

His surgery was done in early February. He returned to work late in the month of November.

I kept up with his car payments. I paid his insurance. I paid his union dues. I gave him money for gas. I gave him money to spend on his girl. I was generous and it was hard, but you do for family, right?

In the summer his girl rented a cottage. He was able to drive by then and he wanted to help her, I know he did. He stole money from me. It was around $600 maybe a little more. That was money I planned on using for my vacation later in the summer.

I forgave him. He went back to work. He borrowed money to buy his girl some presents for Christmas.

He did some jobs around the house for me.

He still lives with me. He still borrows money. He is back at work. Last month his transmission died. I paid $1500 to have it fixed.

A week later he borrowed $500 for court costs (long story).

I asked him to build me some shelves in the closet. The job is sitting there, half done. Everything that was in this closet is out of the closet, on the floor, on a desk, piled on a bureau. He started this project 2 weeks ago.

This is strange to me. We have always been close. He knows he is hurting me. He hears me talk about my savings being wiped out, working at Wal-Mart. He seems like a sociopath to me lately. He doesn’t care. I think the “economic downturn” has burnt a hole in his soul. And it is now burning a hole in my heart. In reality, I know he suffers from depression and I know that he knows he is behaving in a very distasteful manner. I love him, but he needs to fix himself. I am very close to asking him to leave.

I want to get married. But I can’t afford to get married. It is important to us to get married in the Church. But that costs money. So we sit in the rear pew every Sunday, knowing we are sinners in the eyes of God and everyone else around us. And we faithfully pray for a break and to retain our good health, and we faithfully pray for my son and my daughter, and all his family and my family. And we dutifully put our envelope in the collection basket. But we can’t get married. Another year. Maybe next year.

I was divorced about 6 years ago and bought the house from my ex. He falsely elevated the value of the house, costing me an extra 30K, but I bought it anyway, rather than give it to the lawyer to fight about it, and figured that I couldn’t lose if I put the sweat equity into it.

I cleaned up the credit card debt HE created. That was to the tune of $25K. I managed to get about $60K into investments. That’s almost gone now of course, because of the “economic downturn.” My ex bought a house, a hot tub, a new motorcycle and managed to give his male lover Burberry purses and manicures.

But, no one ever said life would be fair. I honestly can say, it didn’t take me long to stop thinking about him and move on, even if we had been married over 25 years.

I began to feel excited about life again. The divorce had been good for me!

I painted the old house myself. I put the sweat equity in. I even got stuck on the roof once for several hours until someone came home because I am so terrified of heights. I painted the outside, painted the inside, put in new carpets and floor, new windows, and renovated the kitchen and bath. I did this one project at a time. I used 0% interest deals over and over. Paid off one, and then started a new one. I did a lot of work myself. I am proud to say, I carry no credit card debt even today! The value of the house increased dramatically.

But I’m afraid the value of the house did not weather the storm of the “economic downturn.” It’s not even close to what it was a few short years ago. Fortunately, I can pay the mortgage and the bills. I am not behind, but I am no where near close to being ahead. Occasionally I have to ‘kite’ a check. But that’s only when my son has hit me up hard.

I lay awake at night constantly running numbers in my head. I am living paycheck to paycheck. I have cut back on groceries, on the heat, on the AC. I started coloring my own hair when I got divorced. Now I cut it myself. (At times you can really tell, but for the most part you can’t). I haven’t really bought any new clothes in a while. I will not need new shoes until the autumn. I might ask for them for my birthday in August. If anyone is giving gifts, that is.

I lay awake at night and think about what’s in the attic that I could sell on eBay or Craigslist. I am making myself sick.

I have some meager life insurance. But I really wanted to leave the house to my kids, figuring that would be worth something. I wanted to give them something that would help them in life. I thought the value of the house would do that. I wanted them to smile and think of me because I could help them financially after I was gone. I cry because now I see that leaving them the house is going to be a burden, rather than a gift.

Tonight I have to speak with my son. I have to tell him I can’t pay for his school books anymore and I can’t pay his union dues. I can’t loan him money, and I can’t even abide to use the word loan anymore.

And he will get pissed off and not talk to me for a while. But he will still come home at night, go downstairs without saying a word and come up later when I am sleeping to eat food.

He might finish the closet in another week or so.

The strange men I have seen walking on my street? I sometimes think I have imagined them. They are visions of my son. These men are my 30-year-old, failed-to-launch son when I simply can’t support him anymore.

For me, the “economic downturn” is the equivalent of gnawing fear.

-Mary
Attleboro, Massachusetts

Portrait: Portland, Oregon

2009-03-30T12:53:00.000-07:00

Three weeks ago, my fiancé and I were standing in our kitchen talking about the fact that money had become a huge topic for us. We made a solid six-figures, but there was never enough, we always wanted more, we wanted to save more, etc.... For some reason, we always craved more. The constant need for more felt heavy, almost making us sick with greed. Although we’d only been out of school for less than two years, we had quietly joined the rat race. MORE! and BIGGER! and BETTER! constantly pounded in our heads every day so much that we felt sick about it.

I literally said a prayer afterward that we might once again be grateful for the things we do have instead of always asking for more.

Seven days later, he told me his firm was closing their doors in 30 days. His last day of employment will be the day of our wedding. Three days later, I got a similar notice from my company.

All in one week, we got just what I had prayed for. Suddenly, everything we have is a blessing. The fact that we have heat is such a luxury, we haven’t used it in a week and just stay bundled up at home instead. We are so grateful for our old college cars, instead of eyeing vehicles with a hefty car payment. His birthday was Friday and instead of getting him some flat screen TV or taking him out to an expensive dinner, we were grateful for the friends that came over to have BBQ hot dogs and potato salad on our porch. And as cliche as it sounds, we are incredibly grateful just to have each other.

I’m hardly wearing make-up – saving what I have for our wedding day. We are taking public transportation. We are getting creative in a limited kitchen. We downgraded our phone plan, our TV, Internet and are finding free entertainment at home. We might have to move to another state. We will probably have to move out of our home unless a job offer comes fast. We had to un-invite 100 people to our wedding reception and instead, we’re having 20 people for dinner following the ceremony. It might be a short trek to another job, but it might be a long, long haul that we have to buckle down for.

A couple weeks ago, I had mentioned to him that I felt like the “economy” hadn’t touched us. Until the next week, when it did. We are still in relatively shallow water, and call me crazy, but I feel somewhat refreshed. Lighter. Stressed, yes, but suddenly the rats around us have gone ahead and left us. Maybe the feeling with be brief, but for now, I feel like we’re free from the race. Until further notice, we'll be stuck on a less flashy journey that is much scarier, but slow enough for us to notice the things we otherwise wouldn’t have thought twice about, and to really, truly feel grateful.

Anonymous
Portland, Oregon

Portrait Update: (A Silver Lining) Singapore

2009-03-26T21:33:00.000-07:00

I wrote a while back about my uncle, whose is suffering through a second relapse in his long battle with cancer. He could barely afford the treatment, and it broke my heart that my childhood hero had to battle the financial demons along with his illness. I see how weak, how sickly, how gaunt he got. I see how his eyes take on that look, which suggested he no longer wanted to fight. I see my 75-year-old grandmother quietly weep as she sees her youngest son suffering, unable to eat, or talk, his speech and eating abilities both seriously compromised by chemotherapy.

But I also see how material possessions don’t matter – what makes him rich is not years invested into his business, but the relationships he’s forged with his family and friends. I see how love is the glue that holds us all together, even in the face of death. ‘For Uncle Andy,’ says my youngest sister, who saved what she could from her pocket money so she could contribute to Andy’s Fighting Fund, as I’ve come to call it. I see courage as he tries everyday to be normal – to whisper now that he can’t speak, to eat as much as he can stomach despite the blisters and the pain, to smile even though the tumour is pressing down on his nerves, making it a challenge to emote, to express.

We just got a call from his doctor today, and Andy’s tumour has shrunk by fifty percent. There is a good chance that if he continues the treatment, the tumour might eventually shrink to a point where medicine is able to contain the growth, and give Andy the time that he needs to do what he’s always wanted: to bring my grandmother on a trip to China, back to her hometown.

“Don’t stop smiling,” Andy told me one day. “I never wanted to, until the day I realised I couldn’t any more. Keep smiling, niece.”

And that’s exactly what I am going to do.

Jean
Singapore

Portrait Update: Good News, Detroit Michigan

2009-03-25T08:49:00.000-07:00

I wrote a while back about my mom, the provider of the family, losing her job after 25 years. She was applying weverywhere for a position but no one would hire her. She rarely even got an interview. Well...someone she used to know through work called her recently to tell her he had mentioned her to a company he knew that was hiring. I'm not sure what he said but he must have said something amazing, because not only did she basically get the job on spot, they even offered her a higher salary than what she wanted. They're giving her more money, insurance, and the time off she needs. Its really pretty amazing.

Just when you think that things can't get any worse, the stars align and everything just works out. Something inside says, everything will be ok. My parents are saved this time, and I hope one day one of us will make a recommendation for someone else to save them. Don't even
burn bridges. Be a genuinely nice person, and people will remember.

Detroit, MI

Portrait: Phoenix, Arizona

2009-03-25T08:41:00.001-07:00

Everyone always says that it will never happen to you; you will never loose your job. And then it does.
Twice.

In seven months.

I can understand loosing one job in a lifetime, but two in less than a year? I still don't quite understand how a young, married, college educated professional, who played by all of the "rules", could loose two jobs in the space of 7 months, through no fault of her own. Some days it sill doesn't seem real. I wish the Universe would play this game of life by some fair rules, instead of cheating and making me suffer the consequences.

In March I was working as an engineer for a national construction company. When I graduated from college less than 3 years before, construction was THE industry to get into in Phoenix. Not to mention, the company was great and I liked working there. Then the call from the HR person came on a Thursday morning and all of a sudden, I'm laid off. No job. No income, only two weeks of pay for severance. Fortunately, my husband and I were in a good spot in our lives and had wisely saved up money, and suddenly very thankful that we had been able to save the small amount we had. We tightened our budget tremendously and figured we had enough savings to get us through this. The unemployment payments helped, although they didn't cover much more than groceries and gasoline. My unemployment was only going to be temporary and short. I would soon find another job and we'd be back to normal in a few months.

My plan of getting a new job entailed a career change. I had been looking into it for a while and this seemed like a sign from God telling me now is the time to do what I wanted to do. It took 3 months of job searching, interviews, submitting resumes online, to get my new perfect job, a job I loved doing. And it came with a salary cut of over $15,000. "That's alright. I'm new in this field. It'll be fine. It meets our budget and that's what matters", I thought, dealing with the initial sting. We kept our tight unemployment budget to make sure we were putting money into savings again. Less than four months into my new career, my perfect new job, the economy imploded and I lost my job. Again.

You start to question everything you did at your job(s). Did coming in to work a few minutes late here and there matter? I stayed later to make up for it every time, didn't I? Surely those times when I stayed late working on projects and didn't bill it to my time card evened that out. Didn't it? Did my bosses just put on a show when they appeared to like me and my work? Was it my work that just sucked? If that's the case, why wouldn't someone say so? You would think that would come up in the periodic employee reviews. It couldn't have been a personality conflict; everyone was super nice to me and genuinely appeared to like me. Or was it all an act that I was completely oblivious to? Especially when I feel like I read people well?

It takes some time to really answer those questions in truth toward yourself. Coming in a few minutes late didn't matter. My work was the best I could do and completely fulfilled the needs and wants of my bosses, even exceeded a lot of the time. And everyone really did like me.

It was the second lay off that really hit me. The first time I had a plan, with steps, that was completely obtainable. I had a goal I was working toward and I knew that it would be attained in a short amount of time. I even knew I was going to be happier with the new career. The second lay off was completely unexpected, out of the blue. You don't think that your brand new dream-job will end in less than four months. It doesn't even enter your thoughts in the tiniest way. Suddenly you're faced with these questions: What do you do when you've exhausted your meager savings with the first period of unemployment? What do you really do when you've found a job you love and now you don't have it anymore? How do you tell your friends, AGAIN, that you've lost your job again? And when they respond, "Seriously?" what do you say to that? Like I would really joke about this.

So, I'm on to searching for another job, after a few months out of the workforce. I just could not make myself look for a job for a long time. I floundered and seriously did not know what I wanted to do. I did not know how to make my dreams become a reality.

In all of this, I am extremely thankful that I have a husband who still has a good job. That I have a husband who supports my employment decisions because he just wants me to be happy. That we were able to keep our house. That we have both been healthy during the time of no insurance. That I have a support network of friends and family that care about me and are willing to help in whatever way possible.

I've come to accept and be happy that I'm now starting my third career in a year (and now a fourth). It's been a long journey of really high highs and extremely low lows in the year since my first lay-off, but I've made it through. While the economy doesn't look stellar even now, I am confident everything will be ok. I have to be optimistic about life. It's just not worth living if you don't think anything good can happen even during the not-so-good times. I firmly believe God is good and that He has a plan and will take care of me.

Anonymous
Phoenix, Arizona

Portrait: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

2009-03-19T21:13:00.000-07:00

My husband and I are both creatives (he's a graphic designer and I'm an ex-scenic painter/set designer, now interior decorator). We didn't start out like you and your husband. We met in college and were immediately best friends and roommates. Six years later we were married. I keep trying to reinvent myself career-wise, while C held a good salaried job with some wonderful, returning freelance clients. I eventually found some stability working as an interior decorator for an ikea nearby just as C was offered a full-time position as an art director of a growing NY hedge fund. For the first time we were completely flush. We could buy anything we wanted, see theatre, eat out. It was bizarre and amazing. We saved so much money, knowing it would eventually end. We saved money and bought a house. We saved money so I could get pregnant, have a baby and take a year off. We thought it would be no problem for me to take my experience at Ikea and find a job doing displays or decorating somewhere else. C would work another year or two at the hedge and then we'd talk about starting a design studio together. We dreamed.

Then J was born. She was amazing, but she didn't sleep, didn't eat well, couldn't be put down. She was five weeks old when C was laid off, his hedge being one of the early implosions. We had savings, so much more than most. C was so qualified and talented, he'd find another job in no time. Five months later there was finally a job, though J had gotten easier to care for, as she discovered the world. We were still tearing through our savings, so a couple months later, I
started looking for work. We played with budgets and possibilities. It was pretty unlikely that I would be able to find a full time job that would pay enough to cover childcare and our shortfall, but I had to look. Something was better than nothing, right? I looked for four straight months. I networked and emailed and searched. We tightened our belts even further. I recently found a job as an design assistant for a local interior designer and I love the work. The pay is good, and my boss is interesting and understanding. It still isn't enough, but we're almost there. We have to hope that the occasional freelance client will help us keep afloat as our savings dwindles and no better paying jobs are in sight. We're not as concerned as we used to be. We feel confidant that something will turn up.

Here are the good things to come out of our circumstances. For the first five months, of our daughter's life, both of her parents were with her, learning her personality, caring for her. We also cared for each other. We're still struggling with parenthood and all it's complexity. And we don't know the future. But we have to hope that things will start to get better, just like it has for us. Slowly and surely.

Alisa
Philadelphia, PA

Portrait: Lee County, Florida

2009-03-15T22:12:00.000-07:00

Lee County lies on the Gulf coast of Florida, about half way between Tampa and Miami. It saw a development boom a few years ago, but last year Cape Coral, a primarily residential area laced with canals, led the nation in home foreclosures. More than three quarters of the homes sold in Lee County as a whole last year were in foreclosure or close to it. Though the county attracted urban planners, construction workers, and home-buyers five years ago, it now has the highest unemployment rate in the state of Florida.

John Hawkins is a 55 year-old heavy equipment operator. He moved his family from Long Island down to Cape Coral four years ago to work in construction, clearing and grading land for housing developments. He worked for the same company all four years until this past Thanksgiving when he was laid off. He is pictured here at one of the sites he worked on, where many homes remain unfinished or vacant.

John and his wife have three children, and while she works part-time, their financial situation is growing dire. He describes job hunting:

"I go to the career center here in Fort Myers, which is a frustrating experience in and of itself. You stand there at 6:30 in the morning and there's a line in front of you of 30 or 40 people. The doors don't open until 8. I spend the whole day there because I'm not fluent with computers, I have to seek help. I fill out applications for jobs all day, some of which I'm qualified for, some of which I'm not. Then I go home, only to not get any replies,".

One of their sons has moved back to Long Island to find work, and their 16 year-old daughter has taken a part-time job at a movie theater. John himself is studying to qualify for new classes of licenses. He is pictured above with the handbook he is using to gain a license to drive a bus.

"What I'm trying to do is invest in myself while I have this time," he says of the effort to give himself more of an edge on the job market. But he believes his family's future in Florida is uncertain.

"I've even begun applying to trucking jobs out of state, but I want to wait until my daughter graduates in June. It's up in the air where we go from there...if it doesn't get better, who knows? If I don't get a job in the next two months, we're not going to be able to make rent".

In 2002 Amy brought her family to Fort Myers, a city just east of Cape Coral. They came because Amy was an urban planner and Lee County was one of the fastest growing counties in the country at the time.

They soon realized Florida's climate wasn't good for a respiratory condition Amy has and planned to move to North Carolina. In 2006 she left her job in preparation for the move and to care for their new daughter Evelyn. The couple soon found they were unable to sell their house for what they'd paid for it. Additionally, they owned eight other properties in the county, all of which had depreciated greatly. Before they knew it, the family was facing foreclosure and had to declare bankruptcy.

Amy's husband Rick is a car salesman and now works 10 hour days, seven days a week, to make ends meet. They've moved into a rental home, but don't know how long they will stay there. They are being enticed to stay in Florida because of the incentives offered through the Neighborhood Stabilization Program, a part of Obama's stimulus package.

"I believe in the NSP program because there's a lot of people here, myself included, who are in the construction industry that don't want to have to take unemployment, they want to work. But there's no work, so what do you do in that situation? You create work," says Amy.

The program allows local governments to redevelop foreclosed properties, and offer them to low to middle income families at reduced rates. The hope is that it will create jobs again in the construction field and help families get homes they can afford. It has already spurred an upswing in home purchases in the area in the last four months.

While Amy realizes staying in Florida is not good for her health, she feels they have the best opportunity here now.

"I've got to do what's best for my family. Where else can we go where my husband can make $60,000 a year and we're going to get a mortgage?"

-Lee County, Florida

cross-posted with permission via Faces of the Recession

Portrait: Divorce, Connecticut

2009-03-10T10:24:00.000-07:00

I know most women won't argue with me when I say that even if you can't find it on a map, divorce is a state. Its a location, or, really, a dislocation. I should say upfront that it isn't my divorce, and this isn't my story. Its my mother's. My mother is 62; she was married for 28 years before things fell apart. She is beautiful, strangers say it, but she is alone in the big house that she and my father built as their dream, back when their kids and their marriage were young.

I don't want to talk about my dad, about their divorce. Any divorce after that many years, with children, and the economy... Marriage is hard and my father was constantly not getting the types of jobs he wanted, chasing a financial dream that he couldn't reach. I guess sometimes people reach for something other than their spouse to make them feel successful.

The divorce took a lot of time and money. It was final right after Lehman crashed; the financial ramifications and the court system meant somehow that my dad takes crazy vacations to the Turks and Caicos and my mom, for a while, was working two jobs. She keeps saying he needs work, if only so she can get alimony, but she knows about the vacations.

I know how much worse it could be. My friends and their parents, all over the country, are losing their jobs. People are losing their homes. My mom has her house and a job. But at 62, she has this terrible pain in her heart and she doesn't have health insurance, not that that would fix it.

That house isn't going anywhere. She keeps hoping upon hope that it will sell, but no one has the money for the mortgage these days, not in what used to be hedge fund Connecticut. No one will rent it, and she doesn't have the money for other options. She is going to start taking in boarders.

Because they own the house outright, she is stuck in a mausoleum to their marriage. The same pictures are on the walls. The house is still both of theirs by law, but she lives alone in it, and as long as its still theirs, he has say over what she does with her home. He isn't supposed to show up there anymore, but he owns half the place, and apparently hasn't forwarded all his mail. She is divorced, but he is still in her life. She walks around this house filled with years of memories and so much pain. Thanks to the economy, even though she isn't his, her home still is.

- S,
New York, USA

Portrait: Phoenix, Arizona

2009-03-09T18:09:00.000-07:00

I am a 27 year old mother and wife. I love my husband and daughter as much as any wife and mother could. They are amazing and make me so happy. They fill my life with love, laughter, friendship and hope. Because I love them so much I am incredibly fearful about our future.

I am the sole provider for our family. My wonderful husband stays home with our daughter, just over a year, and he’s so good with her. He quit his job when she was just 3 weeks old and has been a stay at home Dad ever since. We did fine on my income alone for about a year, but I am in real estate. Enough said, right. My income has decreased by about 60% and although we were very smart with our money when times were good I don’t want to slowly eat though our savings only to end up broke in a year or two. We have cut back our over head as much as possible to try to live within our new income level and although we’re doing just about everything humanly possible, we’re still not quite there.

We got rid of our cable (both computer and TV), our cell phones are at the lowest plan (we don’t have a home phone) and we’re on the savings plan with our electric company - only doing wash and running the dishwasher between 9pm and 9am and on the weekends. We got rid of our Netflix account so all we have is 1 TV channel that comes in and movies to watch, we now buy our dogs the super cheap food (which isn’t all that good for them, but hey we’re all sacrificing) and we get all our baby’s clothes from friends and family hand me downs.

We get our meat and diapers at Costco, we shop with coupons and buy what’s on sale, and we do not eat our at all unless we have a gift card to do so at no cost. We only water our yard and plants once a week, the baby gets a bath every other day, and I shave my legs before I shower in an attempt to save water and lower our water bill. I no longer buy the nice razors for myself but the crappy disposable ones that give my legs a rash half the time (probably because I use them a week or two longer than I should), I only wear mascara on my top lashes (which I have decided I like anyways) and don’t wear make up at all on my days off to make it last longer, and I no longer buy mask for my face but instead go into our backyard and cut off a piece of one of our aloe vera plants, which works amazingly well, and put that on before bed.

I buy the cheapest hair spray I can find, I haven’t had my hair cut in about a year (my husband cuts his own), and I use super cheap shampoo/ conditioner which leaves my hair feeling “oily and gunky,” but it’s 1/3 of the price of the name brand I used to buy. We try not to use the cars more than necessary in order to cut down our gas expense. My husband tries to walk a lot more and find ways to entertain himself and the baby without getting in the car to go joyriding or off-roading (which they used to love to do).

The only debt we have is our house, which is great except that it is over $100,000 upside down. It’s so discouraging as we put 10% when we bought (didn’t do the crazy $0 down, 100% financing) and we own $100,000 more than what our home would sell for today. We own everything else we have outright and we still can’t seem to get our overhead low enough to let my husband stay home with our baby girl. As disappointing as that is, it’s not the end of the world. He’s been looking for a job and I have been looking at day care facilities. We pray that he will find something, anything, soon and that he’ll have weekends off so our daughter only has to be in day care 3 days a week. This would be okay - we would adjust - we’d all be fine.

However, my company is looking to do layoffs again. They just can’t make money selling houses in this market – the costs to build a home (purchase the land, raw material, labor etc) is more than what the market will buy it for so they have to slow their production and get rid of some of us as there is not enough to sell to keep us all employed. It makes sense, financially, for the company to sit on the side lines and let the inventory around the valley get bought up. They’ll get back into the market when they can make money on their homes again. You can’t blame them - no company can consistently lose money month after month and stay afloat, but for me it’s the end of the world. If I get laid off we lose our healthcare. This, more than anything else, scares the crap out of me. I have been looking, any applying, for other jobs that offer less than I make (even making 40% of what I used to) just in case, but I haven’t had much luck. My husband has also been looking and applying to jobs I find him (we don’t have the Internet at home anymore so I have to look for him at work) but that isn’t going well either. There was recently a job fair here in Phoenix and 10,000 people showed up for 400 available jobs. It’s not hard to do the math and realize that there are a lot of other folks who will take whatever they can find too.

The future is bleak and uncertain, but I choose to be hopeful. We are willing to do whatever we need to in order to take care of our family. We have lots of love in our lives and good family and friends. Everyone says money is just money and it’s not what really matters in life. With the way things are going I think a lot of families, just like mine, are going to put that saying to the test. We’ll all find out, very soon, whether we can be happy with love and friendship alone.

Anonymous,
Phoenix, AZ

Portrait: Chatsworth, California

2009-03-09T13:10:00.000-07:00

I live in the San Fernando Valley and have seen business close up around us in the past 6 months. Currently, we have lost the Linens ‘N Things, K-Mart, On the Border Mexican restaurant, Circuit City and Applebees restaurant. And those are only the big name chain stores. We have had many little places disappear. A friend of the family had to close their car dealership that had been family owned and operated for over 50 years. Things will never be the same because many business will not come back if/when the economy picks up.

My husband is currently unemployed having lost his job in the entertainment industry in Oct. His unemployment is up in April and we will file for an extension. The company where I work as an Office Manager is doing poorly and we already had a small wave of layoffs that I fear will be bigger next time.

Currently we are renters and two weeks ago decided to make an offer on a townhouse. This was something we thought long and hard about and the deciding factor was that the mortgage payment would be the same as what we are paying in rent. I realize that the economy is tenuous but both my husband and I are tired of renting and being at the whim and mercy of a landlord who can raise your rent when you go month to month. My husband is in his early 40’s and I’m in my late 30’s and we feel that we are ready to take the next step in our lives. Because of the FHA loan we are able to put only 3% down.

We are currently debt free, a fact that I’m proud of and realize how incredibly lucky I am able to say that. I know that will change with the purchase of the townhouse but we are ready for it and aren’t going into this situation blindly or getting in over our heads. The townhouse complex where we live was selling townhouses for $430 back in 2007 and the one we are buying (as a short sale) is listed at $285. We could have been those people who went for it in 2007 and got upside down before they knew it but we waited and though I feel bad for the people who are selling this unit for way less than they paid I don’t want to keep our lives on hold any longer. I know having my husband out of work isn’t the best time but we got a home loan no problem (our credit scores were both in the 800’s so that really helped).

I’m grateful for what I have because I know so many people don’t and are in horrible situations. God forbid I lose my job, we can still make the payments on my unemployment. It helps to have my sister in law living with us as a renter. Because we are debt free and don’t have kids we can do this and I really feel weird saying that we are trying to buy when so many people are losing their homes. I feel in a way that I’m benefiting somehow from all this misery but there is part of me that thinks what were people thinking when they bought a townhouse for $430? How much higher did they think it would go?

I hope all works out for us and everyone else struggling to make ends meet. People say things will get better and I pray that it happens sooner rather than later.

Pamela
Chatsworth, CA

Portrait: Boston, Massachusetts

2009-03-08T10:48:00.000-07:00

I moved to Boston, MA 5 days after graduating college in 2003. With a small loan from parents, without a job , not knowing anyone and hoping things would just work out. And somehow magically it seemed they did. Almost 6 years later I had a great job at an investment firm, a wonderful boyfriend who I lived with, awesome friends, a brand new car which I financed myself and a rather strong sense of pride that I'd made a good life for myself in not so much time.

I was laid off from my great job at the beginning of December 2008. It was a shock to say the least as my boyfriend and I had planned to stay at our jobs for the following year (2009) and then live out our dream of moving to Florida to be closer to some of my family and finally never see snow again. At first I was ok with no working, then as a month past and we moved into a new apartment I started to panic a little more each day. I was incredibly lucky to recieve a severance package that was very generous from my former employer so I knew I had a certain amount of time before the money ran out. I would estimate I applied for over 300 jobs, anything I seemed vaguely qualified for. 3 people called me back, I went on 2 interviews and was offered just one job. At a hospital, with slightly less pay, more responsiblity, no hope for a bonus, and not nearly the benefits. I took the job immediately because who knew what would happen? I've worked there for about 3 weeks, and the things I'm learning and the people I'm meeting could not be more interesting. It has me considering going back to school to do something in healthcare. Something I would have never considered if I had just lazed around at my former incredibly easy job.

I consider myself extemely lucky to have found employment in this economy but it wasn't easy. 2 months of waiting for the phone to ring to hear about a job you're not even sure you want is never a good feeling. Many of my friends have lost their jobs, almost everytime I go to a restaurant around here there is another one closed right next door. Bars are empty, shopping malls are empty, restaurants are empty. We don't really go out that much anymore, instead we have friends over or go to their house. In times like these you really realize what's important and it certainly isn't how much money you make, what you have, where you live, or how much your bonus will be. It's who will be there to help you and listen when everything you knew is different.

Becky
Boston, MA

Portrait: Atlanta Georgia*

2009-03-07T15:03:00.000-08:00

Chanda Williams was an office manager and event coordinator at an Atlanta restaurant. In October, after struggling through a slow-down in business, the restaurant was bought by a larger company and her position was eliminated. She has been out of work since.

Williams lives in East Atlanta with her husband, a maintenance worker at Emory University, and their 3 year old son Che. Their home is cozy and scattered with toys, and looks out over a partially wooded backyard that this morning is blanketed in snow. The house is owned by Chanda's mother, a fact Chanda considers a blessing that allows them to continue to stay afloat.

"I have a bachelor's degree and I can't even get secretarial work," says Chanda. "My fall-back has always been waiting tables, but I have a friend who is a manager at a restaurant, and he told me they put an ad on Craigslist for servers. They got 200 responses in the first day and half of [the applicants] had masters degrees".

Since Chanda is home most of the time now and they've lost her income, the Williams have taken Che out of daycare. Coincidentally, two of her friends with children also lost their jobs recently, and the three have teamed up to create their own daycare network.

"It forced us to build a community," says Chanda.

The three mothers each take turns watching the kids, giving the other two time to job hunt and run errands. The solution was a welcome change for Chanda after a period of being home with her son seven days a week.

"I didn't realize that working part-time was keeping me sane, because it was a break and it was making me a better mother. If I have the day away from him, then the time we have together is so much better".

Chanda Williams, 27
Atlanta, Georgia

*cross-posted on Faces of the Recession where new friend and photographer, Andy Cook shares stories gathered while he drives around the United States meeting people who have lost jobs or been impacted by the recession. Andy will be cross-posting his stories, here, weekly. For more Faces of the Recession, go here.

Portrait: West Des Moines, Iowa

2009-03-07T11:11:00.000-08:00

We laughingly call it The 12 Year Plan. That’s even the name of my blog. You see, my husband and I switched roles so he could go back to school. His dream is to become a doctor, and we are now 5 years into that 12 year plan. We’re by no means ahead of the curve – we are much older than most of the other med students, and we have 2 kids. People always get that look when we talk about medical school. I know what they’re thinking – “Oh they’re going to have it MADE”. Well, I certainly don’t think that’s the case, but we hope that eventually this very long road will mean that there’s enough to pay off our student loans, send our children to a state college, and save for retirement – with no room to breathe between any of it.

I currently work part-time from home and care for our two young children. When we moved to Iowa for medical school, I was able to keep my job but had to transition from full-time to part-time. I was also able to keep some of my benefits - meaning we now pay more than $600 a month for health insurance. I still feel lucky to have both my job and health insurance. We now live partially on student loans and partially on my salary. After I made the transition 18 months ago, my bosses made it clear that I shouldn’t consider this a permanent solution. My company is coming up on the end of another fiscal year and I am preparing for the worst. We’re already understaffed, and I do the work of two people, but I know that ‘part-time with benefits’ means I am the most expendable person.

We have some money in savings, and have worked hard to pay off our credit cards and other debts. As a student family, we do what everyone else is doing – shop with coupons, buy clothes & shoes only on final clearance, and drive less.

If the axe falls, I probably won’t look for another job. My husband starts his rotations in August, and his schedule will be completely inconsistent for the next 5 years. I also don’t see the financial sense in trying to get a full-time job so that I can pay $1,000+ a month to put our kids in daycare. This means we will rely completely on student loans, which will give us an income of about $20,000/ year. I know it’s not much, but hopefully it will keep a roof over our heads and some food on the table. This is more than a lot of people have right now, and I feel blessed for it. Our families are very supportive of us and we know that if we had to, my kids and I could move cross-country to live with them while my husband does his rotations. It is a scary time, but I know we will be OK. This too shall pass.

Amy
West Des Moines, IA

Portrait: San Francisco, California

2009-03-06T11:23:00.000-08:00

Sonnet for the Survivors of the Second Coming

You have to, it's all come tumbling down before
and too hard to fear an inevitable dark. So be brave,
see boards that split will frame a door, and
bricks rocked to rubble still build up starts. Know over
and over the break is day, so pick yourself up
and follow the long ticktock, what's crumbled like a bone resets.
Rust can wash away like sin, like tough luck,
like your last lost love regrets.
If choking time shadowed, dust yourself off and
blow across the life you knew, too old or undersold:
A life well lived will leave you lust sore, and of all
the lives that run a course, few have been too bold. We love, fall.
It won't ever be as it was then. You can, will
start all over again.

Nicole
San Francisco, CA

Portrait: Parker, Colorado

2009-03-06T10:24:00.000-08:00

I live in a typical suburban area, where there are more stay at home Mom's then working Mom's. I see these SAHM's standing on the corner of my neighborhood relaying the latest gossip they heard at the nail salon, gym, or hair salon, as I drive home from work. You see, I don't fit in here. I am not a SAHM. I am a working Mom. My political views don't match those of my neighborhood, town, or even county. In our local elections, if you put an (R) after your name, you are sure to get elected, even if no one knows who you are. I am not against the SAHM's in my neighborhood, however, I feel that they are against me. How can she go to work everyday? How can she leave the care of her child up to someone else? Truth is... I intimidate them. They are jealous. I am my own person. I am not dependent on anyone else.

I work. I work hard. I work in the construction industry, and we tend to feel the economic crisis more so then others. When you can't get bank loans, you can't build a building. If you can't build a building, you definitely don't need anyone to design that building for you. If you don't need a design, you don't need me. I work for a small consulting firm, and we are weathering this crisis very well. In fact, some say, we are on top of the wave right now. Thank you to President Obama for releasing a stimulus package that is creating projects in my state. Thank you to my Governor for accepting this stimulus money, and realizing what it can do for the local economy. These are projects that I get to work on. These projects are what is keeping me employed right now. I just keep hoping that wave doesn't crash into the rocks anytime soon.

I go to work everyday. So does my husband. By doing this, we can afford to send our 2 year old goes to "school" everyday (as she calls it). We can afford to go to Vegas for the weekend to celebrate a friend's birthday. We can afford the luxuries that we want. I can still put away money every month for my daughter's college education. We are STILL investing in the stock market. We are not behind on our mortgage. We have small manageable debts for car loans, student loans and the like. Does that mean we aren't concerned with the economy and our finances? Absolutely not. We watch where our money goes. We use coupons. We wait for big ticket items to go on sale before purchasing them.

I don't fit in here.

Lately, it appears as if the gossip circle is getting smaller. I do have one friend that is a member of the circle. She has relayed to me that a couple of the SAHM's are having to go out and find jobs to help support the family. Their husbands have been laid off, required to take a salary cut, or work reduced hours. The other SAHM's are helping out by watching their kids for them while at work. I am starting to look less intimidating to them. They are becoming more independent.

So the economic crisis - how is this effecting me? I haven't changed the way I live my life. I have always watched where my money went. I have always made sure that I can afford the things that we have with the money that we make. However, remember? I don't fit in here, but I may be starting to.

Anonymous
Parker, Co.

Portrait: Fairfield, California

2009-03-06T01:07:00.000-08:00

By most standards, I have it good. I have a part-time job that brings home a little bit of money and a feeling of pride when I can go home and show my husband the little bit of cash I earn being a hostess. My husband is Active Duty in the US Air Force, and we live on base, so we don't have to worry about foreclosure. His job allows me to stay home with our two kids every day that I don't work. When I work, we are fortunate enough to have family nearby that have no problems watching the children whenever. The four of us are healthy, as are our friends and family.

Every night, though, I worry. Some nights I can't sleep because I'm too worried to close my eyes. I desperately want to go to school and become a nurse - start a career - but I'm so afraid of the debt that getting a four year degree with rack up. So many people tell me not to worry, that any money I can make after I get my RN will help defray loan costs, and then when I go into the service as an officer, that will help even more.

But it doesn't stop me from feeling like there's a shadow waiting to swallow us whole.

That's probably the worst part of this recession for me - the fear. The not knowing. I hate it so much. It paralyzes me, makes my skin crawl. Some days I feel like we should go ahead and rob Peter just to keep Paul as far away as possible.

Every day I pray that there will be a light at the end of this tunnel, that the silver lining is close at hand, but there's this tiny voice that tells me I shouldn't get my hopes up.

Anonymous
Fairfield, California, USA

Portrait: Hollywood Hills, California

2009-03-04T10:57:00.000-08:00

My nanny friend complained to me this weekend that her bosses were ignorant elitists. Unaware that 99% of the world does not live the way they do.

I guess I'm in the 1% only I choose to not have full-time help. So I hang out with nannies. I live by celebrities. I live in a big house with spectacular views.

I've never been so lonely in my life.

I used to live in a state that is very green and most houses have wrap around porches there. We used to sit outside and people would just stop by. Community, family, I never felt so rich in my life.

But my dad drank and gambled that all away. So I know what it's like to have the re-po man come to you in the night. I know the panic attacks that set in.

There is a balance between scraping by to pay rent and having so much you choose to build up walls to keep everyone else out.

I am trying to find the balance here and have been scaling my fancy neighbor's walls for awhile now begging someone to lend me some eggs or olive oil to help me feel the richness I once did while living a more modest life.

I think this economic slump we are in, while horrible yes, can hopefully open us up as a whole to re-examining what we value.

Anonymous
Los Angeles (Hollywood Hills) California

Portrait: Lexington, Kentucky

2009-03-03T12:55:00.000-08:00

I am the girl you want to be.

I have a secure job at a company that is well-placed to survive this economic crisis even though we are tied to the construction industry. I have medical, dental, vision and short term disability that will kick in during my maternity leave this June. My husband owns his own business which is thriving. When our daughter is born, she will go to work with my husband so we won’t have child care expenses. Our cars are paid off. We refinanced our 5 bedroom house in a desirable school district in early January at a good rate. We are in the process of installing hardwood floors throughout the entire upstairs.

I am the girl who doesn’t sleep well at night.

I have $17,000.00 in credit card debt from my first marriage/divorce. Even at my low rate, my minimum payment is $350.00/month. My paid off car has 140,000 miles on it and I’m afraid it will go at anytime. In June, when my daughter is born, my health insurance cost out of pocket will go from $40.00/month to $300.00/month. If anything changes, my situation will go from rosy to rocky overnight.

I am the girl looking for four leaf clovers.

I’m not cutting back on ‘luxuries’ yet. I have my expensive cell phone plan and high speed internet. I still pick up take-out when I’m too lazy to cook. I am still going to prenatal yoga twice a week. I am hoping and praying that the status quo reigns in my life for another year while we weather the worst of this.

So cross your fingers for me. Cross your fingers for all of us.

Anonymous
Lexington, Kentucky

Portrait: Brooklyn, New York/ Central Pennsylvania

2009-03-02T20:12:00.000-08:00

In the grand scheme of this economic crisis, I'm doing okay. I have a relatively stable job. And long before stocks plummeted, I was watching my pennies. I was typing everything from a morning coffee to my student loan payments into an Excel spreadsheet every night. It quickly became my pre-bedtime ritual -- enter the 75 cents I spent on peanut M&Ms for an afternoon pick-me-up into those judgemental little cells; feel defeated as an adult; go to bed embarrassed that I was going to have to sell something on eBay to pay my rent later in the month. I was cognizant of every dollar, every dime. But I had to be, I live in one of the most expensive cities in the world and my rent for a small one-bedroom in Brooklyn is half of my monthly salary. So, in a way, those cells probably saved me from myself. I was able to brave my own taxes this year and got myself a decent refund. I'm actually pretty proud of me for not falling apart yet.

Where I grew up, though, is a different story. My family is struggling. Some of it their own doing, but most of it due to the unstable economic climate. And, as some who always wants to be the problem-solver, I am struggling, too. I talk to my mother, a trade school teacher for almost 30 years, several times per week, and try to stomach it as she tells me that she's not sure when her husband will be able to work again. Or how she's been supporting a family of four on her salary for more than a year. Or how my grandmother's husband, at 70, was just laid-off from his factory job. Or how my uncle's hours were cut at his full-time job to a mere 16 hours a week and his children always seem to be ill. Or how little oil my family has left for the winter. They make all of the news coverage real.

I offer what little I have to give -- as a loan, because I know my mother does not want my money. She knows I don't have much more than she. But she doesn't take it. Instead, she asks me if I have groceries to get through the week. I tell her I do, and that I really don't mind not eating out anymore. She knows I like to eat out and I miss not being able to anymore in a city like New York. She will even send me five or ten dollars every few months with a note telling me to treat myself to some Starbucks. She's in a terrible position and she sends me money to go to Starbucks. Because she's my mother and she's only thinking of the little burst happiness she can give me.

Ashley
Brooklyn, NY / Central Pennsylvania

Portrait: Dayton, Ohio

2009-03-02T19:43:00.000-08:00

I grew up in a blue-collar town with blue collar parents. My dad worked so much he missed out on a lot of things when we were little and once I was in school (I am the youngest of three), my mom began working 3rd shift at crappy jobs in order to make ends meet. There were no name brand shoes and going out to eat was a rare treat. I didn’t even know what a college-fund was until it was too late to start one for myself. I got a job at 15 and have been working since.

When I started college in 2002 I thought I was doing the safe thing: get a degree to have a better chance of getting a good job. I even went to a local community college to get my general education requirements out of the way and paid everything in full. Then I fell in love with academia and more specifically, Sociology, and created these far fetched plans of going to Europe for graduate school and then pursuing a PhD in Sociology or Philosphy. I was good at school; always making Dean’s list and throroughly enjoying going to class. It made sense for me to take it as far as possible.

$65,000 in student loans later, I have one year of Graduate coursework under my belt (that’s all I could get my public university to pay for and I’m not about to take out more loans to finish) and a job that is less than thrilling but pays well enough for me to get by. I’m no where near a PhD or in Europe, which is fine, life happened and I met someone worth staying in Ohio for, but the only way I’ll be able to continue graduate school is because I work at a small public university and the tuition is waived for full-time employees. I thank whatever powers that be every day for this job, but this is never where I pictured myself at 24.

I am getting married this year. I had to use forebearance on my federal loan re-payment in order to pay for things for the wedding because I make too much money (before taxes/retirement/benefits), don’t have any dependents and I’m not in school anymore so deferrment wasn’t an option. We are on a $5,000 budget for the wedding and I worry every day my Fiancé will loose his graphic design job due to the economy and then we won’t even be able to spend that. My private-loan company re-payment begins next month because forebearance on it would cost me a jump in my interest rate. It will be $363 a month for the next 20 years. I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to afford a house.

Is this the “American Dream”? Most days it feels like a nightmare. I thought getting a degree would mean I wouldn’t have to worry like my parents did about money, but I guess I was very wrong.

Sara,
(near) Dayton, Ohio

Portrait: Phoenix, Arizona

2009-03-02T17:52:00.000-08:00

My portrait is several years in the making. We are among the lucky ones--at least for now. My husband has a great job--actually two--and we've got income coming in. My husband leaves the house at 4am every day to begin his 14 hour day working for two different employers. Our rent is astronomical (at one point we'd hoped to buy this house at the end of our 2-year lease and part of that rent would have gone to the down payment) and we're moving next month to reduce our living expenses by about 50% total.

In 2006, we lost our entire lives nest-egg when we sold our structurally defective new home back to its builder for around $100k less than its market value. It was that or face foreclosure--and the builder knew it, because the market had begun to sour. After 18 months of trying to hang onto it while we couldn't live in it, we relented and sold.

To add insult to injury, recently the state decided that we owe capital-gains tax on the sale of the home, because we both did not live in it two years (my husband had to work in another state in order to make enough money). They sent us a tax bill for over $25k and will sue us/garnish my husband's wages if we don't somehow resolve this in the next 10 days. I can assure you we won't be able to send them $25k like they've requested!

That same year, my husband's employer went under and we became aware that none of our health insurance claims had been paid during 2006. At the time we were paying $1200/month in health insurance premiums and I had a high-risk pregnancy and a very ill toddler. The company stole our premiums--it was a fortune and we sacrificed to pay for that health insurance that they never funded.

This in turn led to our credit score dropping from about 700 to around 400 because we have tens of thousands in medical debt that we cannot afford to pay. Universal default kicked in and all our creditors raised our rates severely and lowered our limits. We stopped using credit in late-2006 but we are years away from paying them off.

The Dept. of Labor has been investigating the former employer's ERISA violations--for almost three years and we don't have much hope that we'll received any sort of favorable resolution.

Also in 2006, our 20-month old was diagnosed with a serious GI illness and then suffered a stroke in 2007. She needs to have elemental formula (sometimes via a feeding tube, more often orally) in order to stay well and not become malnourished. Our state has no elemental formula insurance protection and our health insurance will not pay for the formula even though the summary plan description indicates that it's covered--and without the formula her other medical expenses would be much greater. I won't even go into detail on her medication co pays, except to say they're in the multiple hundreds per month.

At one point we were paying $1400/mo for her formula. Yes, that's one-thousand, four-hundred dollars per month. I've since been reduced to buying her formula on EBay and from various people I've found online who have extra and sell it off cheap. In my quest to fight for insurance coverage, I've spoken with moms who have to use expired elemental formula because they can't afford anything else!

Our financial issues have also led to my husband and I often neglecting our own medical and dental health, which has led to both of us having some pretty significant health issues and now we're paying the price for that because we don't feel well (me especially) and we're busy paying to treat things we could have prevented. I just have to hope it's not too late and that this doesn't affect us long-term.

The ironic part of all of this is that we are *not* unemployed (praise everything holy). We have what is considered excellent group health (it pays 80% down from 90% in recent years), dental and vision insurance. My husband works for two companies that have promising outlooks even in these hard times.

It is very difficult to work so hard, so many hours per week, and not be able to afford to go out to dinner or even to buy lunch during the work day. My husband brown-bags it daily and our dates as of late consist of getting $1.29 Whopper Jr. sandwiches at Burger King. We have been working our tails off since we got married when we were barely 21 years old. We bought our first home at 22! To have to start over in our mid-thirties is not fun! It feels like by now we'd have some security and we wouldn't have to be trying to dig our way out of a huge debt--it's like we're starting over but not from zero. We're starting over from a big-time negative!

My husband and I have been forced to adopt a kind of a laissez-faire attitude about our finances--we say "it's only money!" and we try to laugh. Because if I'm not laughing, I might be crying. It's not that I no longer care -- I care enough to devote a large portion of my life to carefully budgeting our money and devising a plan to try and get ahead.

We're very blessed in many ways and it really helps to focus on that, because things could be a lot worse. I've been through days where I didn't know if my then-two year old would ever speak or even open her eyes again. Yes, I remind myself daily, it is only money. Some nights I can't sleep because I'm worried (and trying to ignore stress-related heart palpitations) and I just have to think that to myself and shove everything else out of my mind.

Anonymous
Phoenix, AZ

Portrait: Chicago Suburbs, Illinois

2009-02-28T11:05:00.000-08:00

If you came to my house, you would see a modest older home on a quiet street, two healthy kids and food in our pantry.

And we're hanging tooth and nail onto that. You would not view us as behind on our mortgage payments and filing bankruptcy. You would not see a family filling for scholarships so our daughter can go to camp this summer and stay at her school.

My husband and I have good jobs. I work in insurance and my husband works in Building Management. All our problems began about two years ago. My husband took a new job. He had been working for a company that required 8-16 hrs of mandatory overtime a week. This sucked for his home life, but we could always pay our bills. Our son has many medical conditions that required $240 worth of co-pays on six medications a month to keep him breathing and eating from severe asthma and GERD. We juggled, but everything was paid on time. When we had to juggle, we relied on credit cards to get by. If our son needed extra meds, it went on there. Kids had a growth spurt, new shoes and clothes went on the card. We paid more than the minimum every month, but it was under control.

Hubby took the new job and the overtime went to about 4 hrs a week. We juggled and still were doing ok. The the overtime dried up completely. More guys were hired at the new job to cover all the buildings, so the overtime was rare. Hubby would go two months with no overtime. We were so happy when a storm hit because it meant a chance at overtime.

We were juggling even more, some bills were not getting paid. We took our son out of daycare to afford having to send our daughter to private school, because our school district has declined so much. We were robbing Peter to pay Paul to keep Peter off our butts. It was a horrible time and no one knew what we were going through.

We went into debt consolidation to clean up our bills. We weren't happy about it but creditors did not want to negotiate. One creditor told me, when trying to negotiate a lower monthly payment, pay the full balance or we will sue you. They did not want a parital payment. The mortgage company wanted us to pay for a program to take the payment out in two parts not one each month. They would not allow us to do it on our own. I was unable to qualify for a program for people who are behind and they would not tell me how to apply. So much for any help from working with your creditors.

The debt consolidation did not help anything. We signed up in March, 2008. In October, 2008, we found out the state of Florida shut the company down. Now nothing was being taken care of. They had settled none of our debts and the calls began yet again. We have both been sued for our some of our debts and we had to go in front of the judges to tell them we were filing bankruptcy. We have applied for a refund from the debt management company and our paperwork was accepted, but we don't know how much and when we will receive from the court.

The bankruptcy process will officially start this week when our tax return will pay the filing fees and we hand the lawyer a stack of personal paperwork to figure out if we qualify for 7 or 13. Our goal is to get rid of the $70,000 of debt and keep the house. We may have to pay part of it back and we are preparing ourselves for that.

The saddest thing is, only about 3 people know what we are going through, Hubby will not tell his family, as his brothers and sisters think we are doing the best of all. Two of his siblings and his parents have gone through bankruptcy before, so I think they would understand. My dad knows, but he isn't telling my mom. He wants to pay off the debts for us, but he is going to retire soon and I don't want to ruin his nest egg. The rest of my family would not be so understanding. So I don't say anything to them.

So, now we juggle each week. We have no credit cards to fall back on in an emergency. Everything we do is a cash basis. I stretch my meds further and beg for samples so my kids can have their meds with no interruptions. We get creative with meal planning. We go through ad papers every week to make sure we are getting the best deal on groceries. I have been selling stuff on Ebay to help pay some of our bills, or have an emergency fund available. I try to find coupons so we can go do things as a normal family occasionally, like roller skating or eating out. I am behind on private school tuition and they have been good working with us as many families in our church are going through similar things.

This experience has totally humiliated and humbled me to no end. The lawyer told us that we can apply for a credit card after the bankruptcy is completed. I will, and then stick it in a cup of water in the freezer. In case of a true emergency.

Anonymous
Suburban Chicago, Illinois

Portrait: Indianapolis, Indiana

2009-02-26T18:02:00.000-08:00

My portrait is actually the story of my father-in-law. And it’s not the story of foreclosures or falling home prices or even investment portfolio nosedives. Rather it’s the story of one man that I think is representative of his generation. Of the pitfalls they’ve faced, even though they made good choices and sound decisions.

His life, until nearly 4 years ago, probably followed the trajectory of many Midwestern blueish/whiteish-collar Boomers his age. He grew up in a tiny mid-century yellow ranch in a small burg on the outskirts of Indianapolis. Had a fully intact set of parents, 3 brothers, a competent, if not top-quality, Catholic education. Entered the National Guard when he graduated high school, did his 1 weekend and 2 weeks while attending a local college. Fell in love with his wife-to-be, decided it was time to be able to care for a family, married her, quit school, got a full-time job, and supplemented his pay with his service in the Guard.

After a short move out of the area and then back again, started working for a company he would serve for more than 30 years. What he did isn’t actually all that integral to the story, but mostly it was sales; specific, rather technical sales to a very distinct customer base. It was a smallish company that grew and grew and his career grew and grew right along with them. He started at the very bottom and eventually became Vice President and regional manager.

As my mother-in-law will tell you, with no prompting whatsoever, he sacrificed his life and gave so very much to his company. He had to travel most weekdays, and often wasn’t home for days at a time. She was a single mother with a husband, and it was difficult on them all. But it was all worth it. Sure, she had to work to supplement their income. They made a deal, though, she might not get to be a stay-at-home mom, like her peers, but instead, she could be an early retiree, with lots of time for herself later. Maybe she could have to opportunity to be a stay-at-home grandma. But eventually, as the kids grew up, and the school tuition stopped, and his salary increased, she just kept working, not because she had to, but because it gave her the chance to supplement their leisure and luxuries. As a matter of fact, she had taken a part-time job in his office, working on some of the accounting; a perfect arrangement.

For two people without college educations, or even specific vocational training, they had really made it: beautiful house in a rather exclusive neighborhood, bought one son a brand-new Mustang, and sent the other to four years of college without a single student loan to his name. They both drove cars they loved, vacationed twice yearly at their timeshare in St. Maarten, and made pilgrimages to the jeweler’s, where he stocked up on her gifts for the year. They had little debt, a low mortgage payment, and were saving diligently for retirement.

Then, four years ago, his company decided he was replaceable, his salary too expensive. Now, of course, the official reasoning was that they were downsizing top level management and wanted to combine regions for cost savings. They told him over and over again that he was a great employee that they would hate to lose. And that they were so very grateful to him for his years of service. They didn’t know if the company could have grown so exponentially without the contributions that he had made. But the reality was that they had hired a recent college grad and could pay the young man less than half of my father-in-law’s salary, with little risk to their health insurance and a lifetime before they would have to pay out any retirement. Not to mention, my father-in-law had trained him, and had already passed on everything he could.

They offered him a severance package, worth exactly one year’s salary, but with no other benefits. But, if he accepted the package, he had to sign various contracts agreeing to not discuss his ‘resignation’ outside of immediate family and to never sue them for any reason, including age discrimination.

Their life as they had carefully built it, brick by brick, spit shined to a gleaming polish, was over. The company wasn’t going to fire my mother-in-law, but she couldn’t exactly stay, either. If they agreed to the package, it would give them a year to get things back in order, but wasn’t what they were doing wrong? Shouldn’t they maybe talk to an attorney? In the end, he took the package. And he spent the year, not reordering his life, but in a deep, unending depression.

He would never call it depression, of course. He would just say that he was ‘enjoying his time off’. This was a big fat lie. He barely showered most days, and when you talked to him, you’d have thought that the company took his balls when they took his office. The boundaries of how he defined himself were gone. They told friends and distant relatives that he had chosen early retirement, and that he wanted to try a new career path, you know, for fun. Toward the end of that year, he finally began looking for a job. And what he found nearly drove him back into his depression. Sure, he had a lifetime’s worth of experience, but no degree to back it up. Absolutely, his resume showed that he was a great manager of people and resources, but someone with that kind of experience should’ve gotten his MBA by now. And anyway, his prior salary was in no way commensurate with what they were offering. It would be an insult to his talents if they offered him this job.

It’s now three years later. He did go back to school after his year of depression, and graduated in May 2008. He has found a job, part-time, contracted work with no benefits, and little guarantee of, well, much of anything, but it is employment, and it gets him out of the house. My mother-in-law went back to work for the same agency that had hired her when her children were small. She hates it, and dreams of the sunny beaches of St. Maarten. She misses it, they haven’t been back, she hasn’t gotten any new baubles, and the cars that they loved so much are looking a little worn. She keeps sprucing up the dream house, though. Paint and creativity is cheap, she says. It’s best to keep the house looking current and fresh, she says, you never know when you might have to sell.

They are still adrift, in many ways, in their current life, even as they are holding it all together. They’re bitter; it’s hard to realize that the son you put through college makes far more than you now. They see their friends actually heading into early retirement: buying long dreamed for boats, taking month long vacations, having plenty of time for babysitting beloved grandchildren. They know where it went wrong, but how can you even begin to reconsider, for any length of time, choices that you made a lifetime ago?

The future they have planned for themselves is much bleaker than the one they had planned at 40. He’s returned to college again, this time to get his master’s. Maybe, he hopes, when he graduates, he can find something close to what he was forced out of. Or at least he hopes, he can find something to challenge him, something to make waking up in the morning bearable. He doesn’t hope too hard. There are more and more job seekers everyday, and his working experience just keeps getting more and more stale. But he has to keep moving, has to keep doing something. She’ll keep working for the agency. Hoping and waiting for the day she can be the stay-at-home grandmother that he promised she could be all those years ago.

Anonymous
Indianapolis, Indiana

Portrait: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

2009-02-26T16:26:00.000-08:00

Every Tuesday and Thursday night I make the kind of walk college students
across the country dread. It is a mile-long hike up a busy street to a
hated class; straight up hill- a bigger workout then you will ever receive
at the gym perched on top, looking over the city. The street is
homeless-central, and in the beginning of the school year, when it was
warm and the scent of new pencils and books filled the air, I would pass
one, maybe two homeless people each block. After months of this, same
night, same time, same people, you start to recognize them and they you.
It becomes a comfort; just like passing the same bookstore means I am half
way home on the way down in the early night. The bald man in army
fatigues and sneakers with holey toes on the corner of 5th and Oakland
means I am ¼ of the way to my class at the top of the hill.

When my lungs are about to burst, I take a break next to a building, pull
out my water bottle and smile at the person sitting on the ground next to
me. Sometimes this starts a conversation, a life story, and sometimes
the man or woman just frown and look away. Occasionally they do not even
seem to notice me, rocking and humming to their own beat. But the
stories! The misconception about homeless people is they are alcoholics
or druggies or that they are running from the law. I certainly have
avoided my share of people who look sketchy, who do not come across as
stable. For the most part though, the regulars are down on their luck,
maybe for several years now. She lost her job at McDonalds and the kids
grew up and moved away, so why get a regular job now? It is just her- all
alone- and she feels okay living this way.

Lately I have noticed an increase in the homeless people. As a rule, I
do not hand out money. I am in college, and although it is a public
institute and much more reasonable then many other universities, some
weeks I don’t even have enough quarters to do my laundry. When there are
$600 worth of books you have to purchase each semester, donating monetary
funds is not an option.

However, there are many things I can give. I am a great listener if you
want to tell me your story when you sit beside me on the bus. When I
occasionally I eat out, I always hand my leftovers to the person who looks
a little hungry. But is that enough? In this land of opportunity, where
people from other countries attend public American colleges on scholarship
and we send food to Africa with the regularity of the rising sun, how is
it that people are still hungry, still homeless, still illiterate, still
needy on our own streets? When will we learn that, like my mommy taught
me, you cannot criticize another until you yourself are perfect? And oh
America the Beautiful, you are far from perfect.

I believe in the goodness of people, which is why the government baffles
me. This trillion-dollar bail out? Who does this help? No one I know
personally is receiving any type of stimulus, and why should we feed money
to those who ran what they had into the ground? Take responsibility! You
have to help yourself before I can help you, because if you do not want to
be helped, then you have no hope.

As I sit at my desk in my warm apartment, I can see a man scavenging in
the garbage behind the College of Business Administration. Somewhere I
cannot see there are babies who are cold tonight, and a ten-year-old who
just wants a home. For every time I have been unsure if the $25000 a year
are worth it, times like this show why I am in college, why I am helping
myself get an education, why the late nights, thousands of dollars, and
peanut-butter sandwiches are worth it. Our country is so beautiful, from
the Jersey shore where I was born, the cornfields of central PA where I
grew up, and the valleys of California my aunt and uncle call home. Every
time I see a sunset I am still amazed, and every time I watch the 5PM news
my heart breaks. If we can’t help ourselves, believe in and hope for us,
for the people who care, then we can never help the world. And right now,
the world needs as much help as it can get.

Andrea Coté
University of Pittsburgh 2011
Pittsburgh, PA

Portrait: Paradise, California

2009-02-26T12:13:00.000-08:00

I live in Paradise, CA. It's not all the name implies...

Every day it gets a little harder to find the bright spot in my future.

I was raised in a trailer in the bay area of California. My mother sold belts in Oakland so she could buy me milk. My father lived in a van. We were, by the best Californian definition of the word, poor.

Now I am 21 and married, and I thought we were getting by. My husband has never understood what it was to grow up poor, but today I think he’s getting it. Last year we looked at homes to buy and planned to conceive a child. We even talked about names (he favors Alice). Today we moved all our possessions to a studio apartment and I started birth control.

Here are the specifics: I made minimum wage but I had health care and now I am unemployed and swamped with medical bills that have suddenly been denied by the insurance. My husband has managed to hold on to his position in real estate, but now makes 60% less than he did before (see: studio apartment). We used to live in a beautiful house, but then my lack of income caught up with us and we couldn’t afford the rent. I used to pay cash for my college tuition, now I’ve been forced to borrow either from the government or from my in-laws.

The medical bills? In our short lived quest to get pregnant, it turned out that I couldn’t get pregnant. I have PCOS and my doctors don’t smile when they talk to me about children. Finding that out is costing me $60 a month in payments that will eventually total $5,000. My former insurance is thrilled to be rid of me, as is my former job.

I’m going to college to become an elementary school teacher, but I’m terrified I won’t have a job when I get my credential, and then the borrowed money will be for nothing. We have no savings left, it’s all gone to buy textbooks and gas and spaghetti.

I hope there’s a bright spot in my future. I keep hoping there’s a home and babies and clean bills of health, but every night I dream about trailers.

Patty
Paradise, California

Portrait: Spanish Fork, Utah

2009-02-25T17:28:00.000-08:00

I read about Cait from Massachusetts and decided now was the perfect time to paint my own portrait. I am the girl that no one thinks exists: I am a 23 year old undergraduate student with no debt whatsoever. By August I will have my bachelor’s degree in English with High Honor’s. I have paid for every cent of my education in cold hard cash. There is one highlight to the start of a new semester and that is withdrawing around $2,000 from my savings account and handing it over to the Cashier’s Office on campus. I work three jobs and take around 18 credit hours of school. I pay for my car, insurance, phone, food, clothing, tuition, books, student fees and everything else. By the grace of my good parents, I am able to sleep in the basement. I owe nothing for my education except perhaps some overdue attention to my social life and the ones I love. The little debt I have is wrapped up in a gas efficient, mediocre car. Some could say that I have it quite nicely.

Truth is, I’ve worked hard to be broke-ass poor and owe nothing. My fiancé makes perhaps the most sacrifices when it comes to my schedule. I am busy 24/7 between a large extended family, work, school and him. Soon I will begin looking for jobs. In Utah, women rarely find huge success in business. Rather they find their success in their homes with their spouce and children. I’ve known for years that my lot in life would be different. Eventually Adam and I will have children, but until then, and perhaps even after, I will be the main bread-winner. My chances are slim but I am a fighter.

English majors have it tough even in the best economy. Many think we’re trained to read books and spell words correctly. Unfortunately this is what President Bush would call a “misunderestimation.” In the past four years I have been trained to think critically about most everything around me including but not limited to books. I have been taught that language and its precision is necessary for a business to survive. I have learned that the key to success comes from dedication and excellent communication. This makes me valuable to companies needing someone in communication, administration and public relations. Yet, CEO’s and HR Personnel end up throwing away the English major’s application for such jobs in exchange for those who picked business, communication or HR majors. The problem is that these majors don’t focus on the same critical skills that I’ve been working in for 4 years now.

My choices stand thusly: Another bachelor’s degree in Political Science, Grad School for a Master’s or PhD program, Law School, Hope of finding a job that actually utilizes my degree or working the three jobs I have now. The economy isn’t getting better and many students are staying in school to ride out the bad situation. I just don’t think I’ll be able to do this along with them.

I have busted my ass to be where I am today. Had I the sufficient income, my credit is such that I could buy a house. This would help the economy as I’d have to outfit the house as well as pay for the property taxes etc. But how can you buy a house if you don’t have the kind of job that allows for such an expense? I’m caught in a catch-22 while others around me are struggling to keep up on their own payments. I am much better off than a lot are. And I really have nothing much to bellyache about except for the prejudices held against the major that I picked and paid for. I have enough in the checking account to make my payments and a little extra to stash in savings for next semester. I work at a job that is unlikely to let me go despite how horribly I hate it. As my 82 year old great granny would say “Thank God you have a job.” And I do.

Jen
Spanish Fork, Utah.

Portrait: Boston, Massachusetts

2009-02-24T18:20:00.000-08:00

I am that girl everyone loves to hate: the 23-year old graduate student from a well-off middle class family whose parents “help her out” financially. This means they are paying this year’s tuition, cell phone bill, car insurance, a flight home (the cheapest available) at the holidays, and rent (please don’t hunt me down and kill me). Transportation, groceries, books, etc. are up to me. I’ve worked every summer since I was 13 and babysat from age 11. I saved up my money and it allowed me spending money up through my junior year of college (and by spending money I mean money for going out, clothing, transportation, etc) without ever allowing debt to accrue. My freshman year of college I worked all day (45 min. commute) and went to community college in the evenings. I transferred to a 4 year program the following year and graduated within four years. The next year, last year, I worked, over the course of one year, 3 part time jobs and two full time jobs. I also spent two of those months unemployed despite applying to approximately 30 jobs.

My sister graduated from high school last month. Since then she has moved to South America to go to college. My parents couldn’t argue: the university there charges only minimal fees so even with her renting & furnishing an apartment close to the university and international airfare of $2,000 once a year for the next five years, they will pay, give or take, $40,000. That’s the cost of one year at a decent private college or of two years at our state colleges. I certainly can’t complain. Because I’m still listed as a dependent and because my dad earns too much for me to get decent financial aid, paying for graduate school looked daunting. With my sister’s college fund (started by grandfather before he died 15 years ago) sitting virtually unused, my parents offered to pay for my first year of graduate school. I do not know how I got this lucky.

Barring any disasters, major or minor, I will graduate with my Masters and Teaching Certification in May 2010 – despite the school telling me that would involve a virtually impossibly heavy courseload with no time for anything fun or to work. I currently take double a normal student’s courseload, work part-time, and am on an athletic team. It is a wonderful situation, albeit stressful in the way that a graduate student’s life is from time-to-time. I love grad school. But this is only temporary. In just over a year, I’ll have a Masters, teaching certification, and minimal teaching experience. Teachers with Masters earn more than teachers bachelors. Who in their right mind would hire me? A year ago, when I applied to graduate school for a Masters in Education, there was a teaching shortage. Today there’s a teaching job shortage. I’ve considered dropping out and just getting emergency certification, switching to Educational Psychology, staying on for a PhD just in the hopes of emerging to a better market, and becoming a hermit in a shack on the beach. The thing is, the state of MA requires a Masters within a few years of starting teaching. My degree is almost half completed and I would have to start over if I quit now and returned later on at a different university. My hope used to be that a school would be willing to hire me because they wouldn’t ever have to partially pay for me to obtain a Masters. I still have that hope but its pretty dim.

Like everyone else, I’ll ride it out. I figure that I can always fall back on nannying or teach English abroad. Neither is particularly appealing but compared the grave situations so many people find themselves in right now, I am overwhelmed by gratefulness – and guilt. Because yes, I’ll buy the cheapest bottle of grocery store wine, but I’m still able to buy wine when others are going to sleep hungry.

Cait
Boston, Massachusetts

Portrait: Fargo, North Dakota

2009-02-24T14:35:00.001-08:00

They say we’re recession proof. They say it doesn’t affect us the way it affects the rest of the country. That may be true but we still see the pain the economy has brought to our country.

I have a steady job with a company that is expanding in a time that other businesses are closing their doors. I’m doing better than most people my age and we have been able to pay down debt with our tax refund this year. However, my husband is a college graduate who has spent the last three months applying for jobs. He has spent hours each day sending out resumes and filling out applications. He estimates that he has applied for over 300 jobs. He has had one interview.

I work for a property management company and each day we see people who are unable to pay their rent. People who move in and then leave two weeks later with only the items they can fit in the car. We see more adults applying to live in each home. We receive more checks from government housing programs. We go to court with more people who are simply unable to pay. Our collections department is busier than they’ve ever been and are getting more disconnected phones than actual answers.

We have been brought to a point that I never thought I’d see; where I am grateful that my husband will be deployed overseas this year. I am grateful for the money he makes while training for his mission and for the extra drills that they’ve scheduled. I am grateful that while he’s gone we will be receiving separation pay and a housing allowance along with his salary for the year. Even as I type these words, my eyes fill with tears for the time he will miss with our daughters. I think of the things our new baby will learn to do while he’s gone and how different she will be when he returns. I think of the entire year of first grade projects and conferences and stories that he won’t be able to enjoy with our older daughter. I think of the outfits they’ll wear and outgrow before he has a chance to even see them. The Christmas and birthday presents that they’ll know I bought without him.

I don’t want to live for even a day without my husband but I am grateful that he is leaving. If this deployment wasn’t pending there would be no chance we could pay the rent next month. We would be moving in with my parents and praying for somewhere to hire us in the new town. Instead of watching the heartache spread around us, we would be living it.

Heather Smith
Fargo, ND

Portrait: St. Petersburg, Florida

2009-02-24T00:46:00.000-08:00

When I was 14 years old I lived in Johnstown, PA and I witnessed the demise of Bethlehem Steele. This would have been no big deal, except that my father had worked there just shy of 3 years left to retire. He lost his job. So did half the town. Our normal childhood life changed drastically. We no longer had Fruit Loops; they were now Generic O’s. My father no longer went to work, and instead for the first time ever my Mother did. He did odd side jobs and eventually he got called back to work. The Steel Mill eventually closed, thankfully years later and by that time my father was able to retire. However, this experience stayed with me throughout my life.

Since that experience molded me into who I am, I have long learned that happiness is not about what car you drive (for me a 1999 Honda CRV with 125,000 miles on it) or what house you own. I bought a modest 1100 square foot 2 bedroom 1 bath house in April of this year, AFTER the housing prices plummeted and since my credit was amazingly good. (Paid off immense debt after a bad divorce in 2003, it was hard, thank god I sucked up the resentment of it all being his debt and just fixed it!!).

I have been on a savings binge ever since the debt reduction and the purchase of our home. My 2nd and current husband is a driver for a moving company for a living and as you can imagine, not too many people are moving right now. When someone loses their home, they mostly seem to gather necessities and leave the rest. They certainly don’t hire a moving company. I work for a University and have a rather stable job. Between his 30 hours a week (something that used to be 55 hrs a week just a scant 3 years ago) and my full time status we are easily paying our somewhat meager bills. (The key to wealth is not bigger stuff, it is lower debt!!)

We took the offered $7500 (http://www.federalhousingtaxcredit.com/) federal housing tax credit this year for the sole purpose of banking all of those funds in the case of emergency. We would love to put in a new fence (one that is not falling down) and repair the air conditioning duct work (that is sad at best) but we will do neither because those things are not assurances that we will keep our house, but savings are. This is an interest free 15 year loan from IRS.

We already had quite a bit of savings, even after the purchase of our house. One big reason we bought last April of 08 was because we could move into a house and pay the mortgage (tax and insurance included) each month for less than we were paying for rent. This allowed us to lower our daily expenses and yet own our home, something that in the past we could not comfortably afford to do. In some ways I am grateful for this bubble burst because something had to give. We are two adult’s working two full time jobs and yet until this economic downturn we could not begin to afford a home. There’s something fundamentally wrong about that.

I’m scared. I try not to focus on it. I try to focus my energies on ways to save money. I try to stay focused on things I can control. I try to work hard at work and maintain my job. I try to save with coupons and the like. I have cut back tremendously because I’ve wanted to have 6 months of combined savings because who can afford to live on unemployment benefits? Not us.

I’ve lived my entire adult life below my means because I’ve never felt that there were any assurances that my world could not change from Fruit Loops to Generic O’s without any notice whatsoever. So much so that I’ve been eating the Generic O’s as though that’s the life I want to build…because when you do that, there’s much less to lose. In my house, we eat 3 meals, but they are not elaborate meals, never have been.

Upon the first inclination of more trouble to come, I shall disconnect cable (luxury), downgrade my cellphone service (luxury) and cancel my pest control guy (luxury?...not sure but bugs never killed anyone).

Most people can’t make those concessions until forced into a corner. I say make the concessions when you can take the savings and save it. It’s a sad sad state of affairs. Recently a fellow college student told me that she was unaffected by the recession. I reminded her, “You are, you’re just in denial”.

I don’t think I’m better than anyone, because my day might be tomorrow. None of us really knows. My town is full of for sale signs and more than that, it’s full of homeless people begging for a meal. I’ve just graduated with a business degree and I have applied for 350 jobs posted in our area alone in the last month. I have not received one phone call back. I’m grateful I have a job and am hesitant to change jobs in this economy. Last man in is the first man out in a layoff situation. I've now decided to stay put and get my Masters and hope that a miracle occurs in the next 18 months while I finish it.

God help us all because we can all go without Fruit Loops...but we can't go without Generic O's too.

Kristy
St Petersburg, FL USA

Portrait: Northern New Jersey

2009-02-24T00:45:00.000-08:00

I live a few minutes outside of New York City in northern New Jersey. Needless to say, living so close to the city is expensive and everything from groceries to homes are quite inflated. Somehow my husband and I have gotten by the past 4 years living together, though recently it's been difficult. I'm pregnant with twins and, upon telling my previous employer this so they can prepare for me to schedule doctor's appointments and such, I was let go due to "the economy" and a "lack of new jobs" (I work in Human Resources and my primary job is placing talent...so, no talent=no need for me).

My initial reaction was to sue the hell out of them, but since they're a well-known luxury goods company and I was just a lowly temp, I came to my senses and moved on. I'm currently doing freelance proofreading from home, which doesn't pay much, but helps with a few bills here and there. My husband has a full-time job with benefits working in the city, so luckily, we have some sort of stability.

I fear the cost of baby items (times two, since they're twins) once my children are born. I worry about how we can provide and hope that we'll be able to handle this new creation of a family. We're excited and scared for the future. We currently rent a home and had hopes of eventually buying one, but by the looks of our financials, that's not a priority for some time. I had hoped to eventually go to graduate school so I can finally get out of the HR industry, but that will be on hold as well. While our dreams and aspirations are certainly attainable, those that require substantial financial support will have to wait.

There's so much more I'd love to share; the fact that even though I have health insurance, almost all of the blood work/prenatal care I receive is not covered in our network, causing excessive bills on top of co-pays and the actual cost of the births. The foreclosed homes in our area, the increase of crime in our community due to those who are forced to steal to get by; the obsessive coupon cutting and penny-counting elders I see everyday, the fear of my 82 year old grandmother having her social security cut; the cost of our heat bills...all of these stresses swirling around, causing one to pause and hope things get better before they get worse.

Nicole
Northern New Jersey

Portrait: America's Heartland

2009-02-23T12:41:00.000-08:00

I am a lucky woman. I have a stable job. I have a wonderful husband who has a stable job. We have a wonderful child who is healthy and day care we can afford. We are not rich and we live paycheck to paycheck, but the paychecks are still coming.

I have a wonderful family. Father, Mother, 3 sisters. My father owns a real estate business. They have a house, 2 dogs, food, good friends and two of my sisters are in college.

I know what you are thinking. Why is this woman writing this story? From my perspective everything looks fine.

From my perspective everything looked fine too. Until I got a shocking call this past November. My father lost everything in this economy. His business, his savings, everything. He couldnt stand the thought of his family not surviving. My father committed suicide. He took his own life so that his family could live. So my mother wouldnt lose the house. So my sisters could stay in college. He took his own life and left us wondering why he wouldnt just let us help. We could have helped. Had we know there was a problem we could have done something, anything would have been better than this. He didnt say a word.

This economy has taken my father away from me. Forever. There is no recovery plan or stimulus package that can help us. Gone.

And now I must pick up the pieces. Explain to my daughter why she doesnt get to see her grandfather anymore. Cry when I pick up the phone to call him, forgetting that he's no longer there. I don't look forward to birthdays or holidays and I cant yet look at pictures of him because the hurt is still too great and I am still not ready to face what has happened. I stay busy so I don't have time to think about it… but I am the lucky one. My father was there when I got married, and when I had my first child, his first grandchild. My sisters wont have that. It doesn't make me feel better knowing that, but it is a fact.

The economy killed my father. I don't think I can ever forgive it.

Anonymous
Heartland, USA

Portrait: Brevard County, Florida

2009-02-20T21:04:00.000-08:00

I am a middle school teacher.

The economy is slowly sneaking its way back into my work life.
I have been down this road before, and am terrified I will have to take out my map to navigate its path again.
This time it is different,
I love my job.
I love my school.
I love my students.
I love my subject.
The thought of not being at this desk in August is almost too much to think about.
It is breaking my heart.
We haven't talked about the budget cuts in my classroom, I didn't want to for many reasons. One being I would cry,
another being that this is a very low-middle class school and they are dealing with all kinds of cuts at home.
My classroom is a safe haven from this, and an outlet for them.
Today was different.
THEY talked about it.
THEY demanded to be heard.
THEY have so many ideas, it was overwhelming.
THEY are worried that their voices aren't loud enough to be heard.
But they will,
get ready world,
they are mad and loud and together on this one.
There is a "Save education rally" in my county Monday night.
They all received a letter about it first period- a toned down version of what is to come.
100 million dollars in cuts, just for our county.
No sports.
No buses.
No electives.
No fun.
THEY ARE MAD AND LOUD.
They are making signs, shirts, WEBSITES!
It is amazing to see them in action,
brainstorming,
fighting for what is theirs-
trying to protect their teachers.
So much that I did cry.
The chorus is going to sing in the parking lot-
The band is going to play-
I can't wait to see it.
They amaze me.

Erin
Brevard County, Florida

Portrait: Greenville, North Carolina

2009-02-19T16:43:00.000-08:00

I'm an undergraduate student at East Carolina University. This year was a year of firsts for me in the adult financial world: my first W2, my first (and may I say small…) tax return, my savings account disappearing because it was empty for so long, my voicemail box overflowing from the landlord desperate for rent money, my first $500 in credit card debt. I don't consider any of these things products of the economical crisis – they're experiences everyone goes through when they are on their own for the first time; however, as of late, this worldwide money thing I've been hearing about has finally become apparent.

Everything seemed normal before the winter break. Stores were open, the university had plans to build a new student center, and there were rumors the city was finally going to get 3G cell towers. I went to my parent's for the three-week vacation, and somehow missed the downhill transformation. While I was stuffing my face with homemade pecan pie and running around the farm where I grew up, five of the big chain stores in town closed their doors, the university put off the student center plans for at least a year, and the promised 3G was pushed back until June (and I'm sure the day will come when I break down and get an iPhone, at which point I will actually care).

Even though seeing huge, empty stores is somewhat surreal and walking into the student center that became outdated ten years ago is something we all have to deal with, life here isn't that bad. The mall just upgraded to a new management company that promises to bring bigger and better stores (even though it will probably take much longer now), and Fresh Market just popped up, which is odd since fresh organics are way overpriced, and most people I know went there once and never went back.

ECU's transit system, which is one of the best on the East Coast and my employer, just bought three new buses, and will be getting six more next semester. I attended a luncheon with the chancellor last week, and he said that even though the university's budget has been cut fifteen percent overall, everything will be pretty much normal next year. Buildings will be a little warmer in the summer and a little cooler in the winter, and professors will have extremely limited printing abilities (which I like that idea anyway – it saves some trees). We're much better off than some universities that have cut their budgets by up to fifty percent. We'll see how my financial aid turns out this year…

My parent's mentioned something about 401ks and savings, but they've always talked about those things. The economic crisis hasn't really affected me because I sort of grew up in one. We were always well off and I always got what a needed, and even some things I wanted; but there were always fights about debt and bad checks, my mom crying about it and my dad starting yet another business doomed to fail. I learned not to ask for expensive things, and felt horrible when my mom bought me a computer for school. I find myself baffled at the idea of even having loads of money, so it's almost impossible for me to imagine loosing it.

I'm young and new to the whole economy thing. Money has always been this magical entity that appears every now and then, materializes into something I really want at the time, and disappears as quickly as it came. These days it just seems to appear less often, and that's all the crisis has really been to me.

Jason Simone
Greenville, North Carolina

Portrait: Washington D.C.

2009-02-19T15:42:00.001-08:00

One year ago, my husband died from cancer. I went from an over-educated, cheerfully employed mother with an au pair to a 34-year-old widow with three-year-old twins who depends on the kindness of friends and Social Security. That was the start of my own personal recession. The rest of the world is just catching up to where I've been for a year now.

I'm still working full time. My family still has health insurance through my employer (a fucking miracle, considering the beating that policy took when my husband died.) But all of my husband's investments had to be sold to cover his debts. Taxes. Attorney's fees. No more au pair. Hello, strange renter living in my basement. Could you please stop smoking marijuana in my house when the kids are home?

I'm praying that the 2002 Subaru holds out for another couple years. I'm praying that the roof doesn't blow away in some epic thunderstorm. I'm praying that the aging washing machine keeps running on a little bit longer . . . scratch that. Now I'm praying that Sears will take pity on me and hook up the new one so I don't have to figure it out myself.

I'm praying for that Stanford bastard to get caught and tell the SEC that whoops, my bad, musta mixed up the last two account numbers, HERE's the money, and my employer gets its fucking money back so my paycheck doesn't bounce. Due diligence, my ass.

I'll put my kids in public kindergarten next year. Goodbye, sweet little Lutheran preschool. I can't afford you anymore. Broken molar, you're gonna have to hang on a little longer. Apparently I owe the heating oil company more than my last paycheck, and considering that Mommy's paycheck is the only paycheck coming into the house these days, we're going to have to live together for another month or so.

I admire single-by-choice moms, whatever route they took to that destination. But I didn't chose. I just get to deal. And that's what really sucks about the recession for all of us. None of us had much of a choice. But we all get to deal.

Beth
Washington D.C.

Portrait: West Springfield, Massachusetts

2009-02-19T11:00:00.000-08:00

West Springfield, Massachusetts

As the financial news gets wore every day, I look around and KNOW we are lucky. My husband holds a management position for a local company; a book bindery. In a tough economy like this, the bindery does not usually LOSE business, it may even do better-When school districts can't afford to throw out old battered textbooks and buy new ones, the have their old books rebound.

I worked part time after our 18 month old son was born, and since I worked from home, he stayed home with me. However, when he entered the toddler stage, it was time to leave my job and focus on him full time, and I quit in mid-January. I can't even convey the nervousness I feel at the thought of going down to one income in an economy such as this.....But we are lucky....one car is paid off, we have lived in our house for 2 years and have a normal 30 year mortgage, not some crazy ARM that will screw us.....Still, living on one income is of course tighter than living on two.

And still I see how it is effecting everything around me.......My Father in Law lost over $100K in his 401K, my parents lost over $40K......retirement in the near future is now out of the question for my in laws or my parents, and they are all at or within 2 years of retirement age. My sister is about to be engaged, but workis slowing down for my Dad, so no one knows where the money to have a wedding will come from.

The Springfield Mayor announced they will be laying off 89 city workers immediately. Every time I am at the mall, I notice a new vacant store space that has just gone out of business.

Though my husband's job is secure and financially we seem to be okay, I am still scared. I am always looking for ways to save a few dollars. I take my calculator with me to the grocery store to make sure I stay within budget. I make my own laundry soap and dishwasher detergent. We eat out less, and when we do, we might go some place like Costco, where a Hot Dog is $1.50 (with soda) and a slice of pizza is $2.

I, like many others, try to just remind myself that: A) The most important thing is my family, and if we are pulling our belts in tighter just to be safe and cannot buy all the things we'd like to, well then, a person is not a summation of the things they own. B) we are very lucky not be dealing with a potential foreclosure, layoff, or loss of health benefits.

There have been hard times before and there will be hard times again-I have to have faith that everyone cutting back and learning to live within their means will eventually have a positive effect. Perhaps we will stop being a nation of spoiled consumers who equate material goods with happiness? Once can only hope.

Becky
West Springfield, Massachusetts

Portrait: Detroit, Michigan

2009-02-19T10:58:00.000-08:00

I grew up in a suburb of detroit about 45 minutes away. Its in Oakland county which is boasted to be one of the richest counties in the country. I, however grew up in the poor side of this rich county. Which to many and most people, understandably, doesn't get me a lot of sympathy. But my parents worked really hard to get us there. They started in a trailer in detroit, actually THE eminem trailer park, bought a real piece of crap in Redford and then got enough money to move us to Walled Lake. My father started his own business which was really successful, until 1999 when he had a heart attack, discovered a heart disease and was forced to sell his pride and joy, the business on doctors orders. My mother worked for the same company since she was 18. Well actually there were two companies, both were real estate builders, different companies but in the same office. They had worked their way up, and right after I graduate highschool in 2002 they moved to their dream house in Highland, also in Oakland County. This is not your typical extra large dream home but it was exactly what they had always wanted. 2 years ago her boss passed away, and kindly enough left her some money in his will, and because they didn't have a retirement plan, this was a huge sigh of relief for my parents. With this money my parents did something they had been wanting for as long as I can remember, which was buy a small trailer on the Gulf coast of Florida. Its really small, very modest, but they love it. After the boss passed away, my mother continued to work for the other company in the office. But when the economy shifted and people stopped buying, their business started to struggle.

They downsized their office...they moved locations...the cut working hours. They did almost everything they could to keep it running but they hadn't sold a new house in over a year. My parents closed on their Florida house about 3 weeks before my mom lost her job. They paid cash for the house. So now both my parents were jobless, they had two homes in an economy that wasn't selling homes, not to mention they had also just helped me put many repairs into my first home. The guilt that I felt for having taken that money from them was almost unbearable. I started trying to figure out ways to pay them back, but with what I make, and having just bought my first home, there wasn't any extra money.

Mom was put on unemployment. They're still not sure what they'll do. They didn't even get to enjoy a stay in their new home before the news of my mom's job loss came through. Since then, I've had an uncle lose his job of over 25 years. And I've had 2 other friends who have also lost their jobs. Other friends have layoff EVERY Friday at their places of employment. It is a literal week to week question on whether or not you'll be working. And all of these people I'm talking about are hard working, college educated, and dedicated people. I knew Michigan was bad, and people were losing their jobs, but its finally hit home. Not just lazy people are losing their jobs.

While many people disagreed with the bailout, there would have been no hope for Michigan without it. And the trickle effect from the Big 3 going under would have been catastrophic for every American.

Anonymous
Detroit, Michigan

Portrait: Singapore

2009-02-19T09:56:00.000-08:00

We are a country who cut our teeth to hard work. Our chronological struggle – from a small fishing village to being a colony to the pre-independence days of pure uncertainty, for how can a tiny island with no natural resources survive? – is etched into our collective memory. But we did survie. Our impossibly small island-city has thrived in the last half a century (we’re 44 this year), and has fed off the economic miracles just as we have fended off the economic downturns. This current one is supposed to be no exception. Headlines in our national paper tell us that there is hope. The government is doing all they can to help the work force, the elderly, the sick.

At least that’s what the local headlines report, What they don’t report are the little deaths – when dreams are flatlined by reality.

My friend is like me – 27, armed with a few years of working experience, a degree paid for by about three jobs and late nights. My friend is also unlike me – she’s also married, has a kid, and saddled with the growing responsibilites of a young wife and mother. Her husband has been laid off – twice now – and he’s now delivering ice-cream for a fraction of the pay he used to have. My friend doesn’t earn much, and all she does go towards supporting her little family. This was the girl who used to spend all her pocket money on cosmetics and flashy bags. This was the girl who was filled with vivacity and drive. Now the woman she has become is living from paycheck to paycheck, and has taken up another part-time job just to afford all the neccessities – ‘I didn’t know what it means to have money. I probably never will. But I do know what it means to have very little – my baby seeing me only for a few minutes everyday, and I don’t know how to ever explain mummy’s got to leave you because she needs the money for your diapers.’

My uncle is 40 and his cancer has just came back. For the second time. The tumour is lodged near his brain, and it’s growing. He is self-employed, running a design-and-carpentry business out of the home he shares with my grandmother. When the economy crisis hit and all the major furniture stories slashed their prices, he lost many customers because unlike the Harvey Normans of the world, he cannot afford credit terms or installment plans for his clients. With the lack of income, he was left standing at the hospital without treatment, because the hospital needed him to pay cash before they could ‘authorize further treatment’. We all pitched in, and we will continue to pitch in – this is what family is for. No questions asked. ‘It’s so crass but true – there are days where you think it’s easier to die than to be sick. I just can’t afford it anymore,’ whispers my uncle – an operation to remove the first tumuour two years ago has fully compromised his speaking and swallowing abilties.

My father is not yet 60 but he behaves a great deal older. He’s got Parkinson’s, and his body is cruelly whittled down by the disease. This is a chronic illness – expensive to treat, impossible to cure. He was a teacher for 30 years before he retired and was quickly diagnosed after losing control of the steering one day. That was the end of his driving, but anyway pretty soon it was clear we couldn’t afford the BMW. Good thing we sold it – cars on our tiny island come with a hefty tax and a system where you have to bid for a ‘certificate of entitlement’, which prices the car far higher than what it’s worth. Our effective government’s way of cutting back on car ownership, and hence, traffic. A teacher for the longest time, a ‘civil servant’ as all government service personnel are known as – but he has just been served with a letter announcing the fact that his ‘class A’ drugs would no longer be covered by the pension. ‘I can take the lower grade drugs,’ he says to me dully. But as long as I can provide for him and my family, I wouldn’t let him suffer more than he already is. What I will shelve in exchange for a better quality of his life is my goal to complete my masters before I’m thirty, and of course my dreams of starting my own family, and settling down in my first home.

I’m far luckier than many, I know. I’m young, healthy, and I’m holding down an enviable job that pays me enough. Perhaps the economy will recover, the stock markets will bounce back, and companies will start hiring again. But meanwhile, every day is an elergy to the dreams that die, because we can no longer afford to keep them alive.

Jean Tan, 27
Singapore

Portrait: Northern Nevada

2009-02-18T23:13:00.000-08:00

I finished student teaching in December. Teaching is one of the jobs that you are ALWAYS supposed to be able to find a job (you know, teacher shortage and all that?). Well, the day I graduated there were thirty posting in all fifty states. No one was hiring. I was not the only one with this problem. I've had several friends graduate with "useless" degrees and mounting student loan debt. I had a friend whose fiance walked out of her, her daughter and their mortgage seven months into the relationship. She stayed at home with her daughter, watching other children in their home. Now, she's facing foreclosure and will lose not only her home, but her career.

Fortunately for me, I found a long term substitute position. Unfortunately, it's in a school district that is talking about closing an elementary school. If that happens, they have to place those teachers into schools, according to seniority. That means, I'm out. That means the newlywed, recent college grad who teaching across from me is out, even though she has a contract. That means teachers are going to be forced to quit or retire or leave their coaching positions to go back into the classroom. Teachers are facing pay cuts, on the large side. And this is not the only district facing these problems. It's statewide. Heck, it's nationwide.

I have no idea what I will do in the fall. I'm looking at having to go to another COUNTRY to teach. Not county. Not state. Country. That means leaving my family. Leaving my friends. Missing important children in my life grow up. Losing time with my father who was diagnosed with cancer a year ago.

Something needs to change. It would be one thing if I had an opportunity to go 500 miles away and find a job. But, thousands of miles? That's not reasonable for anyone. Worrying about the economy should not be the biggest concern for a 23 year old college graduate. It should not be the biggest concern for the kid graduating high school with no idea of how they are going to fund their college, but knowing that finding a job, any job is going to be difficult with or with a degree.

Anonymous
Northern Nevada

Portrait: Lewistown, Idaho

2009-02-18T20:54:00.001-08:00

I have to say that personally for my husband (28) and I (27), life is good, we both have full time jobs. We have been together for 9 1/2 years married for 3 1/2 years and we do not have any children.

Fortunately we both have jobs that don’t seem to take much of the hit in bad times, why, well my husband is in the beer and wine distribution business and they like to say “when times are good people drink and when times are bad people drink” and possibly more so for the latter. I am a Legal Assistant and there is always work to be done in my field even in bad times when the economy may take a hit these issues do not just go away. So we are gainfully employed, we own a large home that we bought in 2005 after selling our first home for a profit.

We have always seemed to live paycheck to paycheck because typically the more you make the more you spend while living this “American Dream” and we have not made any drastic changes since the economy started faltering, we pretty do what we want and buy what we want, altough we recenetly have been choosing to stay home more instead of going out and spending money excessively. We definitely could cut costs if necessary, we have cable TV with DVR and high speed internet, are insuring three vehicles and there are only two of us. We have a house that is bigger & nicer than either of us grew up in so I do feel grateful that we are able to pay our bills, we still eat out often and overspend recreationally, and we could save more money if it was necessary to do so.

That is not to say that I haven’t seen or felt the tough times, our $288.00 power bill for December was scary and I couldn’t believe that I was actually happy to only pay $225.00 for January, I was afraid it would be over $300.00 so $225.00 was a relief, the increase of the amount has nothing to do with the house it is usually not so expensive to heat, it was the heating price increase that made a big impact. Gas prices dropped dramatically this winter from around $4.65 a gallon to $1.37 a gallon, however that has not lasted long as we are already back to $2.00 a gallon and that makes me wonder how long it will be before they are out of control again.

I’ve definitely noticed the changes also from small specialty shops closing all around us, the increase in cost of consumer products, and the changes small businesses and even larger corporations are making to cut expenses. My brother is out of work and still looking, considering taking a job out of town keeping him away from his wife and children and his wife’s hours have been cut as well, they are both very willing and able bodies who are definitely seeing the effects of a sour job market. My Dad who is mentally disabled and on a fixed income is struggling and unfortunately probably always will be, my Mom passed away in summer 2007 at the young age of 58 and that meant losing her disability income as well, he was able to get his interest lowered on his credit card and is renting out the second bedroom to help make ends meet. Some friends are looking for second jobs to help pay the rent and Idaho’s employment rate for December 2008 was 6.4%, in December of 2007 it was just 2.7%, we are now at 6.6% and the jobs in the local newspaper are few and far between.

Here I am at 27 still thinking and over thinking the thought of having children. As a child my "American Dream" consisted of a great marriage, white picket fence and three children, the older I get and the more responsibilities I have the more I wonder whether or not we should have children. When I think of becoming pregnant the fears take over and all I can think of are the medical expenses, cost for daycare for 40 hours a week, the extra food, the extra clothes, the extra stress on myself, my marriage and our money and an unstable economy does not help to ease my fears on one of the biggest decisions I will ever make in my life.

In the mean time we will keep on working hard and keeping a positive mind set. I voted for President Obama and certainly felt a great sense of hope for a brighter future on Inauguration Day and I look forward to the possibility of better things to come now that we have a new leader to get us through these times!

Haley
Lewiston, Idaho

Portrait: St. Louis, Missouri

2009-02-18T13:48:00.001-08:00

We moved just as school started. This was supposed to be our fresh start. When I was laid off in 2005, we had to file for bankruptcy and lost our house. A friend sold us her trailer for less than most used cars, so we were able to stay in the school district, but it was very old and very tiny. We went from having over 5 acres to living in a trailer park. It took me a year to find another job and a month later, my husband lost his. He was out of work for eight months. He finally found a good job, it paid ok and though it was far away, he commuted with a friend and it was steady work. When my sister took over my parents’ restaurant last summer, my husband went to work for her. It was a pay cut, but he really wanted to get back into cooking and we both liked the idea of supporting the family business. We decided to move close to the restaurant since our old trailer wouldn’t make it another winter and gas costs were getting out of control.

Now, I’m not so sure. I love being closer to my family. We have a beautiful apartment that is so much larger than the trailer. But, I miss our small town. I miss my close circle of friends that were always there for me and each other. I’m worried for them, I’m worried for us.

We’ve been hearing about it for months, seeing effects for months, and now they are circling closer and closer to home. Our hometown corporate identity, Budweiser, was sold. The Chrysler plant closed. A tax hike for the transit system failed so we may have to start driving our daughter to school when route cuts start this spring. There were layoffs in the shop at my company (I work in the office). People at my husband’s work complained about fewer hours. Then a friend is laid off from her job. It’s tough, but she’ll get by. Her husband still works. Another friend is laid off. This friend is the sole support for his disabled wife and their daughter. We worry and bring food when we visit because we’re not sure they’ll manage on their own.

Now my job is cutting back. The cost of my health insurance will no longer be covered by the company. I already pay for the rest of the family, but I saw the new rates, and we just can’t do it. My husband is beginning to lose hours, as well. We both work in luxury industries and I’m tied in with construction. Our move tripled our housing costs. Even though the savings in gas essentially canceled out the difference in housing, everything else costs more in the city. Household goods, toiletries, and, the big one, food (I have two teenagers at home).

We know how lucky we are. My daughter goes to a wonderful private high school and both kids have braces. All of that is paid for by my parents. My kids will have the college education I didn’t, also thanks to my parents. They couldn’t afford it for me, but they can do it for them and I am grateful.

So we’ll cut a little, here and there. Try to put by a few dollars, just in case. We’ll try to help others where we can. We’ve always lived on the edge. Sometimes it was on the edge of poverty, sometimes on the edge of middle class. We’ll manage somehow. Soon the kids will be old enough to get part time jobs at the restaurant, join in the family business. We hope. All we can do is hope.

Sarah
St. Louis, MO

Portrait: Blue Ridge Foothills, North Carolina

2009-02-18T13:45:00.001-08:00

The economy in NC had already taken a hit when I moved here at the age of 30 in 2001. The furniture companies were gone except for the dinosaurs, the names that real buyers trusted. But we started to see even the largest of companies start to back off. The market was dwindling they kept saying but it didn't mean a lot to us at the time. We were educated artists, we were writers and performers and we worked in the trenches for the government during the day to pay for our spotlight Jones at night.

We foolishly did not see it coming. We experienced some warning shots but passed it off as the effect of bad behavior by the ex; why couldn't she work and get her PhD? We took the children on to our governmental benefits and tightened our belts to make up. So what, we couldn't travel as much.

In 2007 my husband lost his job with the county agency he'd put 10 years of blood sweat and tears into and along with it the major health benefits. The environmental agency I worked for experienced severe cutbacks due to defense spending and political priorities. I lost any hope of a permanent full time job doing something I passionately cared about. On the up side I started to get paid at the theatre instead of just volunteering and my husband created a lucrative freelance business and got in with a small publishing company that fit his style and time schedule. Along with these new promises came out of pocket insurance coverage for a family of four with a couple of high-risk individuals. We suddenly understood what Hillary had been talking about all this time. It was the beginning of the end and the long slow slide that has brought everyone to their knees.

We cut the satellite, the TV, didn't replace a broken microwave, and eliminated entertainment from the budget. We rent movies for a dollar a day at Redbox, and the kids come with us to our Theatre and Symphony performances for a night out. We've come to rely on the kindness of comps. We don't eat out. We cook chicken legs or thighs at least once a week.

So the last thing to go was the health insurance. The ex has to apply for Medicaid (bless her republican heart it's killin her!) and I just hope I don't get pregnant before I can afford the $500 IUD. Let's not even talk about the $150 a month anti depressants.

So far the worst it's gotten is out of cat food, out of gas, 15 days late on rent, and no paycheck until next week. We make it as far as we can then float a check at Wal-Mart. At least they're good for something…

The future continues to look bleak. The Arts are dying. We lose donors every day as banks and car dealers close their doors. The environment has to not implode until the stimulus money gets here next December. Our county social service agencies can't afford to pay their people gas money to check on at risk kids.

We've started to talk about garden and living space sharing among friends. So when the Internet is gone and my privacy is down to nothing, living with everyone I trust in the world and canning vegetables; essentially living my Grandmother's life, I guess it will be as bad as it gets. And frankly, it's starting to look pretty damned good.

Kate
Blue Ridge Foothills of North Carolina

Portrait: Bradenton, Florida

2009-02-18T12:34:00.000-08:00

My husband and I married while still in our teens and had our first and only child just four months later. We are worker-bees, both of us. Always have been, always will be. We worked long hours at our pizza restaurant jobs for those first few married years. We scrimped and saved but still lived paycheck to paycheck. We only bought what we could pay cash for except for our house and our cars. We purchased a modest two bedroom fixer upper when we were barely considered legal. It needed work but it was ours.

Over the years we remodeled everything in the house from new drywall to new flooring. New bathrooms. New kitchen. Everything brand new. The paying cash for everything had gone out the window by this point but we both had steady jobs and we didn’t live extravagantly. We decided that it was time to sell while the housing market was hot and we could make a hefty profit.

We begin looking for a new home. We found what we thought would be our dream. An empty lot for sale in a very nice, non-deed restricted neighborhood. My sister worked for a construction company and our friend did mortgages. We couldn’t have planned it better. We put a bid in on the lot without even thinking twice. We paid full price for it, we had no choice if it was what we wanted. And boy did we want it!

Due to various mishaps, the financing took a lot longer to go through than anticipated so construction was delayed. The delay caused additional unforeseen costs and budget overages. The delay meant selling the first home for a hefty profit had to wait.

Ground was broken in June 2006 for the beginning of the dream house. The housing market in Florida fell off the face of the earth in December 2006. We moved into the dream house in January 2007. We decided to rent the house that wouldn’t sell. No hefty profit. No extra money to pay off the bills that had accumulated due to the cost overages and construction delays. No extra money to partially pay down the new mortgage. Nothing.

We were lucky, the house rented right away. We thought we had a good tenant that may buy the house before his lease was up. Hope springs eternal.

Then came the economic downturn that crushed the auto market. My husband was a manager of an auto parts wholesale warehouse. He made decent money and the job was what we thought was stable. In June 2008 they closed his store. No notice, no severance, no paying out vacation & sick time due to employees. Nothing.

We were lucky that he found a new job after only two months and with great benefits. We were unlucky that it was at a large pay cut. We were also unlucky that just after settling into the new job and beginning to adjust to the reduced pay, our tenant moved out without notice. Two mortgage payments, a job making significantly less and a ton of bills that should have been paid off with the sale of our first home.

Still, we are making it somehow. We are worker bees, neither one of us shy away from long hours, hard work and tedious tasks. I am lucky to have a good job with good benefits. He is lucky to have found a job with good benefits and a fairly stable future. We take on extra tasks and work for a little extra money here and there. We will find a new tenant to at least cover the mortgage on our other home and we are surrounded by good family that will help wherever they can. We will never be destitute. We may struggle and live paycheck to paycheck but we still have each other. Isn’t that what really counts?

Hope springs eternal again!

Rebecca
Bradenton, FL

Portrait: London, UK

2009-02-18T12:32:00.000-08:00

All over the place companies are going bust and closing down, or letting go staff, sometimes very suddenly. It all feels shocking, but truthfully it isn't so. Many saw this coming from far away, and even the ones who aren't astrologers have felt the rumblings building up to this the past few years.

Nonetheless, knowing that doesn't mean things aren't upsetting and although the situation in the UK is by no means desperate, almost everyone is feeling the pinch.

On the other hand, the English national mentality thrives on adversity (just look at how treasured Charles Dickens is, with his mean Victorians and ragged orphans and hard times). "Mustn't grumble" is something which is often uttered in the face of both fiscal ups and downs. The English just batten down and carry on, and in a way it seems easier because nothing makes an Englishman more mistrustful than the notion of things which appear to be going too well. The English are on the whole a modest nation of modest requirements, able to extract pleasure from circumstances that would wither the soul of many a European (their national ability to determindely sit on inhospitable beaches on windy days is a testament to this, as is their passion for bird-watching and conservation and trekking around the countryside; even the uninspiring biscuits speak of a people who fully delight in small pleasures, and generally disturst anything which appears to be too sumptous).

There are other things which make our circumstances significantly easier. The healtcare is still free, and not having to worry about what we'll do if one of us gets ill significantly improves my quality of sleep.

True, the economy is bad. Money is tight. As it is I can't remember the last time our bank accounts were in credit at the end of the month even though we have significantly reduced our spending (no shopping except for the baby, only going out once a month etc.)

My husband and I are not English. We have lived in worse economies. I can remember winters where we only had electricity for a few hours a day - trying to bring water to boil over a candleflame, sitting wrapped in blankets around a radio powered by generators. When money was worthless and at the end of the month companies paid people with items to trade (cigarettes, shampoo, tampons). I remember the sense of irony and despair my mother felt when all she could purchase with my father's life insurance payout was two kinder eggs.

And whenever I begin to feel oppressed by all the things i cannot do or buy or enjoy, I remind myself that I am not my possessions and the idea of ecnomic security is illusory as everyone who trusted in Madoff can attest to. My family is alive, healthy, loved. Without that everything else is worthless. With that, we can make the rest work somehow.

Our way of life, our governments and our worldviews may not survive the coming decades but we will.

Nina
London, Uk

Portrait: Sweetwater, Tennessee

2009-02-16T16:43:00.000-08:00

Two years ago in April my husband and I made the leap, we made the American Dream come true for our family. We bought our first home! We moved into a wonderful neighborhood filled with children that our kids could play with. A neighborhood that is composed of hard working people that look out for one another.

A year ago I lost my job. It wasn't much of an income but within months we felt the hit. We went through our savings quickly. My husbands company split, his income stayed the same but there were some downfalls. No more Christmas bonus. No more incentives. We missed the money terribly. We don't live above our means, we don't buy things that we don't need. Hell, I cant remember the last time I had a new outfit or a new pair of shoes. We have two young boys and a baby on the way, there is no frivolous in our vocabulary! Im not even thirty years old and it seems that we will not ever be able to be on our feet again after this.

This past Friday, we moved from OUR house. We are renters again. We lost our house to foreclosure and they will be auctioning it off in March. We were living the so called "American Dream" but nobody ever said to live this "dream" and be dirt poor! We couldn't imagine living in this house, paying way more than we could afford and all of us suffering for it. We took the steps of calling the "hope now" and all the other government programs out there.

The problem with these programs.. your mortgage company does NOT have to participate in them. So after a year long battle, we walked away. I have come to the realization that we are going to be ok and that house did not make us a family, but I feel like I let my kids down terribly.

We are not the only ones effected in our county. Our unemployment rate is over 11% for a very small county. Industrial plants are closing all around us. My cousin works for a major boat manufacturer, they have laid off twice in less than a year, now they work three weeks out of a month and draw unemployment for one week out of the month.

Our schools are suffering. They are cutting budgets and letting teachers go left and right. We have schools literally falling apart and no money to fix them.

People are stealing and breaking into homes. Our once small, safe town where "everyone knows your name" is turning into a place I am not so sure I want to be anymore, but where would we go? Everywhere is turning into the same place.

Jenn
Sweetwater, Tennessee

Portrait: Summerville, South Carolina

2009-02-16T16:40:00.000-08:00

I called my husband one day a few weeks ago to ask him something random and he was already on his way home. It was 10 o clock in the morning. After 12 years with the same commercial building company, my husband has been laid off, he had come home to have a beer to help numb some of the shock.

He was one of the original employees of the company, only two other people had been there longer. He had been assured time and time again that the original group would always have a job. My husband loved his job, he was very dedicated and worked so hard to get where he was in his business.

Now the aftermath, we have a mortgage, a kid, and two car payments. The company used to pay my husbands truck payment, so now that is a large bill we have never had to pay before. They also used to pay for all of his gas. Our 10 month old daughter has some medical issues so health insurance is a must. So that adds to the ever growing list of bills we used to not have to pay. We immediately cut off the cable t.v., got rid of the land line, stopped eating out, etc. We are hording our money, hubby gets one more paycheck this week and a small severance check. I have picked up extra hours at work to try and help. I have a college degree that has done me no good and only make about 10 dollars an hour. I keep thinking every little bit counts, every little penny. We are constantly going over the bills and looking at the bank balance.

We live in a nice house and drive nice cars but have not been super frugal when it came to saving.We are in our early 30's so we still felt we had plenty of time to really save. We were doing well for people our age. We have the usual 401k , not that that is worth much these days, but our regular savings took a beating last year due to a change in health insurance before the baby came. Our deductible had gone from $1500 to $5600. Damn, looking back I wish I could have had the baby a few months earlier, would have been a 1/4 of the price. If we continue tightening our belt we can get by for about 6-8 months,we are not factoring in for unemployment benefits, they will probably not even be 1/2 of what our usual take home was. The stress is taking a toll on us. We are putting our house on the market. We don't need the weight of a house payment and we may have to move so we can find work. In this market we will be lucky if anyone even comes to look.

As bleak as things at our house look, we know that they could be worse. The fact that we can safely pay our bills for the next few months and not go hungry softens the blow a little. We are hopeful, we have to be, our little girl is depending on us.

Laura
Summerville, SC

Portrait: Detroit, Michigan

2009-02-16T15:36:00.002-08:00

If you asked 100 people what city they considered to be the hardest hit in this economy, 95 of those people would say Detroit. Its a city with a name that elicits the strongest response from people, whether we have a bad economy or not. But its a city I love. A city that has created some of the best memories for me.

My entire life has been spent in the suburbs of Detroit. For 25 years, Detroit has been a mere 15 minute drive. I went to college downtown, my husband has played thousands of shows with his former band there. I have spent many years of my life fighting off that Detroit stereotype, because to me, the city has always felt alive. When I was a little kid, my dad worked at the General Motors building downtown. During the summer they would have these outdoor parties with tons of food and musicians and people dancing around, loving life. I never grew up knowing that Detroit was bad, I never feared the city the way out-of-towners did. Maybe I was jaded, having grown up in a semi-wealthy household, I was fortunate to never know what "going through a hard time" meant.

Detroit has always had a reputation for being rough and dirty and barren. A place you would never want to be at night. There have been a few performers to come from Michigan with their over exaggerated stories of growing up dirt poor in Detroit (by the way, Kid Rock is from Romeo which is about 45 minutes away from downtown and it is a really nice place to live). The now infamous 8 mile road was materialized in to a crime ridden "ditch" that separates the rich suburbs from the poor city.

But that was years ago. When people think of Detroit nowadays, its not an Eminem biopic that comes to mind. Its a crumbling car industry, a mayor scandal or a frozen body in the bottom of an elevator shaft. Its everything that people have thought for 50 years but 100 times worse. While I still feel that life coming from downtown, I also feel the fear and sadness. Its nerve wracking to check the news, to wonder what awful thing will happen today. The entire nation was on the edge of their seats during the auto bailout debate, but nobody held their breath more than Michigan. One evening, many months ago, when my husband and I were driving on the expressway to downtown, we caught a glimpse of the Detroit river skyline, with the Renaissance Center standing above the rest of the buildings, the GM logo catching the last rays of the sunset. And it suddenly hit me, what if this bailout doesnt happen? Our city, this beloved place of mine, would not survive. But it did happen, much to the nations dismay. The bailout wasn't a miracle, however, and the problems of this city are far from over. But when I stand outside of the old Detroit train station, all 18 stories of broken glass and graffiti, I know we will be okay. Because the spirit of the people of Detroit transcends time and crumbling architecture. I just hope to see the change in my lifetime.

PS: Mitch Albom wrote an article called, "The Courage of Detroit". Its a little long but worth the read. He sums up the feeling of Detroit better than I ever could.

Megan
Detroit, Michigan

Portrait: Southeast Minnesota

2009-02-16T15:34:00.000-08:00

I am a 2nd grade teacher in a good size school district in SE Minnesota. We have known for many years that in preparing for the 2009-2010 school year the district will have to cut somewhere between 8 and 14 million dollars. The less that is cut for next year will be added to the amount that is necessary to cut for the 2010-2011 school year. The greatest cost for any school district is the teachers' salaries. In our district, teachers are cut according to their seniority. Since I have only officially taught for the district for 2 years, it is possible, if not probable that I will receive a pink slip in my box in the next month. This has unleashed many questions for me, because I would almost prefer a pink slip so I could pursue other jobs that would be more enjoyable for me.

There are things that I love about teaching. However, on a daily basis I do not look forward to going to work, and am drained, unhappy, and grumpy when I leave. In my mother's generation, when you obtained a good paying job that would support your family, you kept it. Wasn't your favorite? Didn't look forward to going to work? Were so tired when you got home that you didn't have energy for your family? It was never a thought that you should start looking for a job that you were happier and more fulfilled at.

Our generation is completely different. If we do not enjoy our job, we want to start looking for a better one. Which brings up the question, is there a perfect job out there for everyone? I believe it's unrealistic to think that you can obtain a job where you love everything about work. Although I would embrace the opportunity to look for a career path that is more enjoyable for me, I also know that my husband and I made a choice to buy a house and have a baby and as the major bread winner in our family, I know that I need to take care of these responsibilities that I chose. Obviously the best option would be that I would be able to find a career path that I enjoyed and was fulfilled by and was able to continue supporting my family on.

I also feel guilty when I see other teachers who are great teachers, who love their jobs and look forward to coming to work each day. By keeping my job, I may be forcing some of those teachers out of the job that they enjoy and excel at. On the other hand (hopefully without sounding too conceited) if you look at my data, my kids make great academic strides in my class. Is it fair to those kids that I give up teaching?

One of the greatest deciding factors will be my son. When I come home from teaching I have given all of my energy, attention, and patience to my kids that so desperately need it during the day. I come home as a mom that I do not want to be. A mom that does not have energy to play with, bathe, and read to her son. A mom that will yell at him when he makes a mistake. In a list of importance, first is obviously providing for my family but second is being the mom that I want to be to my son.

If I don't get laid off and decide to teach next year, it's also not going to be a very happy place to teach. We will miss a lot of teachers, custodians, cooks, administration, and clerical staff that were not so lucky to keep their job. These people have become my friends and I will miss them and also worry about them because they have lost their livelihood. Teachers will be asked to make greater strides towards the standards that each student is asked to meet with less money for supplies and tools to get there (like, you may make one copy each month, choose wisely!).

I think of my grandma and grandpa who were just thankful to have a job and worked their careers not even thinking of their enjoyment of their work. They worked to provide for their families and that is all they thought about. To them, leaving a well paid job to pursue one that is not, for enjoyment reasons, would be unimaginable.

During this difficult time, I turn to my faith and my deep rooted belief that everything will turn out the way it was meant to be. I have employed this belief for about six years and since then, that faith has not let me down. Does that mean that my life always makes sense to me, certainly not! That I have had an easy ride, not if you ask me! But I also consider myself lucky and am happy with who I am, who I choose to walk through life with, and even though some challenges in my life don't make sense at the time, I always learn from them and eventually see why it was important for me to go through that challenge. I look forward to seeing what it was that I was meant to learn from this struggle.

Kate
SE Minnesota

Portrait: The Bronx, New York

2009-02-16T15:31:00.000-08:00

I live in the Bronx, but I think my portrait represents all of NYC. I graduated from community college last May with my Associates in Applied Science, Nursing. I passed my boards at the end of the summer and am finally a licensed RN. During the fall I resigned from the job that I had during school because I had some medical issues to deal with. I wanted to focus on fully recovering so that I could be 100% ready to start my nursing career in the new year. While I was home I sent out resumes, emailed hospitals, recruiters and posted my resume online. I've also signed up with multiple medical staffing agencies, but most of them require 1 year of clinical experience. I got a call back from a hospital, but unfortunately did not get the job. I'm sure there were hundreds of applicants. I've received a couple of reply emails from hospitals/recruiters that tell me they're having a hiring freeze. And the hospitals that are hiring are only hiring experienced nurses and those with Bachelor degrees. A couple of my friends have been able to find jobs. Most of them were able to get them last summer right after school. Unfortunately, I was not able to plan that way because there were other things I needed to deal with.

I think there are many reasons nursing grads are having a problem finding a job right now. There are medical facilities that discriminate against Associate degree nursing grads because we do not have the 4 year degree. I took the same licensing exam they did and I did really well on it. So they are better than me because they took a couple of more classes than me? I worked full time for 4 years while going to school on nights and weekends. I'm very determined, but I guess there are those that don't get that when they see my 2yr degree. And the yearly salary differential between an 2 yr degree nurse and a 4 yr degree nurse is around $1,000 - $2,000. Not a big difference.

Another reason is that the hospitals do not have the money that it takes to conduct orientations for new nursing grads. Depending on the unit you are on, a newly graduated nurse will go through an orientation and shadow a nurse. This costs money. Money the hospitals do not have. So even though there are units that are understaffed, newly graduated nurses are not being hired. Instead, most hospitals get experienced nurses from medical staffing agencies that will fill a void for a couple of months or whatever the need may be.

It was recently announced that two hospitals in Queens, NY will be closing because the company that owns them has gone bankrupt. So now all of those nurses will be looking for work along with the thousands of nursing grads that graudate throughout the year, and the thousands of unemployed nurses. I know many people in my same situation. A friend told me that a recruiter recently told her she had 1,000 resumes for just a couple of positions. There's a website called allnurses(dot)com where nursing students, nurses, etc. can go and write on message boards about all kinds of topics. I've read so many stories from all over the country that are so similar to mine.

I live with my parents and help them with our living expenses. I'm very grateful for having them because they were there for me when I was home recuperating. I saved money while I was working so that I would still be able to pay them rent while I was unemployed. I stopped working in October and my funds ended in the beginning of February. I felt really bad that I still did not have a job and that I was not able to keep helping them. I decided to file my federal taxes early just so that I had some extra cash and help them out. I received a phone call from a recruiter that suggested I move to a couple of states in the MidWest. I am not able to do that. I help my family and they need me here.

My dream since I was little was to be a nurse. This is all I have ever wanted to do. I worked very hard to get here, but now I feel like I'm stuck in mud. I've been trying to stay positive and believe that the right job for me will come. But I do have my bad days when I just want to yell until the windows break from the frustration. And then I remember that I do have an apartment to go to, family to help me, food, and a warm bed at night. Unfortunately, there are MANY out there that are doing far worse than me. I pray for them. There is not much that I can do to better the economy. I just hope that those that can make a difference will do what is in the best interest of ALL of the people in this country. A girl can dream, can't she?

Anonymous
The Bronx, New York

Portrait: Santa Clarita, California

2009-02-16T13:15:00.000-08:00

I’m twenty-years-old, and don’t know what I’m going to do when I graduate. I know what I want to do. I chose English as my major because I want to bring my love of literature to high school students. I want to go to LAUSD. Now that teachers are being laid off every day, now that budgets are being slashed (again), now that no one’s hiring for English, only math and science…I don’t know how I’m going to live after college. I can’t get a ‘real job’, one that pays me more than ten an hour, because I don’t have a degree. Getting that degree is increasingly more difficult, because I don’t have the money which would allow me to get the most out of my education. I commute an hour to school every day, and an hour back every night. Unlike most of my peers, I’m not eligible for financial aid—my parents make enough money to pay my tuition, so the system doesn’t care about the strain that those costs put on the rest of our lives.

In comparison to what a lot of people are going through, these concerns don’t seem so weighty. If I lose my job (which I very well may; more people are starting to see that Gymboree classes are luxury items), I will still have the same roof over my head. We can afford to pay our bills every month, which is sadly more than some of my friends can say. But the previous generations have a habit of saying that the children are our future, that everything rests in the hands of the next generation….well, I am the next generation, and I don’t know where to begin. How am I going to finish school? A Masters Degree is almost a necessity; how will I pay for that? Where will I get the money to pay off my student loans? How will I ever be able to afford an apartment, a house, a family? When I move out, am I going to be living from paycheck to paycheck? What if there’s a hiring freeze, or what if teachers go on strike? How am I going to make a life for myself when other people’s lives are falling apart? If someone could tell me where my generation is supposed to go from here, I’d very much appreciate it.

Andi
Santa Clarita, CA

Portrait: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

2009-02-16T13:07:00.000-08:00

I quit my job four days after the stock market crash in September. I was working as an advertising copywriter, and it was supposed to be “the job” – that first real, salaried job out of college, the one I’d been scraping for a year to find. It wasn’t what I’d hoped – as the new employee, and the one who least shared the interests of the tiny company’s owner’s, I was the fall guy. Even the intern passed work off to me. I learned pretty quickly from the girl who’d vacated the position a month before that it would always be this way. There was no where to go but out, and so I did, leaving my key on the desk a few minutes before noon, emailing my bosses a curt good bye, and flying home on my bicycle, finally relieved of the nervous stomach ache that had plagued me for the month and a half I’d worked there.

I work at a coffee shop now, making roughly $200 less than my monthly bills. A combination of savings and tips have carried me through the past four months. I just picked up some contract work for a company I worked for last spring and summer, so I’ll be okay as long as I keep hoarding money like a Depression widow. My café is near a lot of corporate offices, and the people being laid off, or on the verge of it, have a lot more than I do to worry about. These are people who have been with their companies for years, who have families, who thought they’d earned some security from years of service. It’s different for me. I graduated from an arts program in a country on the verge of a recession. I’ve been on the brink of disaster since birth. I’m used to this. That’s not to say that I like stretching $7 worth of groceries for three days, or living without insurance, or working 50 hour weeks on top of trying to write, but I can do it. I don’t really have the choice. I know a lot people whose families have helped them along well into their 20’s, and it’s hard for me not to be jealous sometimes. After a while, you start to think that you’ve built enough character that you deserve a free ride. It’s not going to happen. The most I, or anyone can do, is keep going, not because it’s easy, or we want to, but because there aren’t any other options.

Jaime, age 23
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Portrait: Rural Southern Pennsylvania

2009-02-16T13:05:00.000-08:00

We just moved to Pennsylvania from Northern California about 8 months ago. We had lived in rural Northwestern Pennsylvania as kids, and kind of assumed it’d be similar.

My husband got a decent job, and I’m really thankful that he’s still working since they’ve been cutting hundreds of jobs here, and back home at one point around Christmas every male in my family was laid off. But living as we do on the main highway between 2 major Pennsylvania cities, we’ve been seeing an effect form the economy.

Earlier this week 4 guys robbed the gas station here on the corner. They beat up both cashiers and stole the money and lotto tickets. You’ve got to be desperate for money to STEAL lottery tickets and hope you win. The cashiers are alright, but it really shook our little town up. By the way these guys look (we’re not as ethnically diverse as I’d like), I assume they drove all the way out here from one of the more urban areas to rob our gas station. Maybe theirs was out of cash?

Maybe it burned down. There has been a huge increase in fires out here. An arsonist in the next town had set 23 or 24 fires since New Year’s; people’s barns are burning down “mysteriously”. Some of this is bound to be criminal activity for the sake of criminal activity. But I firmly believe part of it is an effort to collect insurance money to pay off other debts.

I know I shouldn’t be surprised by the increase in criminal activity, but it IS a surprise in such a rural town. When we moved here I never thought I’d be concerned about home invasion, arson, or robbery. I was thinking something more along the lines of cows getting out of their fence and tromping our yard, or maybe squirrels…I don’t know…but it wasn’t this.

Sabrina
Rural (Southern) Pennsylvania

Portrait: Salt Lake City, Utah

2009-02-15T12:42:00.000-08:00

Salt Lake is not one of those cities that people flock to. Its easy to be a big fish here because it is the small pond most speak about when using cliches. We tend to be behind on most things and the economy is one of them. We haven't had the housing crisis. My parents are still successfully flipping houses. The one area we are feeling the crunch is in the job market. Here is my story....

I became pregnant with my beautiful daughter after knowing my boyfriend for 3 months. When we met he was a county firefighter and because he was with the wild land division his job ends in October of every year and starts up again in March/April. He started looking for a job and did not find anything until March of 2008, almost 6 months after firefighting ended. He was only able to find employment at a restaurant/pub so that was bringing in little money. He was unable to go back to the fire crew summer of 2008 due to the birth of our daughter. He found another job that was a 3 hour commute each way with a 8 days on 8 days off schedule working with a youth wilderness program. I had an emergency c-section in Aug 2008 and he lost his job because he had to report for duty 3 days after our daughter was born and I was pretty much immobile. He then did not find employment until October of 2008. I have been supporting us with my part time job at Continental Airlines and my student loans. I am currently making a whopping 8 dollars an hour and being held to 20 hours a week. I did not get paid maternity so that was just another blow to our finances. I am currently 75,000 into my student loans and am delaying graduation until I can find a job that will pay me more then my current student loan payment of 1000.00 a month. Considering what I will pay in childcare (I currently work at home during the night so when my baby is sleeping) most jobs will not pay me enough. Because I work for the airline industry I have had to survive layoffs twice in 2008. At any moment I can lose my job and will have to go back on food stamps because my boyfriend only makes 1200.00 a month at his job at a youth rehab. I am know looking at the prospect that my student grants will be cut off due to my state's budget issues which cut higher education grants as well as increased tuition... this will put me into repayment of my loan. Forget trying to save anything because there has to be a remainder from the bills to put into savings which there just isn't any.

I voted for Obama because I am looking at grim prospects. I am 26 with a child and have a bleak future. My college degree is worth nothing (double major political science and history). I can not go to law school as planned because of the loan freezes. I don't know which way is up and I am trying to be productive member of society but its hard when the economy just keeps kicking me down.

I am disgusted at the way my state handles taxpayer funds. Just last week I saw on the news that although the legislature had to cut 1 billion out of state programs, they are going to start a legal fight to challenge Roe v Wade. The reporter suggested that it will cost at least 10 million to get to the Supreme Court. When I look at my representation I know that I am not the future. I am the "liberal" and therefore my opinion and job are not worth the fight. I would move but with what money? what job?

Its hard not to be depressed in these depressing times.

Lindsay
Salt Lake City

Portrait: Phoenix, Arizona

2009-02-15T12:40:00.000-08:00

Everyone here knows someone that foreclosed on a home. It seems as though there are a disproportionate number of houses for sale or foreclosed on here in Phoenix, and it's not simply my imagination… there are. FOR SALE Signs decorate the neighborhoods. We are right up there with Las Vegas for foreclosures. This valley grew and grew, much too quickly. Our valley spans over 1000 square miles; the cities run together, and often you aren't aware that you have left one city and entered another. Eternal suburbia. The growth has all but halted. The new homes are being put up at a crawl instead of the lightning speed they once were. Everyone here came from somewhere else. Well, everyone but me it seems. There are very few natives, so everyone here has a story, a reason for moving here. The story often includes the price of living, or the lack of snow. That's right, the price of living here is extremely low, or it used to be. No PhD, Master's degree, or family money required to live lavishly here. Before the housing "boom" almost anyone could afford to live here, which is good or bad depending on how you look at it.

At 22, my ex and I bought a condo… for $93,500. He had a regular job under $40K a year and I was a college student. That was almost 5 years ago. When we split he kept the house, and in order to keep it, he now has 2 jobs. Like Rebecca I have not personally felt this recession. I have seen people around me in pain from lost jobs, homes, cars… Friends move home with parents after losing jobs after being on their own for years. When I met my husband, I didn't realize that he was in a stable position come recession time. I knew he was not a broke twenty something, but I didn't know that our field of work was a safe one… We are not rich, but we are stable. I am no longer charging groceries, or living paycheck to paycheck. But many here are. The young couples that married right out of high school and started having children are both working, or moving in with parents. They are no longer able to get by, certainly not on one paycheck. Living paycheck to paycheck, it really only takes one or two rough months to hit bottom now.

There are more empty store fronts than I can remember in my short 26 years. Many people that got into real estate here to make money quick, now have to work second jobs. If you bought a home here in the last several years, you are probably upside down in it, and cannot get out of it, so if you lose your job, you can't move… you are stuck. And you aren't alone. Like I said, everyone here knows someone…

Leslie
Phoenix, Arizona

Portrait: Las Vegas, Nevada

2009-02-14T17:02:00.000-08:00

My home, Las Vegas----The city of lights; the city that for better or worse is built on wild living and extreme spending! Our city thrives when the people of this nation thrive as they flock here by the thousands, it is the countries playground. Yet when the country starts to tighten it's belts trips like Vegas fly out the window fast. Where does that leave this town?? Over spent and broken down..... Which is exactly the economic state of most of us living here.

I live in one of the most uneducated and blue collar cities around, someone once called it the new Detroit "The only city left where you can raise a family on a single income, blue collar job". That is because our blue collar isn't building cars but serving drinks, valeting cars, dancing half naked. Professions that although easy bring in a LOT of dough really fast.

Our city is full of 20/30 somethings who moved far away from home made quick money and enjoyed every penny of it. We are not a town of savers and driving down one street here will tell you that. Escalades and hummers are some of the most common cars driven around. Cars that we can no longer afford to own because the jobs that once paid for this lifestyle are drying up fast. There is a new casino opening near where I live they had about 250 various openings posted the other week, the last numbers I saw they had over 3800 applications to fill these positions. Every school is cutting teachers next year, the construction industry that used to employ a huge part of our city has basically shut down. The new housing projects all over the city have been left unfinished.

Yet that is only half the picture because the most distressing point is that when the job is cut, when the tips dry up those who have moved here are now stuck. Stuck in a town that no longer offers to support their family, their life. Stuck in a house that cannot be sold, stuck with a car they now cannot afford to drive.

We recently bought a foreclosed upon house, it was a great deal for us and we enjoyed "sprucing it up". We bought our house last summer for over 100K less than our neighbors down the street bought their house for just a few years before. In fact, every person who owns a house in our neighborhood (myself now included in this) is currently upside down on their mortgage, the only difference being how much money each person owes. There are 6 houses currently being foreclosed upon on my street.

I have a good friend who is having her house taken away from her not far from mine. She has lived there rent free for over a year now as she awaits the bank to get to her case and actually come to take the home away. She plans to stay until they kick her out and figures she has saved over $11,000 not paying her mortgage in the past year. Which is good since she has recently lost her job and could not afford the mortgage payments anyway.

The portrait of Vegas is not just a place where "Hard Times" have hit but a place where the majority of people are so far behind (hundreds of thousands of dollars) that there is nothing else left to do but just walk away. Just leave our houses and cars behind and when the credit scores improve, when things turn around, in 7-10 years--- maybe try it again. Until then we can only hope that we have learned something in the process. This city that shines with it's bright lights is in a strange way a bit quieter these days, a bit more somber we face the reality of the present situation.

Vicky
Las Vegas, Nevada

Portrait: Newport, Michigan

2009-02-13T20:24:00.001-08:00

I worked for a health insurance company in Detroit Michigan, but I always dreamed of being home with my children We already had 2 girls and I was finally pregnant with #3 our boy. We had decided early on in that pregnancy that I would finally be able to stop working and stay home with the kids, having 3 kids in daycare, plus my commute would not benefit us with me working any longer. 3 months into my maternity leave, October 2008 to be exact I resigned from my job. Even with giving up our extra income, our medical and dental benefits and a nice cushy desk job, it felt good. In our eye it was worth everything we just lost for me to be home.

On December 3rd, 2008, my husband calls home. "I was just fired" he said. I yelled at him for the lame joke he was playing, but the silence on the other side said a lot more. This was not a joke. 2 months ago, we had 2 incomes, then one and today we have none. Next to nothing in savings, 3 children, 2 of them in diapers, and we now have no money living in Michigan, who just happens to have a 10% unemployment rate, the highest in the nation.

I don't remember much for the next couple of weeks, I know I cried alot. Feeling sorry for ourselves, wondering what would be if I just held onto my job a little bit longer, and not resigned when I did. I could be going back to work and we would have some money. 3 weeks before Christmas. How were supposed to give our children the things they longed for, the things they searched for and circled in the toy books? So many thanks goes out to our friends and family, they all pulled together. We had a great Christmas. Probably one of the only Christmas' that I enjoyed getting toilet paper and laundry soap as presents. They kept our spirits high, and told us to hang on. Something will happen they would all say. They also told us to hang onto each other, because financial burden is the #1 divorce cause. We listened. We didn't play the blame game and held on. We stopped paying our bills. The bills we worked so hard at always paying on time and never missing a payment. They started to call, they started to demand. Still we hung on, hoping and praying a prayer that so many others were saying as well.

Then it happened. Just when we thought we weren't going to be able to hold on for one more month, he got the call. That call that said, "Can you start Monday?"

We got the 1st paycheck today. Boy oh boy, can I tell you how good it feels to be able to put some money in the bank. I never thought I would be able to say it felt good to pay those bills, but today, you will here me say it sure felt good.

Tasha
Newport, Michigan

Portrait: Ontario, Canada

2009-02-13T20:18:00.000-08:00

I have lived in the same small town for as long as I can remember. I always considered it to be too rural, too old fashioned, too far removed from the rest of the world. When I began to hear news of economic hard times I really didn't care. Such things were far away from me and my family, and besides people were surely overreacting. I mean, it was a rich person's problem, right? The stock market might be important to people who had tons of money but surely it didn't affect me, right? Maybe some folks would have to down-size their mansions and sell off a few luxury cars but it served them right for being rich in the first place, right?

When I was a kid a factory opened up at the edge of town and started turning out metal car-parts. Soon the town was growing. People were driving in for work. Housing developments sprang up. The population inched higher. Then another plant went up on the other side of town, this one made plastic car parts. The school was full and new stores opened up down-town. Half of the kids in my high school got weekend and after school jobs at the factories when they were 16 and a lot of them never left. I know several families in which mothers and fathers both work at the same plant, usually on opposite shifts to cut down on child-care costs. They said it was a good job with benefits and over-time and vacations. After the last Christmas vacation employees were told not to come back, the plant didn't need to be opened at all in January. Then they started laying people off. At the other plant my aunt's crew went from more than ninety people down to less than fifteen. My aunt was not one of those fifteen. All those kids I went to high school with who started working full time the day after graduation now have spouses and children and mortgages on the nice new houses that were built so recently, but they do not have degrees or skills or experience with anything else in the world. Those families suddenly went from dual income to none at all.

It still didn't personally affect me. I was sad to see my friends struggling but I still felt secure enough. I left work when I had my second child and we lived as frugally as possible on my husbands salary as a furniture salesman. We were used to living paycheck to paycheck and doing without the finer things in life and surely we'd be fine until I went back to work. We had no investments to lose.

These days there are more and more houses up for sale as people head for the cities to look for work. Half of the stores on Main street stand empty. But not everything is declining; the use of crystal meth is skyrocketing, same with prostitution and teen pregnancy. It's a long drive to anywhere and gas is expensive.

Now it affects me. People aren't buying as much furniture anymore. My husband's paychecks have shrunk and his job is in jeopardy. I have been looking for work for 7 months, ever since my maternity leave ran out for a job that I can't go back to. We have two kids, two broken down vehicles and no savings, but at least we have a place to live, enough to eat and resources to take care of our kids. My aunt found a part-time job and is supporting herself and my cousin on about 10 hours of work a week. My disabled mother asks for extra shifts at her job at a retail chain store and hobbles home from work in agony, pushing a walker and dragging her leg in a brace. She's barely able to move until her next shift but she's terrified that she will be fired for being too slow or having too many doctors appointments. She can't pay her bills and support my 84 year old grandfather if she has to go on disability.

Last week I was standing in line at the grocery store telling my five year old that we couldn't afford a chocolate bar today, when two women got in line behind me and I over-heard this: "...It's just disgusting. Every day I have kids showing up at school who haven't been fed. They don't have hats or mitts or even coats sometimes, it's ridiculous! The government should track down these parents and give them a good kick in the rear!..." Really? really? I was pissed. Do you think people want to send their kids to school cold and hungry? Do you think the parents are lounging by their pools being served cocktails by their butlers while their kids stomachs grumble? Because maybe, just maybe, the parents are doing the best they can with what little they have. If you're so high and mighty why don't you lend a hand instead of complaining? Don't you realize it's not just someone else's problem?

Times are hard and everyone is affected.

Anonymous

Ontario, Canada

Portrait: Atlanta, Georgia

2009-02-13T18:53:00.000-08:00

It's hard to post about your financial woes in a time where there are people losing their homes, their lifelong memories, their ability to feed their children - but here's my story.

I got divorced about four years ago. I had to do some accounting before I decided if I could leave my marriage. But I realized that I could scrape by on what I was making. Fortunately, we had no children; so I only had to pay for myself. I paid all my bills, including a pretty hefty car payment and even budgeted $100 a month for cable TV and Tivo. I squeaked by on $25 a week for groceries and only used my credit card once for tickets to an Andy Williams Christmas concert for my mom's birthday. I was very proud of my self-efficiency!

I met my boyfriend about a year later. He was the Vice-President and a mortgage broker for a small up-and-coming mortgage company. When we first started dating, he was driving a Lexus. We'd go out on the weekends and he'd pick up the tab for drinks and fancy dinners. I told him tearfully and sincerely one night early in our relationship that I wasn't just interested in his money. He laughed and told me that he didn't have as much as it seemed.

That really proved to be true when the bottom fell out of the housing market. His company hadn't played the subprime game and was truly invested in ethical lending practices. And it cost them what could've been a ton of money in commissions. He said he knew the market was in trouble when a representative from one of the banks came to his office one day and offered him a loan product where a customer could get 100% financing on a home loan just one day out of bankruptcy. He asked the guy from the bank if he thought that was a responsible lending practice.

I didn't realize it at the time, but he wasn't closing any deals, wasn't making any money and was trying to maintain his lifestyle on credit cards. In the midst of all this he had completed his MBA, using student loans, thinking that it would be money well spent as he tried to grow the mortgage company. And I had moved into his newly bought condo with him and his two cats. After living together for about a year, he finally admitted to me that he didn't have enough money to pay the mortgage anymore, and so I started paying for it all, instead of just the half I had been paying. After about a year of this, he sadly left his mortgage company to look for another job where he could actually make some cash.

After he left the mortgage company, he took a job working as a recruiter, serving as a middle-man to place job seekers in open positions that were contracted to the recruiting company by employers. What an unfortunate time to be in the business of hiring. He worked there for a year and couldn't place anyone in a position. Companies weren't hiring. He hadn't made any real money in over a year and a half. He was forced to file bankruptcy because he couldn't cover the huge credit card debit he had accrued. Then he was laid off in September.

For the past six months, and really for the two years we've been living off my $60,000 a year salary. Fortunately, we live in a great condo that has a fairly reasonable mortgage payment. And paying off my car in June has helped tremendously. But we've had to cut back. We used to eat out two or three times a week at least. Now we're able to go out on the cheap once every two weeks - every other Friday on payday. We've sold his BMW (he totalled the Lexus) which has saved us an insurance payment and $100 a month for a parking space at the condo. He's quit going to his cooking club which cost a considerable amount each month. We've stopped going to the movies. We mostly sit around the house with the cats and watch TV every night.

I can't complain compared to the situations others are in. We have everything we need. We still pay all the bills, feed the cats, and drink too much. We have cable TV and broadband internet. I changed jobs about a year ago and my company pays for my public transit to work. (Previously, I was driving an hour each way to work. If I were still doing that when he got laid off, we never would've been able to pay for the gas.) There's no money for intangibles like new clothes, but that kind of thing has never really bothered me. But I still find myself feeling resentful of people who haven't been touched by the recession. I've been responsible with my money all my life. Why am I here, when others are still able to go out to fancy dinners and buy BMWs? But then I try to take a deep breath and give thanks for their fortune and well-being.

I try not to think about it, but I don't know what we'll do if I lose my job. I work for a major media company that's still in pretty good shape at the moment. But these days, there are no guarantees. It will be seven years before the bankruptcy is off his record, which affects his job search. Someone called him the other day about a position and then had to decline when they found out about the bankruptcy. It's more stressful than I acknowledge. I feel like all we have is balancing precariously on my shoulders. That's why I have to be able to afford drinking.

Anonymous
Atlanta, Georgia

Portrait: Pflugerville, Texas

2009-02-13T17:08:00.000-08:00

We bought our house right before the housing bubble burst. I'm convinced there is no worse feeling than knowing that your house is worth 20K less than what you paid for it less than a month after you've bought it. Our home was built in a modest neighborhood and it is the smallest floor plan that our builder does (in fact, I don't think they even build this small of a house anymore). So we knew that we could afford our house, and we weren't living extravagantly, but, we also knew that we both had to have jobs to keep the mortgage above water and pay bills.

At the time, I worked 2 and a half jobs. My primary job was as a part-time assistant for a real estate agent. For my secondary job, I worked as an assistant to a salesperson for a luxury home-builder. My third job was contract work as a transcriber/copywriter. In the first year that I was working for the real-estate agent, my work hours had been cut back to nearly nothing. But, the interesting thing is, my boss's focus shifted from selling homes to specializing in foreclosure. With job #2, homes simply stopped moving. They weren't selling, and my job basically became unnecessary. But one interesting thing I noted while I was there, is that most of the homes we were selling were to people moving to Texas from California. They frequently commented on how you could buy a 4,000 square foot home with an acre or four of land in Texas for the price of a 1000 sq. ft. home out in Cali. So the only dependable income that I had was the least paying job out of all three.

On the flip side, my husband got a raise and started doing really well at his job and his company started doing really, really well. In our neighborhood alone, there are homes going up for sale left and right. Some of these houses haven't even been occupied for a year yet. My neighbors down the street were there one day, and the next, there is a foreclosure/eviction notice taped to their front door. Foreclosure specialists like my old boss are closing deals like crazy in my neighborhood and other neighborhoods like ours in the area.

The scary thing is, builders aren't slowing down anymore. They did for about four months, but now, our neighborhood is closing out. They are putting up new houses and they are just sitting there. This makes about "0" sense to me. Not only are the houses just sitting there, the bigger houses are selling now for what we paid for our small house, thus decreasing our home's value. I am not working now at all. If my husband lost his job (luckily, we still are pretty positive that this won't happen), we couldn't sell our house for what we owe. We are literally upside down, but blessed to be here.

A.H.
Pflugerville, Texas

Portrait: Portland, Oregon

2009-02-13T17:06:00.000-08:00

I live on the edge even in a good economy. I make about $1000 / month, before taxes, 3/4 of which goes towards rent and bills. I don't have any kids to worry about, though, and I cook for a living, so even when I can't afford to buy food, I can still eat at work. I got my job at just the right time, the service industry in Portland is overrun with people who would normally be doing something else. Suddenly jobs that would have been some teenager's summer spending money are a family's retirement income. I have a friend who moved here almost a year ago, and still can't find a job. She can't get an apartment without one, so she's been couch-surfing. For a year. Whenever I think about how much it sucks to be poor, I think of how much more it sucks to be homeless.

My father is a journalist. He retired last year, and got his retirement in a one-time payment, a lot of which he invested. My parents probably lost half of what they expected to live on for the rest of their lives. They have no debt, though, and while they worry about money, they don't worry about whether or not they can eat tomorrow. We're doing a lot better than a lot of people. As long as I don't get sick or pregnant, I think I can ride this one out.

Alison
Portland OR

Portrait: Georgia

2009-02-13T11:20:00.000-08:00

Two Halloweens ago, my husband arrived home early from work. I was on bed rest with our third child (our first planned baby), and thought "oh, great! He's home early to help get the children ready for trick or treating!"

We had bought our first home just three months earlier (a house we hunted and saved for for a year and put down 20 percent on), and I was looking forward to meeting our new neighbors on this outing. Nevermind my husband had not come home early to help before without me asking for it. He was the corporate public relations guy - a suit that didn't get to leave early unless there was a justifiable reason for it.

He walked through the door, and I teased him, "Aww, honey, did you get laid off?" It was a joke I had never made before. He looked stunned, then replied, "yes."

We went back and forth, me in denial, as he tried to convince me he was indeed serious. He pulled the severance papers out of his briefcase and handed them to me. And I remembered he wasn't really that much of a jokester to begin with.

We channeled Pollyanna in the beginning - we had a little savings, a very slight severance package, and my job with the magazine. We would be fine! Besides, who wouldn't hire him with almost a decade of experience? He was a pro with a great resume.

Nearly 85 companies passed him over in the next seven months. He was over-qualified, over-educated, too experienced, or they could hire a noob out of college for mere pennies.

Finally, after our youngest was born, our savings depleted, and the severance money long gone, my husband got the call: he could start a job with the state on Monday. It was a significant pay cut - 10 percent - and he would have to commute three and a half hours total every day, but it was work! We put our beloved house on the market, and again, the Pollyanna within took over. Sell our house, buy a new one, and start life in a new state.

We became thankful he was laid off when he was. Newspapers began laying off employees by the thousands a month after he started his new job. His hunt would have been seriously complicated by this, and whew, didn't we just dodge that bullet?!

We watched the print journalism world crumble around us. Friends and colleagues are laid off every quarter, and those that remain are overworked and underpaid, and know there will be no raises this year while praying they will have a job to come to the next quarter. Our hearts bleed every month for the people we know now stuck in the limbo hell we were in last year at this time, and then we thanked God he was one of the first to go.

It has almost a year since he was hired. Our house is still on the market, and we're fairly certain our credit isn't good enough to meet the new stringent credit requirements for a new loan even if we could sell it.

I lost my job with the magazine after hours (and ad sales) dwindled to nothing, and we get an hour a day with Daddy before it's time for bed. I spend 12 hours home alone with our three children. There's still no money in our account because we can't get ahead when his salary alone won't pay the bills, and I have not had any luck in my job hunt.

We have three college degrees and seventeen years experience between us with great records and references, yet no company in a three-state radius is in need of someone with our skill sets.

Even if places like Lowes and Target were hiring, they don't pay enough to cover the day care our three children would incur.

We have always lived simply - we have no credit card debt, one car payment, and our bills total less than $2,200 a month. We didn't top $60,000 the last year we were both employed, yet we still owed taxes because I was self-employed.

We continued to try find the bright side, even though the stress has been tangible and we are officially "broke" and "poor." My cooking skills have improved with less eating out, I have discovered the gold of consignment shops, our children are healthy, and we have had family who helped when financial emergencies have come up, like the plumbing going suddenly in our house. My occasional contract positions keep us afloat and have paid for the small things, like Christmas and our daughter's first birthday.

Yes, we're "slow payers" some months, but the bills always get paid. For that reason alone we're doing better than so many others, right?

Last week, the state my husband works for announced it will be forced to make cuts. They adhere to a strict last hired, first fired policy. He will be unemployed no later than July 1.

And with that, Pollyanna has packed up and moved on.

Miranda
Georgia

Portrait: Lee County, Florida

2009-02-13T10:32:00.000-08:00

I am an Urban Planner originally from MI. I moved to Lee County, Florida in 2002. In 2002, Lee County was one the 5 fastest growing counties in the country. I planned on getting the experience I needed to move somewhere else after a few years. After working here for a while I asked about all of the houses that were being built. I wondered, who was going to live in all these houses? Was there a housing shortage? Well, there was a lack of housing that teachers, policemen, firemen could afford, but that was going to be fixed be developers being required to build a handful of affordable units as part of their sprawling new greenfield projects. Where were all of these people that were going to live in these houses coming from? What was going to happen to the houses they were living in previously? I mean, I'm not having eight kids.

We planned to move to North Carolina in 2006. We put our house up for sale for 2% more than we paid for it in 2005. When our daughters' preschool contract expired & I wasn't given enough of a raise so that my salary was paying more than 50% of the cost of daycare, we made the decision that I should just leave my job.

Six months later, we still hadn't sold our house. We lowered our price. Thankfully we had put $100k down when we purchased the house. This meant that we would hopefully still be able to walk away from selling the house with some money in our pockets. When we got an offer for essentially what we owed on the house, the deal fell through because the house would not appraise for what we owed, even after we put $100k down. In one year.

While I did find some sub-consulting work, most people were leery of hiring me because it was well-known that we were trying to get out of Dodge. The company I had left when we put our house up for sale has laid off over 200 employees since I left. It is an over 60-year-old company which is now in danger of bankruptcy.

When two other properties we bought in 2002 that we tried to switch to fixed interest rate mortgages from variable appraised for $20k to $30k less than what we owed after paying on them for six years, we got down to brass tacks. We decided to declare bankruptcy. It sucked.

That was in March of 2008. Almost a year later, our house was being foreclosed, & this is how it felt:

Between the years of 1993 & 1998 I moved 14 times. Yes, three of those times were to dorm rooms, but I still count them because they did require a major analysis of my belongings, paring them down to only the bare necessities, to fit into a very small space. When I think of those moves now, one thing is very noticeable to me regarding then in comparison to now. The majority of those moves were expected, except for somewhere around number 8, where I had a literal crackhead steal most of everything I owned, which to her credit did make things pretty simple. I did not fret much then about how I was going to pack, how things would be relocated, what would get broken. I occasionally made the decision of the next place within days if not hours before the actual move. Like I've said before, I was a leaf that went where the wind blew me.

We have made a decision on the next place we will be living, signed the lease, paid our money. It was stressful for all of us. No, it doesn't meet any of the qualities that MiniMe had requested & it is far out from most of the places we like to go. Regardless, MiniMe told us she likes it. She includes, "I want to go to the new house!" in her daily list of laments. We are happy with our decision & it is truly a nice house. I'm still not okay. It's not the new houses' fault.

It's not the loss of our current house that is bothering me. It's not the bankruptcy. The decision to file for bankruptcy is unquestionably the most right decision we have made in the past year. There are things about our current home that I will be glad to be relieved of. It is the loss of our home that I am mourning.

A sense of place, experiences tied to the context of the environment, is a very essential part of my personality. It is why I studied architecture & became a planner. The concept of place is something that preoccupies most of my thoughts. Very many important things have happened to me, to us, in this place. This home.

This is the place where I sat & nursed MiniMe for hour upon hour. I painted this room "Blue Collar" the second week we lived in the house, when MiniMe was just 3 months old, & we had no power because of Hurricane Wilma. Biggie put the beautiful crown molding up, using the compound mitre saw I got him our first Christmas in this house. Where I sang Audra, Nick Drake, Innocence Mission to her. The very last time, when I sang Into the Mystic, into her ear, while my father listened over the phone. Just this past Christmas she realized that as I was singing Barbara Streisand's The Best Gift, I was telling her that she is The Best Gift I've ever received, in this very spot. We still sit here to read bedtime stories together every night before bed. The majority of the most profound conversations she & I have had have been in this place. We have discovered each other, more than any other place, in this place.

This is the place where she took her very first steps, the Wednesday before Mother's Day, in 2006. She was so nonchalant about it all. I couldn't comment for what seemed like forever because it looked so strange to see this little 15 pound person actually upright & independently mobile. I was mesmerized.

This is the place that I was the very last time I spoke to my Dad. I was stripping the wallpaper off of the wall. My mom was there helping me. He was talking about things he had seen on his route the past week, driving through the Upper Peninsula. He told me he was so glad he had a daughter that understood him; that understood why he preferred driving on little State Routes where there was little traffic, simple people, simple food. When I told him my mom was there with me, he asked me to tell her that he thought of her every Monday, when he crossed over the Laughing Whitefish River, as they had made that trip when they were married, on his little Triumph. I marked the sense of nostalgia in my heart. It is the place where I was the last time I got to hear him tell me he loved me.

This is the place I was standing when my step-mother told me my father was dead. She had called, hung up after 3 rings, before I could make it to the phone, & then called back not 2 minutes later. I had sensed something was wrong when I went to answer the phone. I had dreaded that moment for years. I paced in this doorway, not crying, just nodding, listening to the flood of sorrow my step-mother poured over me. I stayed in that spot to call my husband to tell him. My mother, too. I remember thinking that maybe if I stayed in that spot I would be able to continue to not cry.

This is the place that Biggie was sitting when we healed our marriage. He said awful things to me & I let him. I let him say them, meaning I actually listened, because I knew he didn't mean it. I knew, finally, that it wasn't about me. It was about everything before me. He saw that I let it go. He knew that I had every right to be justified, self-righteous, hurt. He saw that I let it go because We Are More Important. Whatever it is, We Are More Important. He acknowledged the sacrifice of my spirit to do this. That acknowledgement brought us back & gave us hope.

Although we lived in another house when we were married, when MiniMe was born, it is in this house that I became a mother & the mother of my husband's children. This place is inextricably tied to the history of our lives, of our family. I am sad that we have to leave it under these circumstances. It has served us well. I have been proud of it.

I wish we could know the next occupants. There are so many places, houses, homes that are losing their stories & context. It's messing up so many families. In the telling of stories, you have the who, the what, to what extent, & the where. For so many, the where is being forcibly & traumatically changed.

Amy P

Lee County, Florida

Portraits: New York City

2009-02-13T10:24:00.000-08:00

I was reading this article in today’s NY Times, when I was reminded we are in a recession. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t just wake up and realize this, but sometimes I tend to forget what’s going on in the real world. By day (morning, noon and most of the night) I live in a wondrous world where people get whatever they want, no matter what the cost: $800 worth of uneaten dinners (they were too cold and heating them in a microwave is, apparently, out of the question), $1200 make up chairs, $900 back pillows, $1000 in a car service (wait and return to/from Barneys) even though the passenger lives four blocks away from said store. I could go on, but the excess, the waste, is overwhelming.

Reality does hit on casting days, when the plastic, brightly-colored Ikea chairs are lined up against the wall in the hall and the actors come in to audition. Today was “cute, blonde girl in cafe” yesterday was “pudgy comb-over diner.” Walking past the recent visitors to our casting couch, I noticed the following:

1) A recent Tony nominee (who won rave reviews in her latest musical, which closed last month due to the recession)

2) A writer/director (and sometime actor) whose most recent film was critically acclaimed, but whose funding for his next feature fell through when his investors lost their jobs and their fortunes

3) A TV Pilot queen, who was clearly over-qualified for the part, but there were whispers about her needing money

4) A former West Wing cast member (also over-qualified, but see above)

Meanwhile, back in the production office, lists are being made of items cast/crew would like in the welcome baskets in their trailers for the first day of shooting. These items range from: “A case of Smartwater, to organic chips from Trader Joe’s, Cuban cigars, iPods (with access to download new songs every day), a nice case of a ‘vintage’ red wine, and daily fresh flowers (white only).”

There are people who see too much pain and suffering in the world, especially in times like these. But knowing that exists and yet, seeing others spend so much without batting an eye or taking a second to think about it, is almost as bad to witness. I can’t do anything about it, I can’t control it, and there isn’t anyone saying “NO.” So, the cycle continues, the egos inflate and the demands increase as the dow takes a dive. And, all I can do is look over at the waste treatment facility, conveniently located next door to my office, and laugh and cry, until the credits roll.

“Money is everywhere but so is poetry. What we lack are the poets.” - Federico Fellini

AVB

NY, New York

Portrait: Jacksonville, Florida

2009-02-13T10:22:00.000-08:00

We have always lived paycheck to paycheck, for the most part. We managed, just barely to buy a house, right before the housing market dropped, so, of course we overpaid. (We live in Florida) But, still, we, okay, he was smart enough to buy something we could afford, even if it was pretty far away from where we ideally wanted to live. Something he could afford, since technically we live on his income. And for awhile it was enough. Barely enough, but enough, it got us through month to month. I was working part time for extra spending cash in a bookstore, and doing childcare out of the house, and things were okay. Not great, but we have food, and an internet, and it could be much, much worse.

And then gas prices doubled. Which, if you work an hour away, is a huge deal, doubling an already high expense. And I got sick, and couldn't work anymore, because who wants to hire someone who's puking (and etc) all the time? And who will let me watch their kids all drugged up on pain medication?

But, he was fortunate enough to get a raise, and then we were back to living just barely on the edge. It made up for what I had lost.

Gas prices went back down, but the price of everything else has gone up, and up. Every month, the credit card bills go up and up. Groceries go up and up and up. (I suppose I could stop eating, since most of it goes to waste anyway)

And he is so stressed, because his job isn't all that secure, and if it fails, we will lose it all. It's all on his shoulders. I just feel so guilty and helpless. I can't DO anything about it. Except be a burden with my medical problems and my kid and our damn pesky need to eat and be clothed. I'd begged for a car that would fit all the kids, back when I was babysitting, and now we are stuck with car payments on an SUV I don't really need anymore, but can't sell or trade without losing more money.

We are incredibly fortunate to be hanging on, but, this being on the edge thing is rather frightening. I wish I could do something. Everywhere I look, other people are falling themselves. And all I can do is watch. And hope, selfishly, that we make it through okay. I keep thinking that if everyone can just hang on, a little longer, something will give and everything will be ok for us all.

Eryn

Florida

Portrait: St. Petersburg Florida

2009-02-13T10:17:00.000-08:00

Mine is a plain story, barely even a "story." I've had ups and downs financially, with other people and circumstances to thank for the ups. After finally paying off stupid credit card debt but maintaining a great credit score, I bought a house in Florida in Oct. 2007 for a ridiculously good price. Florida taxes and insurance, however, bulk up my monthly mortgage payment. I have a good job - celebrating five years this month at a business newspaper. But I can't help but be slightly afraid given the state of print news these days.

My husband and I, both in our 30s, got married in May 2008 and paid for almost the entire wedding ourselves, so it was a very low-key event. About a month before the wedding, a great-uncle died and left me a decent sum of money (he never had children). So that helped with the wedding costs and I'll admit I splurged a little more than intended.
Soon after, we got termites in the house, so that had to be remedied.

Then came new floors to get rid of dingy carpet. Finding ways to economically upgrade our home made us feel better.

My husband makes less money than I do but his job is also somewhat stable - who can say for sure their job is stable these days?

However his father owns a successful company out of state and sends us money once in a while - never requested. He even gave us a generous wedding gift which allowed us to take a honeymoon, something we weren't sure we could do.

I hate saying that I splurged this money away this year. We still have a good chunk in savings. But what do we do? Keep it in savings? Pay off one of the cars? What's the SMART choice in today's market?

Our most recent news is I'm pregnant with our first child, which is miraculous since I miscarried just this past December. So far so good with this one so fingers are crossed.

So now we have another room to remodel and we can do it, but I fear a little for the future. Should I spend the money to remodel the room, only to find out later I'm out of a job and struggling to pay the mortgage because I paid off a car to have less debt? Such questions abound.

Thanks for letting me share. Like I said, I have no doom and gloom. I've always been a middle-class person and enjoyed that spot in the world. I guess these are middle-class problems, too.

Pam
St. Petersburg, Florida

Three Portraits: Los Angeles, California

2009-02-12T22:57:00.001-08:00

"Where is he, now?" Hal called from the kitchen.

"He's merging onto the 10, it looks like."

The slow-speed car chase had been on for hours and we could not look away. Neither could many Angelenos, our eyes glued to our respective television sets. Rumors spread quickly that the man in the driver's seat was a celebrity. A rapper, perhaps. In town for The Grammies. I even went so far as to follow White Bentley on twitter. We watched, Hal and I, shaking our heads.

"Why don't they just put the spikes down on the freeway, already?"

"I know. I'm getting bored! Something happen, already, geez."

"Why is he driving so slowly?"

"Why is he heading back home to North Hollywood where the chase first began?"

"Why is he using his turn signal to change lanes when he's the only car on the road?"

"He's using his blinker?"

"Yeah."

A man running, afraid to stop. A man who used his turn-signal to change lanes on an empty highway while running from dozens of LAPD and Highway Patrol. A man at the end of his rope, squinting from spotlight of helicopters and news crews, his very demise a sort of demented entertainment for me and thousands more. We watched until midnight when the news story ended to make room for diet pill infomercials and went to sleep curious as to his fate. How did it end? How does it usually end? Why must it always end?

The next day we found out he had died, turned the gun on himself during the four hour standoff, alone in the $120,000 car he could no longer afford.

He wasn't a celebrity at all but a man who owned a business that failed. A man who lost everything financially and couldn't emotionally deal, a George Bailey without the Clarence.

........

Hal and I have not been financially affected by the economic downturn. The thing about having nothing is that you can't lose anything. We don't own a home or have investments. We don't drive fancy cars or go out for meals. We don't have to cut corners because we've never had corners to cut. We rent a two-bedroom duplex in a neighborhood surrounded by mansions and victims of Madoff. We're safe because we've always lived precariously.

Hal is a freelance writer/producer for reality television. The production he's currently working on ends Friday and he will be out of work once again as he usually is after a show ends. We have lived for the past four years on work ephemeral, our income(s) mostly unstable and jobs temporary so for us the uncertainty of work is nothing new. And for that I feel lucky. Prepared. Just as, in a way, I feel relieved to be investment-free, and yes, even broke.

......

I watched an elderly man ask for a job application at Trader Joes, yesterday. He had to be in his 70's. Maybe older. It was disconcerting, watching him negotiate with the store assistant manager. He had lost everything, he explained, and was eager to work.

"I haven't worked in a few years and you probably can't tell by looking at me but I'm a strong man. I have big arms," he said, flexing his biceps. "Plus, I like Trader Joes. Sometimes I shop here."

"I'll see what I can do," the assistant manager responded, clearly affected by the man who walked with a slight limp out the glass doors and toward the bus stop on the corner of 3rd Street and La Brea.

Rebecca Woolf
Los Angeles, California