You know I’ve been running through the various scenarios in my head for awhile now. “What if I lose my job? What if my wife loses her job? What if we both lose our jobs?” By doing this, it has given me some sense of security in knowing that I should be prepared for just about anything. I still think we are in for a prolonged period of ugliness in the economy, but I think that no matter what happens, we’ll be just fine.
It’s times like these that you are forced in to an evaluation of what’s really important. I know that in our family, the most important things are health, happiness and the basics like food, shelter etc. From an economic standpoint, that’s a pretty cheap existence. While I like fancy electronics, nice cars and the rest of the consumer goods that are out there, they are by no means a necessity in life. Hell, most of the world gets by just fine without all that stuff.
So, we move on. We are continuing to add to our savings and have drastically reduced our excess spending, (although we are still spending way too much on food). My company is just starting to announce layoffs and we expect at least a 10% reduction in labor. I think I’m pretty safe for now. My wife also appears to be pretty safe for the moment. Now we just need to continue to practice good fiscal discipline and wait to see how things shake out.
While we had the initial fear of “Oh my gosh, what would we do?”, that has pretty much subsided. Now we just need to work on being prepared for whatever situation we find ourselves in and live each day to the fullest.
Have you changed your practices much since the economy took it’s “dip”?
We’ve been living frugally and building up savings for quite a while. I think we’ll be ok. We do own our own business so we’re a little worried about how things will shape up with that next year. We have developed multiple income streams so if one dries up we have more coming in.
I have been paying extra on my mortgage, I may cut back on that and throw the extra $600 a month in my emergency account, then when things start looking up I’ll send it all in.
I would have to say I am looking at things here and there and classifying them as immediate change or last minute change. But I’m doing what I can along with trying to persuade a spendthrift to cut back.
Everyone is worried at the minute about the future. We can hope that things will not touch us, but we need to be realistic. Job cuts are everywhere, houses are repossessed and the media is constantly creating a gloomy outlook. Everyone, especially families with children have to do everything in their power to protect themselves. There are unemployment covers, which are not much, but will help to keep your head under the roof, as it will pay your mortgage in the event of you losing your job.