The document discusses the difficulties of living on a minimum wage income and the high cost of living. It notes that budgeting $500 for monthly necessities is barely possible, leaving no room for fun activities or extras. Minimum wage jobs often do not provide enough income to cover rent and expenses. College is too expensive for many, and student loans result in debt that takes years to repay. Even with a degree, finding well-paying employment is challenging. Additionally, taxes take a significant portion of income, reducing motivation. Starting saving early helps lessen the effects of bills and expenses later in life.

1. Final Reflection
When asked to budget out a month’s worth of necessities with $500 I was pretty surprised. I
know how much we end up spending on this kind of stuff in my own house and I thought it
would be pretty much impossible. It turns out it is possible, I would just not be able to do very
many fun activities or buy anything extra. Everything budgeted out just fine, but just barely.
This opened my eyes to the situations of many in our country and around the world. The cost of
living is so high these days, and people are just getting by on minimum wage jobs. Today I
calculated that if I was living alone working a minimum wage job I would be bringing in about
$1400 a month. In a lot of cases, this isn’t even enough to pay rent never mind all of my
monthly expenses. There are lots of people who have to work so hard for jobs that don’t pay
enough for them to live comfortably. And on top of just living, there are also other things to
worry about, like saving money and paying off debts.
Now you could say that to fix this all you need to do is get a better job, but going to college or
university to get a better job costs way too much for a person who can barely afford the cost of
living. That is of course, they take out a huge student loan that they will have to pay off for the
next who-knows-how-many years. Even if they did take out the loan though, getting a job even
after you have earned a degree is almost as hard as earning the degree itself. Lots of companies
want experience but none of them will offer to help people gain experience, some fields are
extremely competitive leading to unemployment, or you could work in a field that is based off
of your consumers and one day it could suddenly crash and leave you jobless.
On top of our wages which are not high to match the prices of everyday life in the first place,
they are also taxed. I know that taxes are important, they pay for a lot of necessary things in
our lives. But what I don’t understand is why the price of taxes is so high. Taxes can turn an
annual salary of $80,000 into around only $60,000. When you are working for $80,000 and are
only receiving ¾ of what you are working for, it can really kill your motivation. I don’t know
much about the economy or taxes, I am only 15, but what I do know is that taxes are much
higher than they probably have to be. If you listen into stereotypical adult talk it centers around
the jab market, the housing market, the economy in general, and taxes. In an ideal world, there
would be no taxes, but since the government does need the money to put towards our
necessities we do need some taxes. Even if the amount of taxes cannot be lowered though, we
can try to put the money towards things that the people want. Since the money is coming from
the people in the first place, I feel like it would be the most productive to put it towards things
that those people would like it put towards. Of course wit the exception of absolute necessities,
even if the people don’t necessarily agree with them.
There are tons of factors to play in when you start thinking about your future, in order to try to
lessen the effects these factors are going to have on you it is important to start saving while you
are still young. This way, you don’t have to worry about taxes, bills, rent, and the other
necessary prices that come with living in your own house. This is why banking is so important. It

2. is very important to start young in order to get into the habit of saving. Even just putting a
couple dollars in your account every here and there eventually adds up. Especially if you have a
high interest account. That way even if you have a little bit of money in your account, it will
keep on growing over time. Once you get older you can start putting larger sums of money into
your account, only spending what you need to spend. Just because you have money doesn’t
mean that you should spend it all. You could buy a cheaper alternative to an item you want in
order to put away some of the money you have and save it for something more important you
will have to buy in the future.