How to live on $432 a month in America

This is addressed directly in the article:

>And for those who might be quick to point out that there could be a dearth of jobs there, note that when people say “there are no jobs” in a given area, they generally mean that there are no jobs that could produce a normal, upper-middle-class lifestyle there. Which, even in Massena and Ogdensburg isn’t entirely true. But even if it were, the Stewart’s gas stations in both towns are actively hiring part-time cashiers at $17/hr. These places will let you work just one day a week if you like, and seem to be pretty good about flexible hours. In this case, you could work just one ten-hour shift per week, and in so doing, earn more than 30% of what you need to live well at this particular house with just four days of work per month.

And when those gas station jobs fill up but there's still empty houses around?

I love the stupid math in this paragraph. One 10hr shift is ~30% of what you need. So multiply that by 3.3 and... oh hey you're working nearly 40hrs a week to afford your impoverished lifestyle in the middle of nowhere. Just like everyone else in this country, only now you get to own a shed. Also you have to take the bus, which runs from 5am-6pm, so you need to beg your boss to not be an opener or closer. Your coworkers will love you for that.

> One 10hr shift is ~30% of what you need. So multiply that by 3.3 and... oh hey you're working nearly 40hrs a week to afford your impoverished lifestyle in the middle of nowhere.

Are you possibly confusing "per week" with "per month"?

Well yes, it's not a brilliant observation that in the US you are given the option to work at around $15-30k a year ($17/hr part time is going to wind up around there) and use that money to fund an impoverished lifestyle.

"Why aren't more kids embracing a life of poverty? How dare they ask for anything better in a country that produces more wealth than any other?"

One 10 hour shift is ~30% of what you need per month

40 hours per month is much less than 40 hours per week

Have you not read the article? The whole point of it is once you get your costs down to this manageable a number, you have a lot more options for "how you're going to support yourself." You could clear $5,000-10,000 a year, which I should remind you would be tax free money simply due to the standard deduction, doing any number of things either local or remote. Ideas I'm just making up:

1. Buy, repair, and flip MacBooks on eBay 2. Do stuff on Fiverr 3. Mow lawns 4. Clean gutters 5. Set up a little stand and sell baked goods or tamales 6. Make YouTube videos or shorts about (insert your nerdy interest) 7. 3D print something and sell it on Etsy

All these things are things I'm sure I could do personally, but don't have time to do because I have to work 40 hours a week to earn enough money to pay for my mortgage in the expensive place I live. But all that goes away when the only thing you need to shoot for is to clear maybe $800 on a good month.

And also, if you have modest savings for a city person you could do with far less earnings, as interest on $200,000 = $10,000.

"impoverished lifestyle"

"live of poverty"

You're really doing a great job exemplifying the attitude which guarantees misery.

The whole point is that living a simple life in the country, with minimal amount of time spent working (thus maximum free time) is arguably a much richer and more fulfilling life than, say, a life where you and your spouse each earn $200,000 working 40-50 hours a week at a Very Important Job that you drive to in your Range Rover and BMW, and getting to spend 1 hour most nights with your family before falling exhausted into bed in a house that cost $2 million, just to wake up and do it again tomorrow.

> 3. Mow lawns 4. Clean gutters 5. Set up a little stand and sell baked goods or tamales

Those might pay well in the city, but nobody making $17/hr is going to pay more than $10/hr for lawn mowing.

>1. Buy, repair, and flip MacBooks on eBay

No internet at the house in this scenario, so that's a lot of trips to the library.

>2. Do stuff on Fiverr

See above.

>3. Mow lawns 4. Clean gutters

These are both viable in the summer, provided there is some "landed elite" in the area that makes more than the $17/hr the gas stations pay. I guess you could shovel snow in the winter.

>5. Set up a little stand and sell baked goods or tamales

Doing that legally requires licenses and registration, but good idea. Do the people of upstate New York enjoy tamales?

>6. Make YouTube videos or shorts about (insert your nerdy interest)

The first point again.

>7. 3D print something and sell it on Etsy

The first point again.

My smartphone plan is $45 (happens to be same company as article suggests, US Mobile) and supports 50GB of tethering which is plenty. This doesn't appreciably change the cost of living but yes, obviously you'd have that as an expense. Who cares? Yes, it would enable like half those work ideas. You could afford it. What's the problem.

> licenses and stuff

What? No, nobody selling tamales outside in the country (or probably the city either) has a formal license to do so. Nobody cares unless they're trying to get you shut down because you're being a jerk (say, selling them right outside their restaurant). Also, what if I told you, you could pick whatever kind of food the people in the area do like, and teach yourself to make it?

That's fine, you don't need them to pay more than $10/hr. You only even need to earn say, $800 a month (I'm assuming you'd want a pickup truck to transport your mower and get around, so padding the $432 a bit) so if you worked 5 hours a week at the gas station for $340 then you need about 11 hours of $10 work per week for another $440 and you're done. If you have any savings, the current interest on $100,000 would alternatively give you $416 so you could just not work at all.

Honestly, this is the weirdest way the author could've written that sentence.

He should've said either "one 10 hour shift per month will make 30% of what you need to live here" or even "one 10 hour shift per week will make more than what you need to live here."

I think you've arguably left out some interesting options in the middle.

"Just break the law, it'll be fine"

Great financial advice happening on the orangesite.

Really good stuff.

YES! this is the question.

How are we the homes of the largest economies in the world, cities known not just by name but by brand, around the world and: - day care worker can't make enough to move beyond improverished and day care is expensive - teacher can't make enough to move beyond lower middle class and school (even public once you add in all the trips, certs, childcare for non-school days) don't make enough - your burger is $15! but the person making it apparently should live in a wifi-less shed.

Not very long ago at all, this economy was about finding opportunity. Now it seems to be about aiming to reintroduce feudalism.

It doesn't seem to be caused by his lifestyle as the posters above also cant divide by $7 per hour. Its 62 hours or 11 shifts.

I think hé means one should do all kinds of small projects.

The problem with these lifestyles is that when you have it all finely tuned to live on $400/mo you have no capacity to absorb a $400 water heater expense.

Ironically, I think this is a "blind squirrel finds a nut" situation.

When you're at the absolute bottom, you're not gonna make ends meet by playing by the rule and the enforcers generally leave you alone because you can't get blood from a stone. So for the people living on $400/mo running an unlicensed tamale stand or parting out cars or breeding pitbulls or whatever isn't as risky as it would be for someone making real money.

But yeah, the advice here is generally out of touch.

$17/hr is the rate

432/17 is 25 hours, or otherwise stated one 8 hour shift every week or two.

Right, which is why it's extremely confusing that the author wrote:

> In this case, you could work just one ten-hour shift per week, and in so doing, earn more than 30% of what you need to live well at this particular house with just four days of work per month.

What he probably did was write that one shift is more than 30% of what you need, then switched gears to write about four days of work per month, but forgot to remove the 30% number.

I read that sentence three times. Pretty sure he was trying to hide the ball, but still not sure where he was hiding it or what exactly the ball was, to be honest.

That makes it even more funny. No wonder we cant find a cheap place to live.

$17 x 26 h = €442

One 10 h shift per week is to much apparently.

One wonders why anyone ever left the country to move to the city then. Maybe not everyone wants to live a simple life in the country. Maybe that's considering boring and socially isolating. Maybe some people want more kinds of experiences and even things. Maybe they want a kind of community that's a lot harder to find in the country, or is even discriminated against.

In my experience law enforcement in rural areas generally are squeezing stones for blood, you think the local cops or judge are going to be living on $20,000 a year? No. And where do they get the money? By extorting poor people that live in the area. Oh you literally can't afford their fines? Well then you can spend the next month or two in jail, now having a criminal record, likely losing your job, and when you are released owe the courts and jail a few thousand dollars on top of all that for the mandatory minimum court and jail fees which will cost just as much as the previous fine you couldn't pay and got sent to jail for.

Sure you might get lucky if you keep your head low, but maybe you won't get lucky and you lose the gamble and are put in a WAY worse situation.

I mean we're talking about someone who thinks living on $432 a month with absolutely no government assistance and including housing is a reasonable claim to make. (In the comments, he reveals he goes to Mexico for medical care... I'm really curious how one travels round-trip to Mexico from New York on a $432 a month budget.)