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Stop Wasting Money On Your Commute

By Frugaling 3 Comments

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Traffic Jam Commute

We all want to maximize our take-home-pay, but with the constant increase in fuel prices, getting to work is costing a fortune. Thankfully, there are some easy, fun, and fast ways to reduce your commuting costs. Here are 7 ways that will put more money in your pocket:

1. Carpool Partner(s)

Find someone who lives near you and set up a deal to take turns driving to work. My co-worker lives 40 miles from work and has been fortunate enough to find someone to commute with.

Pros:

  • You’ll get to know a fellow employee better
  • You save on gas
  • You have a little flexibility since you are working with someone you know
  • Accountability, as you are more likely to be on time or early with someone else counting on you

Cons:

  • You don’t have your own transportation during the day
  • If you or your co-worker needs to stay late, someone has to wait
  • If you have an emergency and need to leave early, you may need to pay for expensive transportation

2. Third-Party Carpool Service

If you can’t find someone on your own, perhaps your area offers a carpool matching service. St. Louis and surrounding areas can take advantage of the RideFinders program. This program is free to use and funded by the Department of Transportation as a clean air initiative. RideFinders matches people with similar commutes.

Pros:

  • Potentially large commuter base
  • Someone else does the matchmaking for you

Cons:

  • You don’t have your own transportation during the day
  • Little to no flexibility as the arrangement is more formal

3. Vanpool Services

If there are enough commuters, you may way to consider the vanpool option. Vanpools are most economical for groups of 7-12 commuters that commute over 30 miles to work. One person volunteers to be the primary driver/coordinator for the vanpool. In exchange for all the coordination, the driver gets to use the van for personal transportation on nights and weekends!

Pros:

  • Driver can use the van for personal trips
  • You don’t have to use your personal vehicle
  • Meet new people (7-12 in typical vanpool)
  • RideFinders offers a Guaranteed Ride Home if you have an emergency or need to stay late
  • Commuters eligible for tax deduction though IRS Commuter Choice fringe benefit plan

Cons:

  • Driver has added responsibility of coordination (possibly time consuming)
  • Limited eligibility (most programs require certain number of people and distance)
  • Little flexibility in emergencies
  • Price split between commuters can cause price to fluctuate (30-day notice is requested before leaving)

4. Public Transportation

If you live in a city with a decent public transportation system, the bus/rail/subway could save money on your commute to/from work. Some employers will even pay for a monthly bus pass. A few years ago, I had a position in downtown St. Louis where parking was non-existent. The building was right across from a Metro Rail station, and taking the train to work made perfect sense.

Pros:

  • Save on gas and vehicle wear/tear
  • You’ll have to do a little walking, which is good for your health
  • Typically, public transportation runs frequently during work hours
  • Employers may provide public transportation subsidies; subsidizing or eliminating the cost

Cons:

  • Little privacy
  • Public transportation can be crowded and noisy
  • Not available in all areas

5. Bicycle

Perhaps you only live a few miles from your job…consider biking to work! You will shed some weight and keep more cash in your wallet. Personally, I live too far from my job for this option, but our Metro System has an accompanying bike trail. Many commuters bike to the nearest metro station, take the rail, and ride into work. If I didn’t have to pick up my son from day care, I would explore that option from time to time!

Many employers encourage health and wellness, and may provide lockers and shower facilities. Some people are invigorated by morning exercise. If you are one of those people, this may be a great option.

Pros:

  • No gas expense or wear/tear on your vehicle
  • You’re getting exercise

Cons:

  • You need to invest in a quality bike and safety gear (not really a bad thing…but an expense)
  • Limited by distance and environment (make sure your commute is safe!)
  • You need physical stamina
  • Forced to travel light
  • Dependent on weather
  • Need a backup plan in case you’re too tired to pedal home, emergencies, or inclement weather

6. Compressed/Alternative Work Schedule

The compressed work schedule is a wonderful thing! I currently take advantage of this and absolutely love it. Basically, in an 80-hour workweek, I get every other Friday off by working 9 hours (instead of the typical 8) Monday – Thursday, then Fridays I alternate between short days (8 hours) and being off. Count it – it’s still 80 hours.

Alternative work schedules (sometimes called flex) allow for variation from the employees core hours without altering the total number of hours worked in a pay period. A common alternative work schedule is 4 10-hour days. This means employees would have 1 weekday off every week. Most choose Friday or Monday to have a 3-day weekend. Another common day is Wednesday, because you are only working a max of 2 days in a row.

Entire states have implemented 4-day work weeks in the past (California and Utah come to mind), but this is a benefit many employers will offer if you ask.

Pros:

  • Break up the monotony of a 5-day work week
  • Employers benefit from extended work hour coverage
  • Quality of life benefit that makes employers competitive for best employees
  • 1 day a week you don’t have to drive to work
  • Potential flexibility

Cons:

  • You’re working longer hours when you are at work
  • Not available unless your employer approves

7. Telework

The last technique on the list is to save money by not commuting at all. If you are able to telework full or part-time, you can save money at the gas pump. Telework is basically working from home. Organizations are split on if teleworking employees are productive. If you take advantage of this option, be sure to show results! Also, full-time teleworkers often complain of being overlooked by their company.

Networking goes a long way and that is hard to do if you’re not in the office. Employees may have the option to use a hybrid approach, and telework once a week or pay period. I’m not eligible for a regular teleworking schedule because of the nature of my work; however, I can telework sporadically with supervisor approval. Usually if there is reporting or paperwork that I know will keep me in front of my desk all day, I request teleworking on that day. I haven’t been turned down yet!

Pros:

  • Immediate savings on cost of driving to work
  • Potential savings on clothes (dress in what you’d like!)
  • Save time for yourself and your company, as you can begin working faster

Cons:

  • Not available to all employees
  • Not suitable to all industries
  • Requires discipline
  • Full-time telework employees are often overlooked/report feeling detached

What about you?

There is not a one size fits all method for saving on the commute to work. You have to factor in what is available and your personal preference. I use the compressed work schedule with an occasional telework day (averaging once per quarter).

  • Do you employ any of the methods listed above to save money on your work commute?
  • Are there additional methods that you can employ?
  • If so, what are they?

MomCents is a 30-something Christian, wife, and mother of a 2-year-old son who is jumping back into the wonderful world of blogging with her attempt to create a personal finance/mom blog. If you’re looking for expert advice, she advises you to stay away! But, if you want to follow the ups, downs, twists, and turns of a real person who will make mistakes along the way…stop on by. Hopefully you’ll find a laugh, encouragement, or both! Find MomCents on Twitter and Facebook.

Filed Under: Save Money Tagged With: bike, car, Commute, Job, public, Ride, transportation, Van, Work

Living In A Van To Becoming A Pornstar: Crazy Ways Students Pay Tuition

By Frugaling 13 Comments

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Photo: MIT is a land-grant university.
Photo: An iconic building in the heart of MIT

Part of the fortunate few

That first day of college is burned into my memory. Mom dropped me off, and I can still feel that vague discomfort in realizing I was independent. Perhaps more accurately, I felt alone. Instead of seeing my brother every day, it was my new college roommate — a heavy metal aficionado. Despite his taste for incomprehensible music, we actually got along (I think).

Both of us had the privilege of parents who saved and paid for our college educations. My undergraduate years were financed through various investments in stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Another way many parents save is through 529 College Savings Plans, which provide tax benefits for a child’s college education. Unfortunately, future college students don’t always have it this easy.

Suffering from rising tuition, fees, and state tax cuts

Americans are in trouble. There’s a confluence of events that’s acting as a perfect storm for adolescents: people save less than ever, tuition costs are on the rise, and state tax revenues for public education are severely constrained.

About 75% of households only have enough in savings to pay their bills for 6 months. A Huffington Post reporter interviewed one person who said,

A single mother of four living in Bangalore, Maine, Norton says she often writes checks for bills without enough money in her bank account to pay them, hoping the check won’t clear until her next paycheck arrives. Between rent, child care and other necessities, Norton says her expenses cost more than she earns, leaving her without a cushion to fall back on in case of emergencies.

Tuition fees are increasing at far greater rates than inflation. Effectively, this is stunting parents’ and future college students’ purchasing power, and leading to nauseating levels of student loan debt. The New York Times found that,

At public four-year colleges, the inflation-adjusted average annual increase has been somewhat higher, thanks mostly to state budget cuts: 2.3 percent (which translates into almost 5 percent a year in nominal terms). At public two-year colleges, also known as community colleges, costs have fallen relative to inflation, at an annual rate of 0.3 percent over the last 20 years.

A caution: these increased tuition rates do not account for greater student loan debt and the possibility of being charged upward of 6.8% active interest to be paid off after graduation. If you account for this, real tuition costs are skyrocketing. This is the burden of students, parents, and our greater society.

cost of attendance
The estimated total cost of attendance at Duke University.

The tuition is too high

At a private institution such as Duke University, you’ll be staring at a whopping bill for about $61,404 a year. Just for some perspective, the World Bank suggests that the average per capita income in the United States is $51,749. For four years at Duke, you’ll be staring at about five years of income — in debt.

Maybe you’re wondering why I chose one of the most expensive schools in the country as an example. My simple answer is twofold: 1) Duke University is highly prestigious and well-regarded by both employers and future students; 2) Two of the craziest stories come from this institution.

You won’t believe what college students are doing to make ends meet. For some, desperate times call for desperate measures. The following are 3 real-life examples of students saving and paying for atmospheric tuition costs.

Ken Ilgunas
Photo courtesy: Ken Ilgunas, writer of Walden on Wheels

Ken Ilgunas: Walden on Wheels

Ken Ilgunas had finished paying off undergrad loans when he decided to return to Duke for a graduate degree. Before starting the program, he was determined to avoid more students. In his New York Times article, Ken says,

I HAD been accepted into Duke’s graduate liberal studies program, but I couldn’t afford it. I had just paid off my $32,000 undergraduate debt, I was nearly broke, and the prospect of taking out loans was unthinkable. Going back into debt made about as much sense as running out of a burning building just to run into another.

His solution was to buy an older Ford Econoline van for $1,500 and live out of it for the duration of his schooling. Using the library for Internet, rec center for showers, and a camping stove to cook food, Ken successfully went to graduate school without accepting defeat and taking out loans.

Ken utilized his writing skills to pen a beautiful book called, Walden on Wheels. The book focuses on minimalism, living debt free, and his journey at Duke. With national attention, a New York Times article, over 300 (mostly) positive reviews for his book, and even a visit to Letterman, Mr. Ilgunas is an inspiration for vandwellers worldwide. More importantly, he did something truly extreme to avoid student loans and pay for his tuition. It worked.

Belle Knox: Full-time student, part-time pornstar

Belle Knox (her chosen pornstar name) is an 18-year-old student at Duke University, who is studying women’s studies and eventually wants to go to law school. Many of her peers pick up side jobs to pay for some odds and ends amidst piling student loans. Belle decided to take up a different line of work and searched Google for, “How to become a pornstar.”

She’s headline news everywhere. Rolling Stone calls her the “top new adult-film” actress and a “studious college freshman.” Dr. Drew featured her on his show and said he’d be, “chompin’ down on cyanide capsule right now [if I was your father].”

When Belle talks about her pornography experiences she says,

I can say definitively that I have never felt more empowered or happy doing anything else. In a world where women are so often robbed of their choice, I am completely in control of my sexuality.

From there, Belle found a talent agency and started flying across the country — mostly LA — to film scenes on the holidays and school breaks. Each scene filmed equates to about $1,000. After about 61 scenes a year, she can completely pay for her exorbitant tuition demands. She’ll avoid the fearful debt this way.

Steve Stanzak: Finding affordable housing in the library

When you’re staring at around $55-60,000 a year in total costs, you’re bound to get creative. When Steve Stanzak of New York University struggled to find affordable housing in New York City (imagine that!), he decided to go rogue and live in the library basement for 8 months.

USAToday interviewed him and they found that,

…He began spending six hours a night in the sub-basement of Bobst Library at the beginning of the academic year after he was unable to pay a $1,000 housing deposit.

He slept on four library chairs and carried vital belongings — a laptop computer, books, clothes — in his backpack. He kept other items, like toiletries and clothing, in storage lockers.

Here’s the crazy part: they caught him because he used an online journal to catalogue his journey. Imagine if they never caught him?! How long could he have managed — putting four chairs together in the place of a bed?

In a strange twist of fate, Steve was rewarded for his library dwelling when NYU offered him a free dorm room. Success!

What’s reasonable when tuition costs are unbearable?

When I searched Google for “ways to pay for college,” I got some fishy results (i.e., Forbes, Fiscal Times, and Huffington Post). Frankly, none of the articles actually help people pay for college. Most just regurgitate old information about getting financial aid (aka, student loans). The worst is the Huffington Post article, which suggests paying for college with “cash” (they must be getting creative to rank higher in searches). I would imagine most people understand that cash is a monetary tool for paying bills. Not sure who’s benefitting from that horrible advice!

I remember feeling hopeless to do anything about my student loans prior to starting Frugaling. The debt piled higher and higher — without escape or end. When I finally faced this reality, I suddenly saw a way out.

It’s easy to get desperate when you see interest-bearing accounts metastasize with ever-daunting sums. Ken Ilgunas, Belle Knox, and Steve Stanzak are three people that used this extreme fear of student loans to prevent them from falling prey to them. Question their legality, morality, and safety as much as you want, the three of them found a way to make their educational dreams a reality.

Significant student loan debt is a scary place, and it seems like these three reacted in powerful ways to stem their deficits. But it makes me wonder, is it even worth it at some point? When is a graduate degree, while in a Ford van worth it? When is it worth becoming a sex worker (aka, pornstar)?

Their stories are hard to hear though. These are the most motivated, enterprising, and smart people in our country and they’re struggling to get a top-notch education. It makes me wonder if we are making it too difficult for people to attain this level of education – preventing new leaders from finding success in our society.

This is just the start, too. As tax revenues continue to fall for public education and social inequality rises, stories like this will only increase. The United States seems to be leaving our future generation in the dust. You can’t pay for a college education with a couple simple part-time jobs over the summer. Those days are long gone.

How can you lead when you’re swimming in debt and held back from the freedom to become more than just a number to a lender?

Filed Under: Loans, Make Money, Minimalism Tagged With: Belle Knox, Duke University, education, Fees, Ken Ilgunas, Library, Living in a van, New York Times, private, public, Steve Stanzak, taxes, Tuition

5 Ways Public Universities Are Swindling Students And Turning Into Private Businesses

By Frugaling 9 Comments

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Public University of Iowa Institution Taxpayer Funded
Sunset over the University of Iowa campus.

From public to private: The budgetary gap in American education

Public universities are generally funded by taxpayer dollars and the federal government. Contributions ultimately lessen the cost education for an individual, and help make a college education attainable for a greater whole. Tax revenues at the state and federal levels fell in recent years, and the share of tuition owed by students significantly increased — all while student loan interest rates skyrocketed.

This recipe has decimated our youth. We afford children the right to a free, public education from kindergarten to 12th grade, but when they graduate high school, the benefits evaporate. The voting public and politicians have argued that college is no longer a right; rather, an earned privilege to a select few (who can afford it).

Public institutions were supposed to be accessible and affordable to the people in state. Heck, there are land-grant institutions that were given vast acreages to educate future educations. Unfortunately, hawkish debt reduction tactics, private-interest groups, and misinformation campaigns created a climate that hated taxes — the consequence was the disintegration of our public universities.

A subtle shift happened over the last few decades, and it’s led to a massive, business-like privatization and profit-motivated aire amidst public universities. Suddenly, administrators are aiming at your wallet, rather than their intended goal: educating the finest group of students for many generations to come. The painful revenue gaps have led to a rise in tricky tactics.

5 business tactics that public universities use to supplement revenue gaps

1. International and out-of-state students are preferred

State schools accept more out-of-state and international students for full-price tuition and limited scholarship availability. This move effectively subsidizes the education of in-state students. Although, by accepting more students outside the state, fewer in-state students are accepted.

If you’re on the cusp of going to an out-of-state school, think about the price differential. Is it really worth the added tuition burden?

2. Degrees are created that offer no career paths

For instance, my alma mater had an oft-ridiculed bachelor’s degree entitled, “Liberal Arts.” This degree is useful as a temporary placeholder for students, while they make final degree decisions, but should not be a formal track. Graduate with a degree in Liberal Arts and you might as well use it for toilet paper.

Similarly, watch out for degrees in “General Studies.” Degrees like this simply milk monies from students and send them on their way without a lifeline. Avoid these at all costs!

3. Watch out for excessive, new construction projects

While these new architectural sights provide a heightened level of excitement to prospective students, they are only afforded through higher student fees and redirected public funds. Brilliantly upholstered and designed residence halls may attract new students, but everything has a price; last time I checked, enrollment and interest in college isn’t the problem, anyway.

If you don’t want to come to a university because hotel-like residence halls are absent, you are likely going to college for the wrong reasons. Much like the cliche regarding books, don’t judge a university by its buildings.

4. Massive interest in distance education programs

At a fraction of the cost to educating students on-campus, many public institutions have a growing body of administrators pushing for online education offerings. Stigma-be-damned, plenty of people are taking up the offer to be educated online. These institutions are frequently charging handsomely for the privilege of being educated online, and offer students little support when compared to their on-campus peers.

Steer clear of most online master’s degrees that purport to give you credentials — all while you are pantsless in a bathrobe at home. While you may be able to say, “Your Name, M.S.,” you’ll be missing out on various networking opportunities and paying some of the most expensive tuition rates available. Most online programs offer little funding, and public universities use these programs to further subsidize in-state students’ educations.

5. Financial aid offices don’t warn you about student loans

This is the scary one for me. It’s quite personal and disheartening that when I requested to get student loans, nobody ever explained to me how they worked. When I met to approve the federal aid a few years ago, I never had a human sit down with me and create a budget, set expectations, and explain how interest would quickly add up. While it’s my fault for not being more critical, I didn’t know what I didn’t know — the questions were not yet clear.

Pay attention to financial aid officers at universities. They usually have no interest in curtailing or slowing your interest in finishing a degree. There goal is to get you federal or private funding and keep you coming back to school — period. If you’re looking for student loan advice, start researching the perils and pitfalls before signing on the dotted line.

Filed Under: Social Justice Tagged With: bachelors, Budget, college, cuts, distance education, education, funding, masters degree, private, public, Student Loans, taxes, taxpayer, university

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