<p>And I work ridiculously hard … on Saturdays, Sundays, and evenings, too. I am unable to take time to take my son to his overdue dental appointment. I make less than $40k. I am not going to complain, though, because I know people who work just as hard - if not harder - at jobs that are less personally & financially satisfying. The key is realizing that we are fortunate & acknowledging that fact (which I have always sensed you do, cpt).</p>
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<p>I don’t think people should apologize either, but I also feel like you should consider yourself fortunate. There are plenty of people who work just as hard as you that are not as fortunate.</p>
<p>I feel fortunate when everyone is relatively healthy and there is no true crisis at home. Doesn’t mean I don’t complain though! I thoroughly understand how frustrating, stressful and exhausting it is to deal with the everyday stuff even as I have seen what real trouble is.</p>
<p>Thanks for the support, Kelsmom. Working in the financial aid office, I’m sure you hear and read the complaints even as you see the whole picture. Your heart must ache as you know that certain packages are so inadequate for families that truly are in need, but the funds are just not there to give them the generous package you want them to have. Then you have the ungrateful wenches (yes, like me) whose EFC puts them on the high end of things, but they are angling to get more money. And sometimes we get it, as the school has its needs and it is worth that extra for that particular student.</p>
<p>At the same time, it is always worth while at any income level to make sure you are getting the best financial “deal”. I see the issues right there.</p>
<p>And I feel badly letting go the guy who has been doing my yard for the last several years. I know business is tough for these folks too. Again, it’s a luxury to be able to feel that way, and I realize it. I can tell you that it’s a heck of a lot easier just to pay for the stuff, charge it, borrow it, figure it out later than trying to work it out responsibly.</p>
<p>^ And I am happy for you that all of those things are true :). I feel that everyone should feel fortunate for what they have though and that statement really bothered me on a personal level.</p>
<p>Why do these discussions always remind me of the Affirmative Actin ones? It’s amazing to me that people in this thread are saying “we” and “they” as if there are split Camps. I used to think a seperate forum, like the Affirmative Action one, was needed, so people could mention their good fortune without being attacked, but I also think it world be nice if “we” could learn from each other.</p>
<p>Having said that, I feel fairly confident that most of “us” making “good” salaries have been much worse off at some point. I know I was. I DO remember. With all due respect, it seems to me that I have learned most things on CC, from those who have experienced things that I have not. No one I knew even dreamed of sending their kids to private colleges, if they dreamed of college at all. When my husband, 10 or more year age, mentioned we should plan on financing or kids college, I thought he was crazy. I was checking on some of his “crazy ideas” (like taking on SAT class!!!) when I found CC!</p>
<p>What’s interesting is if one is perceived to be doing well financially, one is open game to all kinds of snide remarks on this forum. It is almost a sin to be making money. But on the other hand, it would be frowned upon to question why someone hasn’t worked as hard, saved or planned for one’s children. There is one poster on CC said America has shattered her daughter’s dream of going to a top tier school? If that isn’t entitlement, I don’t know what is.</p>
<p>Why should people doing well be required to think of themselves as fortunate or anything else? I think most consider themselves smart and hard working, but heck, there’s no obligation to consider themselves lucky or fortunate. </p>
<p>Education is mobility and many wealthy people I know do their part to make that happen for others. Financial aid largely comes from alumni donors at private colleges.</p>
<p>In this Country many people have gone from low income to very high income in one generation. Most I know who have done this set out to do so. They chose a major and graduate education and careers that could make them wealthy. They work longer, smarter and harder than most. They sacrifice leisure time and many other things. Choices.</p>
<p>Yet many resent these people, think they just got lucky or did something underhanded to get where they are. And that’s the vibe I get from reading threads like these. How dare those people making $450K even think about asking how they might reduce their college bill!</p>
<p>Yes, its fortunate that there are lazy rich people to blame for the ills of the world.</p>
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I don’t know why people who make a lot of money seem to think that they work harder than people who earn less. As far as I can tell, in our society there is an inverse relationship between the difficulty of work and the level of renumeration. </p>
<p>You know who probably works really hard? CPT’s gardener! The reason people with a lot of money are willing to pay others to do their housework and gardening is because that stuff is hard work. I don’t have any objection to someone paying a gardener – I pay someone to take care of my yard as well, even though my AGI is under $40K - but one reason I do so is that my hourly rate for work that involves mostly sitting on my butt in front of a computer screen is significantly higher than what I pay for people to do work that involves physical labor around my home, at least when I consider the amount of time it would take me to achieve the same thing on my own. And I’m on the lower end of the CC-economic scale. </p>
<p>But I earn a lot more than $8 an hour and I don’t see how I could possibly live on that – but its pretty obvious to me that the people earning $8 an hour seem to have the most difficult, physically exhausting jobs. I would NEVER claim that it is “hard work” that leads to my making more money than the people who do all of the jobs involving physical labor and long hours standing on their feet that contribute to the comfort of my lifestyle. It could be said that I work “smarter” (since my occupation requires more brain power than sweat power) – but it certainly can’t be said that I work “harder”. </p>
<p>Obviously a primary demarcation is education. The better the education, the more likely the job is to involve sitting in a chair in some office and directing people who get paid significantly less to do the labor-intensive stuff. So that’s why we want to send our kids to college: it lets them skip up a few rungs of the “work easier - earn more” ladder. </p>
<p>So please don’t insult people who earn less than you with the very bogus claim that you have more money because you “work harder.” You don’t. You may very well work “as hard” (in terms of hours, though not likely in terms of the amount of calories you burn off in the course of your work day) – and you may very well have exercised better judgment than others in terms of decisions you made along the way to preserve the money you earned. </p>
<p>But as Kelsmom pointed out, she works ridiculously hard too. And she’s one of the people I mentioned with a desk job.</p>
<p>That’s exactly what I am talking about. I am being bogus if I dare to say people don’t make as much money because they don’t work as hard. But it is perfectly ok to take pot shots at people that make money. What I wrote there was an example of how un-PC it would be to say that, and you just proved me right. What some people wrote about OP on this forum was just uncalled for, but it was ok because they make 450,000.</p>
<p>Calmom, why don’t more people take those easy, high paying jobs rather than work so hard for so little?</p>
<p>And help me understand why your AGI is lower than most gardener’s, probably half of what many make, when your hourly rate is so much higher?</p>
<p>Can we GET any more off topic?</p>
<p>I happen to be asking my D to look into this “FASFA” thing (that’s what you people call it, right? SMILE!), so she can apply for an unsubsidized Stafford for 09/10. Is the FAFSA universally required for that? We only did the Profile her freshman year. Some schools ( i.e Santa Clara) wanted it for merit consideration.</p>
<p>Yes, the FAFSA is required. I filled out one recently with a student who neeed help and finally found an advantage to not getting aid! What a pain!!</p>
<p>“What a pain!!”</p>
<p>Hmmm… maybe that will be her summer job…</p>
<p>What some people wrote about people who aren’t high earners on this forum was just uncalled for; is it ok because they make more than other folks? </p>
<p>Sheeeeesh!</p>
<p>I didn’t think FAFSA was a pain to fill out; S and I did it together so that he could get a Stafford. I think it’s good for him to understand some of the financial aspects of going to college and if he’s old enough to go to college, he’s old enough to cover some of the costs.</p>
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I don’t know what planet you live on Hmom, but I can assure you that the people mowing my lawn don’t have a "higher AGI’ than I do. Maybe the lady that owns the landscaping company does- but those guys doing the sweat labor are lucky if they break $30K. </p>
<p>Please refer to this chart so you can see what these guys make:
[PayScale</a> - Landscaping or Groundskeeping Worker Wages, Hourly Wage Rate](<a href=“http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Landscaping_or_Groundskeeping_Worker/Hourly_Rate]PayScale”>Landscaping or Groundskeeping Worker Hourly Pay in 2024 | PayScale)</p>
<p>With a 40-hour work week, the TOP wage earners would gross about $32K per year – the mid-range earners are making about $21K.</p>
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<p>I thought I was alone in this. I really don’t understand why it is so hard for people to fill out. I was the first one in my family that has ever done a FAFSA and it took me less than an hour. I am not attacking anyone here, I just really want to know why it’s such a pain. (Again, serious question.)</p>
<p>Cpt’s gardener was an old Italian guy who drives a better car than Cpt or H, and owns a number of some mean looking pick up trucks too. I see him a few times during the season. I see his son once in a while too. Most of the time, a group of 4-5 men swoop on my yard once a week and are finished doing whatever they have to do within 15 minutes to a half hour as they have multiple mowers and other equipment. The reason he was selected among a number of candidates for the job, is because he is registered and insured. He also has a regular group of workers. Many of the “landscapers” here pick up workers at the workers lot and can have a different group of guys every day. For his weekly sweep he charges me $60/month. For anything else, he charges a la carte. I order the fertilizers and yard treatment stuff from a place that specializes in organic product–a bunch of us go in on this together to avoid the more carcinogenic stuff. </p>
<p>His workers probably work very hard over the course of a day, but I don’t think they are as well to do as the head honcho. He is good friends with one of my neighbors, also an older Italian gentleman who speaks little English, and their house is truly beautiful outfitted with the state of the art everything along with a gorgeous garden. He builds houses, and was the contractor for his house. I understand the gardener has a lovely garden as well, though I have not seen it, and I do not use his services for plants and bushes and gardens; I do that myself (not that it is anything fancy or terrific). </p>
<p>In terms of physical work, there is no question those yard workers do a lot more than my H. But he is on call all of the time. He works in operations so he has to always be on call. I took him to the train station this morning at around 6am and he is on his way home; I’ll be picking him up soon. But he does have a nice airconditioned office and makes much, much more than any of those workmen, I’m sure. The top gardener… I wouldn’t bet any money on that one. </p>
<p>Because H also consults and is occasionally an expert witness, we do have a business as well, so we have all the attendant headaches and paper work that go with the extra money this generates. But we are grateful for it and always hope that things are busy in that area. Because H is not home that much because he has to travel a lot, most of the home things have to be contracted out. Since neither he nor I are handy in the least, it is a good idea to pay for any work on the house and yard that requires knowledge. Unlike our gardener and neighbor who do most of their own work. </p>
<p>When my very flimsy garage doors literally fell apart one day, my neighbor very generously sent me one of his contacts (and paid him with me reimburing) to fix it. I have the finest garage doors in the neighborhood other than his for less than I would have paid for the thin bottom of the line replacement that I would have gotten. My neighbor works hard, all of the time. Constantly on his house and garden, and over sees construction project, I understand. I would bet he does make a lot more than we do.</p>
<p>I’m sure these men put in their time when they were young with a lot of hard work to enjoy their current positions and pay. But right now they do not put in the hours that my H does on the job. I’m not sure what comprises hard work and how to relate with pay, though I did work in the compensation field for some years with models that made the correlation. For whatever reason, the ability to generate money, the rain making jobs tend to pay the most. Then the jobs with special skills that not too many people have.<br>
I hope the job is not too difficult as my 16 and 12 year old boys are going to be doing the yard and my neighbor’s for a princely sum of $80 a month.</p>
<p>The reason we did not do it ourselves is because of medical issues that made it unwise for the others in the family to do the work. </p>
<p>I also have a woman who comes and cleans for me 4 hours a week. Yes, we can do it ourselves, but the regularity and thoroughness that we need for our house because, again because of medical reasons requires more vigor than I have as I am pushing 60 years old and have some issues that make it unwise for me to do strenuous work. Until about 8 years ago, I did do all of my cleaning except for twice a year whole house cleaning. I pay my cleaning lady $65 a week which includes taxes and some social security. She and her sister do 3 houses a day, 4 days a week, and just my house on the fifth day. They also baby sit, house sit and do other sorts of house help. Right now things are tough for them as they had nearly twice as much work a year ago and had to split up to do it, but now they can do it together more efficiently with the much lighter work load. They are extremely efficient, young, strong and very type A in getting the work done. They do a much, much better job than I can, I freely admit. They share a house in a good school district with their two kids and their husbands. I think their family take home pay is very close to ours as there are 4 of them employed. </p>
<p>I would say that it is the security of our job that makes it “better”, but I don’t know about that. I have been scared to death as we are getting older and jobs have been disappearing in the NY area. You hear about these financiers making all of those million dollar bonus but for each one of them, you have many minions like my H and his support staff that are considered highly paid, but not at such levels that losing a job is not going to be a financial disaster. </p>
<p>So yes, we make close to Obama’s rich. Every penny we make is accounted for, and we try to be responsible in spending our money. We try to be wise too, paying those who do things more efficiently than we do to do the work. Though I never gave a fig about keeping up with the Joneses, I am aware that there are responsibilities that come with making the income we do, and having the assets we have. Sometimes we are cheap, but we make sure we are not taking chances that are fool hardy at that level.</p>
<p>But it is an interesting subject as to who deserves to be making the most money. I would guess it would those whose services are in the most demand( who can make money) and necessary. I can let my gardener (as I did) and cleaning lady go. I would be hard pressed not to pay the doctor when needed or certain repair folk that can do absolutely necessary work that we are not capable of doing.</p>
<p>I’m somewhat astonished at the number of people here with the incomes mentioned hiring people to do their yardwork.</p>