For 2024, the U.S. federal poverty level for a family of four is $31,200. We’re making $58,600 this year, which still puts us under 200% of the line. This year our kids will turn 6 and 7. Both are currently being homeschooled by my husband, and I’m still at my union office job.
$9.98, Amazon, Prime Video ad-free (42% increase)
Because we have an EBT card, we’re eligible for the $6.99 monthly Prime subscription which is a nice deal and one we’ve used a lot over the years. Whenever we’ve looked at our monthly costs to try to see where we can trim, we’ve never cancelled it because of the amount of kids content it provides. It also gives us a discounted rate on Amazon Kids+ which provides safe screen time for the kids’ Kindles. (Confusingly this is an entirely separate service from Prime Video. There are things on their Kindles that we can’t watch on the smart TV app.)
Two days after Christmas, we got an email from Amazon that said our video subscription would start including ads. To remove ads, all we would have to do was pay an additional $2.99 a month. This would allow them, they said, to “continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time.” I’m well aware of the kind of content they’ve invested in before.
They included a 14-point bulleted list explaining why Prime was still a good value and mentioned that there was no change to our cost. Which isn’t true, because time has value, and watching ads takes time. Not only that, while we wouldn’t be paying more, they would still be getting more money from advertisers who wanted access to us. It felt like they made a series of bad investments and wanted to squeeze more money out of their existing subscriber base. We decided to cancel after January, once the ads start.
$1,097.48, GEICO, six-month car insurance premium (51% increase)
We finally paid off the car in October, and it’s been such a treat to be able to put the car payment into savings instead of the bill pay account. But just when I started to feel on top of things, I got a renewal email from our car insurance company. Our previous premium had been about $725.00. The new one was significantly more. I haven’t had any claims; haven’t moved; my neighborhood hasn’t been overtaken by carjackers or Mad Max racers. When I called and asked what the deal was, they said that the cost of repairs and labor had gone up in my area. I shopped around with three other companies, but everything was about the same. The only option I had was to lower our coverage, which we opted not to do. It didn’t feel like a reasonable tradeoff to save $100.00 but lose $10,000.00 of coverage.
$6.15, Starbucks grande chai latte with oat milk (4% increase)
Speaking of the car, the poor thing is on its last legs. All electric cars run worse in the winter, but ours is almost a decade old at this point and it is tired. On a perfect day where we don’t have to run any climate control the car can go about 60 miles. When it’s cold out, we can go about half that distance and it’s a nerve-wracking experience. I keep my coat on and use the seat and the steering wheel heaters instead of the HVAC. Those run on the accessory battery and don’t reduce the mileage. Turning the system on to defrost the windows drains mileage quickly, so you have to remember to cycle it off once it’s clear, then back on again if the windows get bad again. The car takes longer to charge, too, which means I’ve been spending a lot of time freezing in the driver’s seat lately.
All of that is to say that after a recent experience of sitting in the car for over two hours until my toes got cold, I decided to treat myself to a warm drink from Starbucks. When I pulled around to order, I that all the drinks on the light-up menu listed for a much cheaper price than I remembered. I was halfway to concluding that buying a daily latte was in my future until I realized they were advertising short sizes. A short! The size that used to be practically a secret menu item.
All of this happening within the same month or so just gives the feeling that corporations—and it does feel like corporations are leading the charge, though even something as innocuous as our children’s museum membership has gone up by 80%—are trying to extract every possible dollar from us that they can.
When I was shopping for stocking stuffers a couple of days before Christmas, the dollar spot at Target was already full of Valentine’s decorations. Mid-January, during the same week that had two of the coldest days coldest on record for our town in many years, we were greeted by neon bikinis and water sandals. It feels like we’re being hustled along, rushed from holiday to holiday so we just keep moving. Look, shamrock headbands! So shiny! Don’t worry about how much oatmilk costs.
If I have to read one more article about how the economy is good, actually, I might scream. I’m psyched for everyone’s stock portfolios, but I just want to be able to buy a bra or moisturizer or paper towels without doing the math on how long it is to my next paycheck. What’s worse, all the extra money we’re spending doesn’t even seem to be going anywhere meaningful. Everyone I know is struggling. Not desperate, but struggling.
One More Thing…
This is perfect. No notes.
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