I left my job about two months ago, and I applied for unemployment immediately. I got a new job today, but I STILL haven’t gotten my unemployment decision. Additionally, my food stamp application was delayed due to personal circumstances. In short, had I not had money saved for an emergency, I would have been mega-screwed.
I know some people are not in a position where they have the luxury of storing away significant amounts of cash but, if you are, I beg of you to do so if you aren’t already. I can’t imagine what position I’d be in right now if not for my budgeting.
Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.
PS. I posted this here instead of in c/finance because the sidebar there specifies that it’s supposed to be for finance-related news.
For quite a while I’d always told myself, “I’ll just forego the usual advice, since I could just draw from unemployment if I ever found myself without a job.” I’d had the usual advice drilled into me but, until recently, had completely ignored it. I’m pretty damn glad I pivoted when I did, because holy hell it’s a nightmare to actually start getting benefits, even in my state.
As to why I posted this: if my experience can convince even one other person who was as naive as I was to save a little more, then I’d consider that worth any ass kicking that I get from others. More than anything, I wanted this to be a, “it could happen to you” style of post.
I’ve always been of the mindset to save wherever I could, so it’s interesting to hear some people aren’t like that. It’s kind of just a given to me and the people I’ve been around to try to prepare for whatever we can as best as we can before it happens. I’m glad you were able to prevent things from getting worse for yourself and hopefully you can always carry this lesson with you into the future. It’s definitely a good don’t take things for granted story I think as well.