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If there is one moment that is more stressful than others in one’s career, it is living and working through an organization review at your employer – especially a review that is initiated as a result of a deficit of several millions of dollars. There is nothing more difficult than understanding that your employer is trying to reduce expenses and may deem you unnecessary. When your employer is trying to cut 10% of its annual budget, a budget that had already been reduce in the previous years, you know big changes are coming.

In case you cannot read between the lines, I recently went through this at my employer. It was initiated last fall and was supposed to end in early March. I avoided writing about it on my blog (and will continue to do so) for fear of breaking some unwritten code of conduct. I know that several of my co-workers read my blog and releasing too many details may have made things worse for me. However, things seem to have come to some sort of a conclusion and I feel comfortable reflecting on the situation here.

How People Typically Respond to Potential Lay-Offs Read More

The US Department of Agriculture said in a 6/14/12 report that a middle-class family with a child born in 2011 can expect to spend about $295,560 in the next 17 years on food, shelter and other necessities with projected inflation factored in.

Meanwhile, projected private college tuition and public college tuition is expected to rise to $450,000 and $200,000, respectively.

In total, we can expect a total cost of roughly $500,000-$750,000 to raise a child through the age of 22 if parents are to pay for everything!

Sounds scary right?  The annual expense is therefore about $23,000 to $34,000 compared to the median US household income of roughly $58,000 a year GROSS.  Given half of Americans don’t pay federal income taxes, the $23,000-$34,000 a year annual child-raising cost is probably no more than $25,000-$40,000 in gross income a year.

Still, how does one spend 40-60% of their after tax income every year on one child and manage to pay for rent, food, entertainment and save?  Having a kid, based on this report by the government says that the median household only has about $25,000 a year in after-tax money to spend!

DOES THE GOVERNMENT WANT TO DISCOURAGE PROCREATION? Read More

Have you ever come across a person who repeatedly blurts out to everybody that her birthday is coming up?  What about the woman who can’t stop telling everybody she’s getting married, even though the wedding is still a year away?  Her single friends must love that!  Or how about the guy whose profile picture on Facebook has a ridiculous head-tilt leading you to wonder, What the hell is wrong with your neck man?

Social media has allowed us to talk more about ourselves than ever before.  If you’ve got a blog, like many of us do, it’s a narcisst’s paradise where we can talk about “me”, “me”, and more “ME”!  Some of us even think we’re eloquent and good looking enough to do video blogs!

We can write things like:

“I make $20,000 a month!  I’m awesome!“, when the average monthly household income is $4,200.

“Which of these three size 0 dresses should I buy?“, when the average woman is 5′ 4”, weighs 140 pounds and is a size 12.

“Look what my hubby got me for Valentine’s Day!“, when you have single friends and followers who just can’t stand such a disgusting commercial concoction.

Clearly, these statements are meant to make the writer feel better about themselves.  We all want someone, somewhere to notice our accomplishments at least on occasion.  Is that so bad?

NARCISSISM WORKS BETTER THAN WE THINK Read More