Judging by media coverage of the financial crisis, Australian’s have an inflated sense of entitlement. Never being able to own your own home is not a ‘tragedy’. In other countries renting is normal. Not being able to afford an overseas holiday once a year is not a ‘tragedy’. Some people can’t afford one, ever. Having to ‘cut back’, sell investment properties + stop feeding your children food from a colourful branded packet is not a’ tragedy’. It’s life.
Of course, some people are genuinely struggling, but if I hear one more person in the media who has fallen from a higher standard of living, claim they’ve been “hit so hard” by the recession they’ve had to resort to buying NO-NAME products for their families (oh, the indignity), I may have to write a strongly worded letter. To someone.
Thus my list of why living below minimum wage for five years before the financial crisis rocks:
1. Nothing has changed. There’s need to adjust to a lower standard of living.
2. We have fed ourselves off less than $20 a week before.
3. We live in a run down unit with super cheap rent. It would be near impossible for us to “downsize” unless we moved into our bin.
4. We are not too proud to move into said bin, if the situation arose.
5. Our pantry is a homage to all that is Homebrand.
6. We’re not in debt, because we never earned enough money for a bank to ever approve us for a loan. Teehee banks. Take that.
7. We don’t have credit cards. We have Visa debits.
8. We already have the best value providers of internet, phone and electricity.
9. K-Rudd’s $950 stimulus money is going to make a huge difference. Like, massive-paying-our-rent-for-the-whole-month difference.
10. We don’t feel the need to go on A Current Affair to complain about the state of the economy + our inability to buy Uncle Toby’s muesli bars.
Having said that, I can handle living below minimum wage because I know it’s temporary. I wanted to study medicine because if I stuck to my previous career choice it may not have been temporary. I may have been living on minimum wage forever. We can live ‘small’ (as Dutchboy says) for another six years but I wonder how I’d feel if there was no timeframe.
Tags: economy, minimum wage, recession, stimulus package, student
medically blonde 
April 21, 2009 at 12:00 am |
Love this post.
May 30, 2009 at 10:57 pm |
Love it also. (And hate A Current Affair and Today Tonight).
Also….no investments to see go down the gurgler!! No foreign currency to lose its value. Because…..no money.
May 30, 2009 at 10:58 pm |
And 6 and 7….with you there. I heart my Visa debit. It makes life so much easier. My new one went missing (TWICE) in the mail 3 weeks ago and I discovered how difficult it was without it.