If this should be in another sub-forum, I apologize. What are people cutting back on in these very tough times? I need to be a lot smarter about allocating my money and paying down debt with elimination of it as a long term goal. What I'm scaling back is:

Coffee: once my card that was given to me is used up, back to brewing it all at home and/or keeping with a $5/month coffee fund at work. Not that Kirkland (Costco) is great coffee but it will do. I have some beans at home I can use too so I don't have to buy any for a while.

Cable TV: Going sooner rather than later. It will help me study for my MCSA/E exams again. One less distraction. I keep high speed internet, in fact that's the very last thing I would cut. In my industry (IT Support, want to pick up Network skills) you never know when you're going to need to upload 40 resumes a night. A luxury that I really don't need is the TV, if my high speed goes up $10/mo, the total bill goes down quite a bit.

Beer: I don't drink all that often to being with, but I did go out for beers 4 weekend nights in the past month. That bill can accumulate in a hurry, as you know. The one potential trouble spot, when I go out and chill with beers or want one to relieve stress, Guinness seems to be the only thing I can drink without feeling like garbage the next morning. Yuengling is the budget-conscious beer should I choose to drink.

Diet to go: I really like the meals from http://www.diettogo.com - $56.29 for 7 lunches a week. Less than I'd pay if I went out for lunch for sure, in DC, but this needs to get chopped to 5 lunches a week, if not altogether. I can go with more sandwiches via sandwich meat and will need to. My freezer is filled with chicken and pork that I buy when on sale then freeze. That and canned vegetables will need to become a greater diet staple. Not that canned vegetables are great but they're still healthier than most things.

New clothes: I have what I need for work, and won't be a "suit" anytime soon. Unless I find a pair of jeans or dress pants on clearance, no more.

Sporting events: besides what I've already paid for, no more with the only exception being the World Cup Qualifier here in DC on October 11. It's not just the tickets, it's food before the game, forget about ordering anything at the venue, that kills the wallet.

I'm keeping my running 1-2 races a month, registration fees pile up but it's good for my health, psyche (charitable races), and I get wicking t shirts for a lot of the races, which I need for running. Cell phone is staying (only phone I have), and unless I get pressed even further, gym membership. Need to stay healthy, workouts clear my head, and if I use the one near work, the savings via lower Metro fares after 7 pm help pay for the gym.

Car: only used to do food shopping, go to the gym (don't food shop on separate trips), and the rare non-metro accessible stuff. I'd like to go carless but it aint' happening.

What else can I cut?

After all that sacrifice,Welcome To Randi's Board, MaryJane!!

Thanks. I've been on and off this board for about 4 years or so - I drop in about once a week to see what people are thinking. Many people I know here in supposed "recession-proof" DC, of many different political persuasions, all seem to be quite concerned about the state of the economy. The silver lining, even in places that are supposedly insulated from the downturn (although I am convinced that a lot of the politico's disconnect from reality is they all hide in the rich parts of town) are wide awake to it and are taking steps to get their own things in order.

Buy less food, take the bus more.

I buy whole 8 O'Clock coffee beans and grind them at home. I have decided not to buy any new Madonna cds. And of course, dating in out of the question, I can't afford Ashley Dupree.

We're cutting back on EVERYTHING, since it's getting more and more difficult to pay the mortgage.
A lot of it I blame on myself. I got caught up in paying for things in order to live, on credit.
The credit card companies have come back to bite me hard in the ass!

My doctor needs to see me every 2 weeks due to my blood pressure being so high, and he's looking out for my mental health since I'm going through a separation from my wife. He's not charging me for visits any more, and giving me free samples. Good man.

Eat lower on the food chain. Get rid of collision insurance for car(s). No more visits with my French family; they'll have to come here. Cable TV is going soon. This summer, will design the conversion of our yard to food production: container gardens, fruit trees (espalier), maybe even rabbit hutch - Euro style. Fitness for prevention. Eliminate all non-essential travel; use light rail. Missing the bicycle I gave my son, which he lost. Thinking Vespa. Swap meets for hand held tools. It's more a state of mind ...

I've cut back on food...and lost 20 lbs.

We've cut back just about as much as we possibly could, I have some huge medical bills I am still paying off from having Lung Surgary a couple of years ago....I have very expensive, bad Health Insurance, (Blue Cross) since my husband had to take an early retirement due to an injury at work, I now have to pay for my own.
So, I took a second job, I call my "Benefits" job, as a Special Ed. Instructional Aide, I work with special needs kids, mostly with Autism, the pay is not near what the job is worth, and with Arnold and his 'hiring freeze' I am still a sub, but it puts me closer and closer to permenant, hopefully, one day soon! I am also a Hair Stylist, for 34 years, owned a Salon for 16, it is really nice having my Taxes taken out of my paycheck at the school and being able to pay more into S.S. and Medicare etc.
Actually it is nice just getting a paycheck, after all these years of never knowing how much money I was going to be making etc. etc. Never thought at this age I would be working 2 jobs...go figure!

Everything except sex.

I'm taking the bus now but piss me off I cut back on my water usage to get my bill down and it was bigger this time than last because they had a freak'n rate increase. Now if I use as much as I used to it will cost me even more, the bastards. I also heard the electric company is raising it's rates so screw cutting back on electric.
I'm cutting back but they keep raising the price.

FWIW, 8 O Clock usually wins a lot of categories in Consumer Reports. i personally love their Bokar Blend but can't find it outside MA or NH.

hunt(allowed 2 dear a year) to help feed the family, the meat is much better for you

have a garden

ordered a water reclaim system for the house to water that garden


Cable is now on basic


just mostly watching what we eat, making sure we multi task when driving. look for work closer to the house.


And the big one is to tell my wife and kids that things will get better but only if we(the family) can change with the times

Seeing as how we've had to live with the shredded economy that Chimpy McCokespoon and his Repigli-bubbas left us in Texas; here's what we've done.

Ditched the ego - no credit cards, but a line of credit at the bank for emergencies only; no new cars when we can get a good deal on a lease return vehicle (all that maintenance and limited mileage makes for a good option); the debit card is for paying bills - we each have a cash allowance and know that we can't go over that amount; freezer in the garage and we watch for sales on frozen veggies and meats - oh yeah, Repigli-bubbas like to hunt but often stiff the butcher after they've dropped off their kill. We gladly pay for what they leave behind and the local economy gets to keep skilled labor in business. Roses love tomatos and vice versa. It's just as easy to grow my herbs, (easier even!) as it is flowers, but I mix in edible flowers with the whole happy crowd. Rainwater collection in a rain barrel for now - larger later.

There are bulk warehouses for staples like salt, beans, rice, and spices. Dollar stores for coffee and tea (they buy bulk loads of "short" shipments and we get a good buy - even whole bean sometimes!) The best deal is the garage sales in the "toney" areas of town. Designer jeans worn one or twice and tossed into a yard sale. Same with name brand towels, etc. These folks change the interior design of their homes with the seasons - I really don't care if I have "Fall" towels hung up in my bathroom year round - they have a utilitarian purpose - they dry my wet behind after a shower!

No cable - we have DSL and a land line and keep the cell phone on a pay-as-you-go plan - no contracts, no run around, no pain in the ass people to deal with. Ceiling fans, wood blinds, and lined drapes. If you want to look outside, please do so after the sun goes down or before it comes up. When the utilities expenses go above a certain amount - we save the laundry for a one day 3 hour chore at a laundrymat - everyone pitches in and it all gets done. Movie night is a once a month outing where we go out to eat at a salad and soup buffet, and either hit the off-night specials or go to a breakfast buffet and hit the
Sunday morning matinee.

We are a family of five - the youngest ones are in a charter school - there is no good choice in our neighborhood - the eldest is back after a failed marriage. After this week there will be 3 adults working full-time, 2 of us car pool together, one takes the bus and her bicycle. When school resumes, our total mileage per day will be around 32 miles - right now it's about 22 - and I fill up every 10 days - $75.00 right now. I shudder to think what the total will be when the kids go back in about a month.

We've cut everywhere we can - I am thankful that my husband has good insurance that covers 4 of us - the eldest child covers herself now. However, I will be eligible for retirement in 15 years. The Enron fiasco robbed me of my 401K funds ($32K) and what I have now is laughable. The only light at the end of the tunnel I can see is that our place will be paid for when I retire - and by expanding the homestead just a wee bit, I should be able to make some money by selling veggies and herbs. If the Chinese don't call our debts and take up squatter's rights on my front lawn!

Sigh,

Kyoti

Gamblin', drinkin', n bitchin'.

so KyotiRose all people that hunt are Repigli-bubbas? I can afford to fucking buy meat and I feed my family hunting and i'm a fucking Repigli-bubbas. god some of you people here are to fucking quick with that your a regpug unless you believe exactly what I do.

I cut back a year ago. We are already bare-boned!

I can afford should be a can't afford


sorry for the off color language we are going to the food bank tomorrow and I feel like crap

Hunting is a sacred tradition to our family, one of my ancestoral grandfathers served as a personal assistant to King Charles II.

We eat only organic grass-fed beef, and we love wild meat. My partner is a 5-star chef (retired yet serving private parties by request) and insists on sustainable organic meats and food in general.

If you can, get a small business loan and open a smoked meat business. Start off slow and experiment with an electric gourmet smoker:

Brinkmann's Gourmet Electric Smoker: $120

1-800-663-8810 or visit cooking.com

Just a suggestion...we are successful at our small business (selling smoked duck, organic grass-fed ribs with secret organic sauce, we smoke wild salmon with absolutely no food coloring from certain areas of the world--due to contamination.) which is another discussion in itself.

America will soon realize what it will take to survive.

We've cut out almost completely red meat and gone to chicken. We don't have snacks around the house very often, much to the chagrin of my kids.
I shop at Costco once a week for the big stuff (and a gallon of milk because it's so cheap there).
I also had to give up "Skim Plus" milk because it's to expensive. Back to 2%.
Only thing left to cut out is cigs and thats hard for hubby to give up. We have gone from him buying a name brand at a store (about $7 a pack now) to buying off brands at the nearby Indian reservation ($1.80 a pack).
We never go anywhere, so there is nothing there to cut out.

selling the car that still has payments left. back to the trusty bought and paid for ride. unfortunitly some kids slashed the tires on this old car. New tires are cheaper than another 3 years of payments.

We use coupons and www.thegrocerygame.com to buy our groceries at awesome prices! I also used the skills I've learned from The Grocery Game to shop at our local Co-op with coupons and sales. Also, I buy a CSA and never really know what I'm going to get until I get my box, but it's fun to have local, fresh produce every week at a great price! We've been learning to cook Tofu since it's less than half the price of meat (especially with a coupon).

I keep an extra child during the day, this gives us extra money and helps save my friend money on daycare expenses as well. We have our 3 year old in a preschool co-op so that we don't put much money into that, but I have to work a lot at it. We also are involved in a Babysitting Co-op so that when we need babysitting we can trade instead of pay for it. We don't go to the movies at all, we rent using an online service and we have family nights that involve a free concert and a picnic.

We only buy things on sale (except running shoes) and most of the time shop at thrift shops and yard sales. I make some clothes as well as refashion some things if they are old but can be altered.

We keep the air conditioning at 80 in the summer (my DH actually complained about the house being cold when we were at the beach with his parents and they had it set to 76) and the heat on 63 in the winter and I've found this to be better for our health as well. We also use a space heater that is cold to the touch so it's safe around toddlers, but pushes out enough hot air to warm the back portion of our house where we spend most of the day anyways.

Our gas company is running a promotional right now where they'll send out an inspector to do an energy efficiency inspection (we have a 100 year old house so this is a need) and if we upgrade according to recommendations they'll pay half of the costs. So those guys will be out tomorrow and we'll see what we can afford. We have lots of ceiling fans that we use most all year (they also help push hot air down in the winter and keep things circulating).

We reuse most everything (plastic spoons and forks, ziploc bags, "disposable" containers, etc.). We use cloth for most everything (diapers, towels, napkins, bags, handkerchiefs, etc.). In fact we avoid disposable items most of the time and reuse them when we do get them. We bought those "disposable" sippy cups and found they last about as long as the non-disposable kind (especially since you have to replace the valves in the expensive ones all the time or they start leaking) and we get 5 times as many for the same price.

We are considering getting a bike for me and a trailer to pull the kids in behind me to go to the store and run short errands on, but DH is highly concerned about safety so I'm still trying to convince him on this. He's thinking of getting a Vespa or something to go to work on even though he has a fuel-efficient car to help save even more gas, but again he has safety concerns and is trying to get that straight in his head.

I cook pretty much all the time and when we DO get food at a restaurant we always do so with a coupon. So we buy a couple of coupon books at the end of the year that has lots of local eateries and stuff in it, date nights are typically babysitting through the co-op, food at one of the nicer restaurants in our coupon book (typically we get one of our meals for a couple of bucks or even free if we do it right) and walk around riverfront downtown. We might splurge and get a dessert from one of the shops.

We do drink alcohol, but have found we get more bang for our buck through liquor than through beer. So beer is now a splurge item for us. We used to buy two 6 packs a week (I drink the "girly" beers and DH won't touch them) at around $16/wk, now we spend about $30/month at the liquor store and use the kids' juice to mix or make "tinis" that don't require a lot of extra ingredients. DH also drinks things straight up.

For years we've been taking our yearly vacation with my ILs at the beach. We rent a large house (that my MIL and FIL refuse to allow us to pay for) and pile it with two families. We cook all our meals and just relax and do nothing! We used to do a few touristy things like drive down to Myrtle Beach (half hour away) and go to the water park and such, but we skipped that this year and probably had more fun without the stress because of it. We live in a beach community so we are really only driving 40 miles to the beach that we go to for vacation, so we save on gas that way.

There are so many things, that for us is a lifestyle thing, that save us money that I could spend a week explaining. I think this has already gone on for too long so I'll just leave it at that. I will say that my DH sometimes doesn't realize how much we "sacrifice" until he starts talking to some of my mom friends who do things like buy whole couture wardrobes for each of their kids every season and buy brand new designer everything, have housekeepers come weekly (despite being SAHMs), and generally spend way more money than we would ever spend on normal daily items. He actually told one of my friends that if she were his wife they'd have problems over this! She laughed and I told her later he was serious. He's totally spoiled by me in this respect and I STILL get fussed at for buying things that I think we need!

Almost everything, but the one that hurts the most is not being able to take a good, long vacation. We try to take frugal little weekend trips but even then, with the price of gas, lodging and food it's never as frugal as we had hoped.

I drive 10 miles a day. Five to work and five home. No side trips. I walk to most places in the neighborhood.

We've stopped eating out. We do allow ourselves to have an "order in" night once or twice a week - especially when our schedules get hectic.

I used to stop at the grocery store several times a week. Now we make a list - stick to it - and shop once a week. It's forced me to plan meals in advance and figure out how to use the leftovers to make another meal.

We don't have kids, so our life style has always been a little spur of the moment, whatever we're in the mood for type of thing. Advance planning gets a little monotonous but it does save money.

Also, for me personally - I have reduced my spending on books (a big passion) by browsing used book stores. I can pick up a book for a few dollars that would cost 15 to 25 new.

Planted another 1000 sq feet of vegetable garden. Bought a lot of stuff for survival off the grid. We bought with cash, because we may not be able to afford it next year.

So...solar panels, bee hives, composting essentials...making sure we don't eat anything made of chemicals or GMO. Stored heritage seeds. Grew my own corn and sunflowers this year for bird seed.

We only eat occasssional bird...mostly eggs, cheese, tofu, dairy-beans-grains for protein.

We're looking at chickens and goats, now. Goats? Yup. You can milk them and they eat most anything. Goats are low maintenance.

Keeping the old cars.

Car pooling for the children. Older children are taking commuter rail more. I take in a load of garden food into the city each week(the other house...where the other children live while going to school.)

I've been preparing for this 'dollar collapse' for several years. Now I'm teaching others how to garden 'off the grid'.

Oh yeah...domestic vacation this year. I'd rather stay home and garden, anyway. Who wants to be put through a full-body scanner at the airport? LOL

More buses, trains, and bicyling. Buying locally grown/raised food whenever possible. This doesn't save money but I think it's a good idea to support local food producers. Diversifying assets, spending less on entertainment, travel and clothes. Probably going to sell one of the cars. They are both paid for but the insurance costs a fortune. But really, if there is a major collapse we're screwed.

Isn't that just crazy!!! Denver has been in a drought since I moved out here and there have been several years where they imposed watering restrictions in several areas. Every year, like clockwork, they raise rates, because people are being "forced" to consume less. That's the problem with public ultities.... They still have to meet Wall Street expectations. When consumption goes down, so does revenue, so they raise the rates to bring it back in line with stockholder expectations.

Ease up trigger. I would imagine that she didn't read your post and didn't mean to offend. All the anger isn't cool. I don't hunt, but I think it is far more humane that factory beef farms.

Hey Mobius, jkun17 here. Welcome to the club. Try not to disagree or you're automatically a globalist, Bush schill and a right winger.

That's a very wise choice if you're going to continue to pay top dollar for anything. As a runner, I know how important it is to have comfortable, functional footwear that matches your stride et al. One time I bought "discount" shoes ahd problems with my instep and hamstrings for a couple months. Your feet get messed up with shoes that aren't a fit and the issues can go beyond blisters; it's a domino effect where knees, hamstrings, back, you name it get all messed up. I stick to the higher but not top end New Balance, Nike Air Structure Triax, and Asics Gt series, unless I find a killer deal at DSW.

Business Casual pants, jeans, and even collared shirts: Target. Clearance. Rack. Last pair of Levis I bought were for $9. Costco usually has good deals too. Finding my size is the issue.