What's In It For Me?

My sister-in-law was laid off on Wednesday. Poor thing. She owns her own home, isn't married and barely gets by. I don't think she can survive long without a paycheck. I hope she's able to recover quickly and find work so that she doesn't lose what she's worked so hard for. What sucks is when she took this job they requested she give up her own part-time business doing the same thing.

My buddy Paul was laid off right before Christmas. He may have finally found a job, but it will require a commute to New York City. That's 2 1/2 hours folks! Yikes. I suppose he'll be all right and he such a nice guy its hard not to root for him.

I've heard that a recession is when your neighbor gets laid off and a depression is when you do. I'm on firm ground I feel but I'm not as sure about my wife. Life is full of worries and crises but I'm not losing sleep over it.

Having said all that happy, cheerful news, stocks are at least up this week. That's nice. We can't progress upwards without a few days of it to start. I'm pretty confident President Obama has us on the right track and since I'm not retiring for 25 years or so, I'm buying into my retirement cheap. Or so I convince myself.

Now, about the housing bailout stuff. I live in a modest house. We qualified for a house twice as expensive as the one we got but I thought that would put too much strain on us. So we didn't opt for the jumbo mortgage or the 110% financing. We saved, bought a condo, fixed it up tremendously, sold it at a hefty profit and poured that money into our house. I like to be able to eat out when we want to, or buy a new car or have furnace problems that don't break the bank. In other words, live life and be able to handle the hardships. Or at least recover from the quickly.

Of course I work an extra job on the weekends to have extra money and be more financially sound to reduce potential worries.

I work hard. I planned ahead. I stayed within my means. And I'm surviving. Nicely, to date. But my tax dollars are going to help some (not all) people who didn't do that? Does that seem fair?

Listen, I'm as liberal as they come. I support most, if not all social programs. I'm for national healthcare and, frankly, I don't think Americans are taxed enough. But now, my tax dollars are going to be used to perhaps subsidize someone who a) makes more money than me and/or b) lives in a nicer home?

What's wrong with that picture?

Still. I'd rather be me than someone in a McMansion applying for mortgage relief.