Courtney Harrell (Host)

Maxine went to trucking school in Kansas, where she learned a bunch of driving techniques that would help once she was out there on her own. Like how to turn no matter how long the wheels span, how to keep control through high-grade hills, how to see the road in front of a long-nosed truck. And she learned a healthy respect for the massive machines, learned to stay vigilant all the time.

And she loved it. What is the best part of the job?

Du bringst Sachen an die Leute, die sie brauchen. Richtig.

I think a lot of us associate driving on big, long, open roads the way that you do with freedom. Does it feel that way to you? You feel that.

After the break, we'll dive in to Maxines Week.

Ja, mein Name ist Courtney Harrell und ich bin Produzentin und ich hoste das Show, was wir sparen.

Maxine hatte schon den Tag vorher gekauft, den sie benötigt hatte. Also war ihr Total für den ersten Tag 0 Dollar.

Ich denke immer über Geld. Ich habe immer über Geld nachgedacht. Ich würde sagen, dass ich traditionell eine Menschen mit hohen Anstrengungen bin, wo ich angefangen habe, alle Ausgaben, die ich gemacht habe, als Teenager. Und was hat das ermutigt? dass ich nicht genug Geld haben werde, um Dinge zu machen.

Bist du in der Truppe gerade? Ich bin da. Ja, kannst du mir einfach das Innere des Trucks beschreiben? Was würde ich sehen, wenn ich da wäre?

As long as Maxine stays at her current job, she's always driving the same truck. So all these things in her kitchen, plus the tea and the extra mattress and an old picture of her son's basketball team, make the truck she spends so much time in feel more like her own.

Ich meine, manche von denen waren nur Essen. Ja. Aber es war auch... Ich habe eine Tanzklasse gemacht, als ich Teenager war. Ich bin kein großer Tänzer, aber ich erinnere mich wirklich darauf, wie viel die Tanzschuhe kosten werden. Und ich erinnere mich darauf, Songs auf iTunes für meinen iPod zu kaufen.

Deine 34-Stunden-Reset-Zeit ist die Anzahl der Zeit, die du auswählen musst, bevor du eine neue Arbeitswoche startest. Also kann ein Fahrer nur 70 Stunden in einem 8-Tage-Bereich arbeiten. Und dann müssen sie den Break nehmen.

Total for Day 3, $16 at Love's Truck Stop.

Meist gospel, Rock'n'Roll, ein bisschen Land. Aber sie liebt auch Oper und sie liebt zu singen. Also lernt sie im Nachhinein, O mio papi no caro zu singen.

Ja.

Ich fühle mich verlassen. Maxine kind of is abandoned. Ever since the 1980s, the trucking industry has become increasingly deregulated. And now there's no law that says trucking companies have to cover expenses like parking or supplies. So it's left up to truckers to figure out how to get through the job and then how to pay for life outside the job.

And for Maxine, she can no longer make both things work.

After months of working 14-hour days and waiting, waiting, waiting for her pay to improve so she could catch up on bills, Maxine was forced to make a really hard decision. She decided she had to give up her apartment. After day five, she headed back to North Carolina and started packing up.

Where did you go stay after you left your place? I live in the truck. You live in the truck full time.

Oh, the first time I was in an interview and somebody said, I got a check and I was like, how much was that check for? And then like shrunk back in my seat because it actually felt like so crazy to be like, no, specifically, like, tell me how much you're talking about for all of these things.

How do you all talk to each other about that? What do you say to each other?

If the job is paying so far below what you need to meet your basic needs, what is keeping you in this job?

Are there other jobs besides trucking that you could imagine having more stability in?

We talked before about the freedom you would feel on the road.

When you're talking about your long-term future that you are imagining for yourself, your dream of this land, does that include trucking? Or is your long-term dream leaving trucking behind?

In the weeks after recording the episode, Maxine was still living in her truck and saving money towards the future. But she did get one piece of good news. Her company is getting her a newer truck. Thank you to Alex Leslie at the American Transportation Research Institute and Steve Vasselli. They both helped us understand the trucking industry for this episode.

If you want to know more, check out Steve's book, The Big Rig, Trucking and the Decline of the American Dream. What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margot Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maddy Sprung-Kaiser and Leah Reese Dennis.

Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira. Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josefina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Schuff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornum. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you.

Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

Absolut.

What other jobs did you work before this one?

Das ist Maxine. Sie ist ein 60-jähriger Long-Haul-Truckfahrer aus North Carolina. Wie groß ist der Truck? Oh, das ist ein 53-Fuß-Trailer. Oh, das ist wirklich groß, oder?

Maxine hat Zeit für ein paar andere Arbeiten gebraucht, aber sie ist seit 2004 auf und an für verschiedene Firmen gefahren. Sie hat Routen über das Land gefahren, aber jetzt arbeitet sie auf einer so genannten Dedicated Route, was bedeutet, dass sie immer Homegoods für eine bestimmte Firma durch den gleichen Streit des Landes übernimmt.

Wir haben auf dem Telefon gesprochen, bevor sie aus North Carolina nach Süd-Carolina fährt und dann nach Louisiana. Maxine ist eine der ca. 3,5 Millionen Truckerinnen in den USA, die die restlichen Leben möglich machen. Sie ist eine unmittelbare Teil der amerikanischen Leben. Und wie viele Truckerinnen, macht sie nicht genug, um zu kommen. Maxine arbeitet hart.

Woche nach Woche, sie kauft kaum was und trotzdem, sie kann nicht immer ihre Karten bezahlen. Und sie ist nicht allein. Diese Woche folgen wir Maxine durch eine Woche ihres Lebens auf der Straße und hören über die Vorteile und den Preis des Lebens als Trucker. Ich bin Courtney Harrell und das ist, was wir sparen. Das erste, was man über Trucking wissen muss, ist, dass der Preis verwirklichend ist.

So hourly pay is more likely for local routes with frequent stops in a smaller area. But most long-haul truckers like Maxine are paid by the mile, not hours worked. Wie viel du pro Meile verdienst, ist eine Bezahlung von einigen Faktoren. Was du fährst, wie weit du fährst, für wen du fährst und wie viele Jahre du das gemacht hast.

Aber egal wie viel du verdienst, verdienst du das nur, wenn du weißt, dass du auf der Straße mit einem Truck voller Güter wohnst.

Rates and loads. Basically, Maxine told me that these days there's less merchandise for her to carry and she's getting paid less to carry it. That is not just a Maxine problem. The freight market has been in a recession the last few years because when manufacturing, construction and retail markets slow down, there's just less goods to carry, fewer loads.

And that means there's less work available, which leads to lower rates.

Laut den neuesten Daten vom US-Büro für Arbeitsstatistiken, nimmt der übrige Fahrer um 57.000 Euro pro Jahr nach Hause. Um 10.000 Euro mehr als Maxine im letzten Jahr. Aber erinnere dich, sie werden pro Meile bezahlt. Manchmal enden Fahrer wie Maxine auf der Straße so lange, bis die Löhne durchkommen, dass, wenn sie pro Monat bezahlt würden, sie weniger als die Minimumwage machen würden.

Oh wow.

What do you do when you don't have a paycheck come through or when you get a paycheck that's like, I owe money?

Maxine gibt Geld einer Finanzfirma, weil sie einen Debtkonsolidierungslohn genommen hat, um eine Menge ihrer Schulden mit einer niedrigeren Interessensrate zu reduzieren.

Ist das Geld aus regelmäßigen Lebensausgaben oder ist es ein größerer Ausgabe?

Maxine hat wirklich nicht so viele regelmäßige Kosten. Seine Gesundheitsinsurance kommt aus ihrem Geld, und dann spart sie ca. 120 Euro pro Monat an Utilität, 80 Euro pro Monat auf ihrem Telefon, 645 Euro pro Monat auf ihr Auto und Insurance und ca. 80 Euro pro Monat auf Gas. Der größte Kosten, den sie verursacht, ist ihr Renten, das sind 1400 Euro pro Monat für ihr Ein-Bedroom in North Carolina.

Aber nach all dem muss sie oft ihre Geräte auf ihre Kreditkarte legen.

Supplies like Maxine's paper towels aren't typically covered by trucking companies. Some companies do offer per diems to help with those kinds of travel costs, but there's no law requiring it, so more than half of trucking companies just don't. Despite that, despite the low pay and the loads and the makeshift bathroom, Maxine loves driving her truck. How did you get into it initially?

I kind of, um, well...

So you had your parents saying you were a good driver. But what else was it about trucking that made you be like, oh, as soon as I get the chance to do that, that's what I'm going to do?

You know how you always want to know about everyone else's money? You do, right? Like, you'll see someone buying something you want or taking some amazing vacation and you think, how can they afford that? Or you meet your friend's new girlfriend and she has some very impressive job and you think, how much money does she make?

I think when it comes to money, even if you don't want to admit it, we're all a little nosy. But I don't know, I actually think that's good. I think we should be talking about money more. And all the ways, big and small, that it impacts our lives. On this show, we are actually going to do that. We are going to go somewhere that we almost never get to go.

Deep into the heart of someone else's finances. Hier ist, wie das funktionieren wird. Jede Woche werde ich euch eine neue Person aus einem anderen Land vorstellen. Sie wird uns alles über ihre Finanzen erzählen. Wie viel sie verdienen, wie viel sie machen wollen, worüber sie sich interessieren, oder ob sie sich überhaupt nicht interessieren.

Und dann, für eine Woche, werden wir sie durch ihre tägliche Routine folgen. Jeden Tag werden sie einen Audio-Dialog mit all den schmutzigen Details, wie sie ihr Geld verdienen. Ich meine, die Kaffee, die Gemüse, der Rentner, der Fahrer, der plötzlich alles aufhört. Und danach sprechen wir über das, was die Woche für sie gebracht hat. Was es für sie gemacht hat.

Weil was auch immer du kaufst oder nicht kaufst oder spart oder spart, am Ende des Tages ist Geld immer mehr als dein Balance. Ich bin Courtney Harrell und das ist, was wir sparen.

Und auch, wie viele von ihrer Generation, will sie ein Haus kaufen und ein Baby haben. Und sie versucht herauszufinden, ob es möglich ist, all diese Arbeit zu machen. Kelly verabredete ihren Mann vor etwa einem Jahr. Und acht Monate später sind die beiden von Tennessee nach Salt Lake City, Utah geflogen. Ben ist ein Ingenieur für eine Softwarefirma.

Kelly ist die Direktorin von Klienten-Erfahrung in einem Medizinspa. Und sie ist auch ein Online-Mental-Wellness-Coach.

Kelly wird täglich bezahlt. Aber sie macht ungefähr 50k pro Jahr. Und Ben macht ungefähr 78k pro Jahr. That's before taxes and health insurance. Together, that puts them just under the average income for married couple families in Salt Lake City. How would you describe your relationship with money?

Was machst du täglich, um deine Kosten zu gestalten?

Okay, yeah. So walk me through your spreadsheet. So I would love to hear what all of your regular expenses are and like what you kind of typically pay in each category.

Es ist ein Konvertierer. Phone Payment 75, Pet Insurance 76 and Physical Therapy for 250. It helps with Kelly's chronic back pain and osteoarthritis.

Kelly's degree cost about 40 grand a year. And after undergrad, Kelly went on to grad school at the same university. She has a master's in mental health counseling. But as Kelly sees it now, the math doesn't make much sense. I want to ask you something about that. And I mean no judgment with this. Okay. How did you think you were going to pay off that amount of tuition?

Or were you at the time like, I know I can't pay this off. How did you think about it then?

So that's Kelly. And this week, instead of just tracking it in her spreadsheet, she's gonna tell us about every dollar she spends and every feeling that comes with it. How are you feeling about tracking your finances for a week?

Yeah, me too. I will check in with you on the other side of your week. Okay. Okay.

With her credit card payment, Helena's total spending for day two was $2,514. And the fact that she felt comfortable with that is a huge shift for her. It's a kind of comfort she couldn't imagine feeling again when she first left home for college.

Back then, she was anxious about money for the first time, but she didn't fully understand her new financial position until she got to school and saw how other people around her were spending.

But underneath that, it's also a way for her to put into practice a new relationship with her money. When Helena was a teenager, her family had an unexpected change in their finances. The change was big and dramatic, and it had a tangible impact on what Helena could do with her life.

Helena found herself having to turn down a lot of invitations to dinners at expensive New York restaurants and weekend trips to the Hamptons. And then one night, she was supposed to meet her friends for a big end-of-year celebratory dinner, but she was running late. So she would have to take a cab to get there on time.

And she realized she didn't have enough money in her account to pay for the ride. So she had a choice. Don't go again. Or tell her friend that she needed help. She called her friend.

Even after confiding in her friend, Helena got more and more anxious about balancing what she could afford and living the life that she wanted.

Helena started to feel like maybe her mom had a point, and she gradually changed her social circle. She spent less and less time with the friends going on extravagant outings, and more time with friends she could afford to keep up with. And she started thinking about her future differently, too.

Before college, she'd been interested in being a public defender, or exploring creative opportunities, maybe in the fashion industry. But she knew neither of those paths guaranteed stability.

By giving up the dream of the perfect job, Helena achieved another dream, financial independence.

It also left her with an anxiety around money that she still carries, even now after years of trying to be responsible and working her way through her first jobs after college. But now she's trying to shake that off, trying to just enjoy the money she's got. And this week, we'll follow along and see if that's possible. I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is what we spend.

Helena and her boyfriend Ollie have been together for three years, and when they started dating, Helena could immediately tell that he felt much more financially free.

What do you think happened? Like, what happened for you at the point between him saying you're never going to be able to enjoy your life if you don't work on this and you being able to be on a trip and spend money and be like, oh, I'm enjoying this. Like, what do you think happened?

Helena knew a lot of her friends' parents had taught them how to open an investment account somewhere like Merrill Lynch. And she decided to pursue that herself. So she set up an appointment with an advisor and then opened an account where she started putting a portion of every paycheck.

Total for day four, $204.90.

On day five, Helena also filled up her tank for $70, bringing her total for the day to $106. On day six, Helena worked from home, then ran by the grocery store to grab a couple things for a dinner party at a friend's house.

On day six, Helena also made a $500 donation to a retirement fund for an acquaintance, bringing her total for the day to $676.92.

Did you say that to her?

Helena's total for the week was $3,769.69. What We Spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Marco Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APN Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Sheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornam. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

What is the financial spectrum of your friends now?

Let's get into Helena's numbers. Like she said, Helena makes $173,000 a year before taxes, health insurance, and bonuses. She also splits household bills, rent and utilities, and usually groceries, with her boyfriend. He's in tech sales and, with commission at the end of the year, usually makes a little over $200,000 before taxes. And their expenses?

They spent a total of $1,800 on their two weeks of housing in LA. But the rest of their time in California, they stayed with family for free. Back in New York, they'd be paying $1,500 a month for a room in a larger apartment that they share with roommates. There, utilities run roughly $100 to $200 a month, depending on the season.

In New York, she takes the subway for about $80 a month. But while she's been in California, she's been using her dad's car for free and spending less than $100 on gas.

Wi-Fi at home is $40 a month. Streaming services are $40 a month too. Digital storage is $4.99 a month. And she pays for Amazon Prime in one yearly $60 payment.

Her health, dental, and vision insurance come out of her paycheck for a total of $185 a month. Then she spends $50 a month on medication and has a $30 copay to see a psychiatrist once a month. She also has a recurring donation of $100 a month to the Brooklyn Bail Fund.

Tell me, what was money like growing up?

Oh God. First of all, you said it was a substantial inheritance. What does that mean? I think it was like $20 million. Helena's parents are from Iraq, and Helena's grandpa on her mom's side was on the board of a big oil company there. It was a great job, but Helena's grandpa was afraid of political instability in his country.

Helena says once he got to England, her grandpa started over. He took the cash he brought and bought an apartment that he started renting out in London. Then he reinvested the money he made from that property into more property until he was running a few bed and breakfasts.

Over time, he became more and more successful. Years later, when he passed away from a heart attack, he left the money he'd made throughout his life to his wife.

I mean, literally, how did they spend all that money? Do you know?

Before that point, Helena didn't really talk about money with her parents, including where their money came from. Her mom had been an interior designer, but she stopped working when Helena was born. Helena's dad did well as a software engineer, and they owned a few properties that brought in passive income. So Helena had always assumed that their money just came from that.

She didn't understand that her parents were spending with the knowledge that they had a huge future safety net and didn't need to save for things like retirement or college. She actually didn't even know about the inheritance until her mom told her it was gone. Tell me about when your parents told you that that money was gone.

Helena had just accepted an early decision offer to Columbia, her dream school. Her parents told her they were still going to do everything they could to pay for her tuition, but everything had to change. No more eating out, no more travel, no more big gifts.

Her parents refinanced their house to bring down the mortgage, sold a property, and started looking for places to cut spending or make more money anywhere they could.

After the break, we'll hear how Helena's relationship with money has changed as we dive into her week.

And where do you live?

ClassPass is a subscription service that lets you exchange credits for different kinds of exercise classes. So Helena is basically getting a free gym membership from her work.

Helena and her boyfriend Ollie have been traveling for the last eight months, with a few stopovers back home in New York. They spent last summer in Europe, traveled around California, and then landed in LA for the week of her audio diaries. For Helena, the travel is partly about taking advantage of her and her boyfriend's remote jobs.

Last week on What We Spend, we met Maxine. She's a long-haul truck driver in North Carolina who was working all the time, cutting corners where she could, and finding that the bills still just kept adding up. If you haven't listened to that episode, pause now, go listen to it, and then come back.

We'll talk about a couple of them, but for now, the most important thing to know is that everyone Brian followed had full-time jobs, sometimes more than one, and all of them still couldn't afford housing. Like Maxine, they are the working homeless, people who are trapped in a cycle of housing struggles that doesn't fit the picture of homelessness that comes to mind for most of us.

One place poor and working class people often turn is low income housing, including public housing. But there's a lot of problems with that, too, which you can see in the story of another person in Brian's book, a woman named Britt, who grew up in public housing in Atlanta.

Only one in four who qualify for the assistance actually get it because the government programs are so underfunded that there's just not enough money to cover everyone who should be able to get help.

Brian says they're part of a whole world of homelessness that most of us aren't seeing.

Yeah, yeah. Britt, the woman in Brian's book, actually wins that lottery. Miraculously, her name is picked. But that doesn't get her an apartment or even the rental voucher. It gets her on a waiting list to get the voucher. And she ends up waiting two years. But then, okay, so she finally gets her voucher. Now she has to find a landlord that will accept it. And she can't.

Not a single landlord in her price range will take it. So her voucher expires. And she's still left without a home.

And why is that happening? Why are landlords saying, no, I'm not going to take that voucher?

This partly goes back to the stigma we talked about before. Some landlords assume that anyone relying on a voucher to pay part of their rent is not going to be responsible enough to pay for the rest of it. But also, there's another issue. There's just not enough housing to go around.

And that limited inventory means that landlords can just charge more and more, making the gap between what people make and what they need to make to pay rent bigger and bigger.

Let's go back to Celeste. She's the woman in Brian's book whose house burned down. She is one of the millions looking for housing she can afford with really low wages. But for Celeste, and a lot of people, that's not the only complicating factor.

We've been talking mostly about the group of people who already do not have secure housing to go to. And then there's this whole other group of people that is a huge part of the country who have housing but are on edge, where they're not making enough to be able to know that they're going to be able to comfortably afford the place that they're living.

They're uncertain how long they are going to have the stability that they have right now. Can you talk about that group of people at all?

Can people do anything when they're evicted?

If you did listen, then you know that while she was recording, Maxine was forced to make the really hard decision to give up her apartment, because she just isn't making enough money to pay her rent. We wanted to know more about how this could be happening to Maxine and also to other people around the country.

So what do we do? How do we fix this?

Social housing is government-owned housing that's built to be high quality and stay affordable. But unlike public housing in the U.S., it's open to people across all income levels. And it's a model that's worked really well in other countries.

Yeah. I mean, I think in our last episode, we talked to somebody who I think we would say is a member of the hidden homeless that you're talking about. Her name was Maxine. She is a full-time long-haul truck driver. And She got to the point in her life where she could no longer afford to pay for her apartment and had to start living in her truck full time.

Where did Brit and Celeste end up in the period of time that you were following them?

So both still without secure housing.

Brian, thank you so much for taking the time to talk about your book and your very important reporting.

Brian's book is There Is No Place For Us. What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

And I wondered about what you saw in your reporting. If the people who can no longer afford housing are not on the street, where else are they turning to whenever they don't have someplace to go?

And do we have any sense of how common this is?

How could someone be working full-time, providing an essential service that the rest of us rely on and still not make enough to meet her basic needs? And how many other Maxines are out there? This week, instead of diving into another person's diaries, we're going to try and get some answers to those questions.

Let's zoom in on one of those 4 million Americans. Brian followed a woman named Celeste. Celeste is a single mom of three kids, and one day she got a call that her house was on fire. It turned out that an angry ex-boyfriend had intentionally burned it down, so now she needed to find a new apartment.

She searched and searched for something in her budget, sleeping on the floor of friend's house after friend's house while she did. And then she finally found an apartment she could afford.

But her application was rejected because it turned out that the private equity firm that owned her last apartment had evicted her, without her even knowing it, when she didn't pay rent on her burned-down apartment. She said it was like having a Scarlet E that made it that much more difficult to find a place she could afford.

We've got a guest who's been looking into this exact subject for years, and he estimates that there are millions of people across the country who can't afford housing. His reporting helps answer so many of the questions Maxine's story brought up. Why is rent so expensive? Why don't wages seem to be increasing with rent? And what in the world can we do about it?

I mean, so the system is fit into a very old definition of homelessness so that we can tackle this in the very few ways that we know how or you're on your own.

Is this new?

I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is what we spend. This week, we're going to talk about this problem with housing with journalist Brian Goldstone. He's the author of There Is No Place For Us, a new book that tries to understand our housing crisis by following five families in Atlanta.

Well, and you're saying, too, we have these ideas about homelessness as a culture. And is that why when you were talking about Celeste being hesitant to take on this homelessness label, like, do you think is that what that's about, that people don't want to be seen as I am broken people?

Well, and it means that none of us are safe.

After the break, we'll talk about how we got here and why, housed or unhoused, everyone is feeling the strain.

So obviously, the question of why we have so many people struggling to afford housing is a big one. But Brian says it really boils down to three things, decreasing tenant protections, low wages and skyrocketing rents.

Bevor sie verabschiedet wurde, war Cherry Sozialarbeiterin für das Büro von Kindern und Familien für 38 Jahre. Sie liebte ihren Job, aber sie hatte auch Träume eines neuen Lebens in der Verabschiedung, wo sie mehr Zeit mit ihren Freunden sparen konnte und ihren eigenen Zeitplan setzte. In den USA ist die average retirement age 62. So at 57, Cherry is a bit ahead of the curve.

Was fällt in die Kategorie, die du brauchst und was fällt in die Kategorie, die du willst?

Hast du deiner Mutter gesagt, dass du sie nicht kauftest?

On day two, Cherry took her mom to see a doctor. Her mom had been having trouble moving her neck and they didn't know why until this appointment.

But retirement hasn't turned out the way she expected. She's needed to give a lot of her time to caregiving for her mom. And even though she has a pension, she's come to realize that she wasn't financially ready. This week we'll follow Cherry as she figures out what it's going to take to make retirement work for her. I'm Courtney Harrell and this is what we spend.

Was ist für dich die größte Veränderung in deiner Erwachsenheit?

As a social worker, Cherry's days were packed. She had constant appointments to find and then interview anyone involved in an investigation. And then she'd come home and type up those notes and finish paperwork.

It sounds like it was a really huge part of your life.

Also, I mean, I get the impression that you like to be busy.

Day 3's expenses were just those two phone bills, bringing the total for the day to $208. Day 4. Thursday, 8.31 a.m.

Cherrys Total nach dem Paying-Bills am 4. Mai war 159 Dollar. Aber sie weiß, dass sie morgen mehr spenden wird, wenn sie ihre Freunde zurückzahlt.

Generally speaking, how would you describe your relationship with money?

What is the sadness?

Total for Day 5, $2,532 with an extra income of $600. Day 6. So despite being sick, I pulled it together enough yesterday to go out for brunch to celebrate a friend's birthday. We had the greatest time and it was 16 of us.

Cherry spricht von der Arbeit als Drittpartei-Observatorin für das Staat. Also zum Beispiel, wenn die Eltern in einer Verwaltungsbattel oder von einem Art von Verbrechen verhaftet wurden, wäre Cherry der Supervisorin, der alles dafür hilft, dass alles für das Kind sicher ist. Wenn sie das gemacht hätte, würde sie ihre eigenen Raten setzen.

Zuerst einmal klingt es sehr lustig.

Ist das so, wie du deine Beziehung vor der Verabschiedung beschreiben würdest?

You said something about feeling like an old lady. And I wondered if it changed your relationship with aging.

What is your income now?

How does that compare to what you made before you retired?

Cherry's total spending for the week was $4,097.02. You ended your week deciding that you were going to start working again. Yes. How has deciding to do that changed your anxiety level?

Before she retired, Cherry was making about $110,000 a year, which is on the upper end of what social workers usually make. Cherry often took on additional gigs with the Commonwealth, like working crisis hotlines. But she also just worked her way up the ladder over her 38 years on the job, adding to her salary and her pension. It's like a relatively early retirement, I think, like in your 50s.

What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

Special thanks to Melissa Akiko-Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josefina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Scheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornum. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

When did you become eligible to retire? So was that kind of earliest retirement part of the plan?

Ein Teil ihres Drehens für den Retirement ist es, mehr mit diesem Business zu tun.

Nachdem sie ihre Mutter mit einer ganzen Reihe von Krankheitsproblemen seit mehreren Jahren gesehen hat, hat Cherry gelernt, dass ihre Mutter einen Kidney-Fall hatte, der sofort Aufmerksamkeit benötigte. Das bedeutet, dass jemand zur Verfügung stehen sollte, um sie zu kümmern und sie zu Besuchen zu nehmen.

Außerdem gab es einige andere Dinge über Cheries Job, die Cherry fühlten, als wäre es der richtige Zeitpunkt, um zu gehen. Also hat sie sich entschieden, früher zu verabschieden, als sie geplant hatte.

Cherry war bereits nervös, als es noch schwieriger wurde. Seine Partnerin wurde in einem Auto-Anschlag verletzt und wurde schließlich auch verletzt, als das zu einer Behinderung führte. Wusste du, dass er sich verletzen wird, als du dich entschieden hast, sich zu verletzen?

Let's get into Cherry's numbers. Her partner's income from Social Security is about $980 a month. So between the two of them, they bring in about $5,900 a month. What is your housing cost? $1,800.

Kabel und Wifi 159 pro Monat. Cherrys Telefon ist 111 pro Monat. Und ihre Partnerin ist 125. Und manchmal bezahle ich meinen Kindern, was 88 Dollar ist, wenn ich kann, wenn ich ein bisschen extra habe.

Sherry hatte vor einiger Zeit ein Problem mit dem Fahrzeug, also nutzt sie ein Freundesfahrzeug, bis sie ein neues fährt. Also nur Gas-Ausgaben für jetzt, das sind etwa 60 Dollar pro Monat. Sie hat auch keine Sicherheitskosten für den Moment, weil ihr Gesundheitsinsurance letztendlich gecancelt wurde. Sobald sie sich wieder aufräumen kann, werden das 210 Dollar pro Monat sein.

Oh, that's hard to do. 300 a month in groceries.

Do you help your mom financially too?

We had the best Christmas. We always had tons of food.

In September of 2024. Oh, you didn't worry about it until you retired?

Oh, wow.

How are you dealing with worrying for the first time? That's a totally new experience for you.

Hast du ein Bild davon gehabt, wie dein Vertrauen sein wird?

Nach der Pause gehen wir in die Woche von Cherries ein.

Das ist Cherry. Sie lebt in Boston, Massachusetts.

Total for day one, $73.50.

Was kaufst du?

Wie viele Boots hast du?

Und wie lange bist du verabschiedet?

We talked on the phone before she headed out from North Carolina for her next drive to South Carolina and then on to Louisiana. Maxine is one of about three and a half million truckers in the U.S. who literally make the rest of our lives possible. She is an indispensable part of American life. And like a lot of truckers, she is not making enough to get by. Maxine works hard.

Maxine had already bought the food she needed the day before, so her total for day one was zero dollars.

Are you in the truck right now? I am. Yeah, will you just kind of describe the inside of it to me? Like, what would I see if I was in there?

As long as Maxine stays at her current job, she's always driving the same truck. So all these things in her kitchen, plus the tea and the extra mattress and an old picture of her son's basketball team, make the truck she spends so much time in feel more like her own.

Week after week, she barely buys anything. And still, she can't always pay her bills. And she is not alone. This week, we're going to follow Maxine through a week of her life on the road and hear the benefits and the price of life as a trucker. I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is what we spend. The first thing to know about trucking is that the pay is confusing.

Your 34-hour reset is the amount of time you're required to take off before starting a new work week. So a driver is only allowed to work 70 hours in an eight-day period, and then they have to take that break.

Total for day three, $16 at Love's Truck Stop.

Maxine loves to listen to music while she drives. Mostly gospel, rock and roll, a little country. But she also loves opera, and she loves to sing. So in her downtime, she's learning to sing O Mio Papi No Caro.

Total for day four, $26.

Can I ask, like, this part of your job that's like, OK, I don't get paid if all of these things happen with my truck or with the load. How does that make you feel?

Companies typically choose how to pay based on the kind of route someone is driving. So hourly pay is more likely for local routes with frequent stops in a smaller area. But most long-haul truckers like Maxine are paid by the mile, not hours worked. How much you earn per mile is a calculation of a bunch of factors.

Maxine kind of is abandoned. Ever since the 1980s, the trucking industry has become increasingly deregulated. And now there's no law that says trucking companies have to cover expenses like parking or supplies. So it's left up to truckers to figure out how to get through the job and then how to pay for life outside the job. And for Maxine, she can no longer make both things work.

After months of working 14-hour days and waiting, waiting, waiting for her pay to improve so she could catch up on bills, Maxine was forced to make a really hard decision. She decided she had to give up her apartment. After day five, she headed back to North Carolina and started packing up.

What you're carrying, how far you're driving, who you're driving for, and how many years you've been doing this. But no matter your rate, you only earn that if you're moving, on the road with a truck full of goods. How much money do you make?

Where did you go stay after you left your place? I live in a truck. You live in the truck full time?

How do you all talk to each other about that? What do you say to each other?

How much money would you need to make to be able to reliably have a home again?

If the job is paying so far below what you need to meet your basic needs, what is keeping you in this job?

Are there other jobs besides trucking that you could imagine having more stability in?

We talked before about the freedom you would feel on the road. Do you still feel that when you're driving now?

When you're talking about your long-term future that you are imagining for yourself, your dream of this land, does that include trucking? Or is your kind of long-term dream leaving trucking behind?

In the weeks after recording the episode, Maxine was still living in her truck and saving money towards the future. But she did get one piece of good news. Her company is getting her a newer truck. Thank you to Alex Leslie at the American Transportation Research Institute and Steve Vasselli. They both helped us understand the trucking industry for this episode.

If you want to know more, check out Steve's book, The Big Rig, Trucking and the Decline of the American Dream. What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maddy Sprung-Kaiser and Leah Reese Dennis.

Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira. Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Schuff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornum. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you.

Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

Rates and loads. Basically, Maxine told me that these days there's less merchandise for her to carry and she's getting paid less to carry it. That is not just a Maxine problem. The freight market has been in a recession the last few years because when manufacturing, construction and retail markets slow down, there's just less goods to carry, fewer loads.

And that means there's less work available, which leads to lower rates.

According to the most recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average trucker takes home about $57,000 a year, about $10,000 more than Maxine made last year. But remember, they're paid by the mile. So sometimes drivers like Maxine end up on the road for so long waiting for loads to come through that if they were paid hourly, they'd be making less than minimum wage.

Oh, wow.

What do you do when you don't have a paycheck come through or when you get a paycheck that's like, I owe money?

Maxine owes money to a finance company because she took out what's called a debt consolidation loan to reduce a bunch of her debt to one payment with a lower interest rate.

Is that debt from regular living expenses or is there a larger expense that is just from bills?

Maxine really doesn't have that many regular expenses. Her health insurance comes out of her pay, and then she spends about $120 a month on utilities, $80 a month on her phone, $645 a month on her car and insurance, and about $80 a month on gas. The biggest expense weighing her down is her rent, which is $1,400 a month for her one bedroom in North Carolina.

But after all that, she often has to put her groceries on her credit card.

Supplies like Maxine's paper towels aren't typically covered by trucking companies. Some companies do offer per diems to help with those kinds of travel costs, but there's no law requiring it, so more than half of trucking companies just don't. Despite that, despite the low pay and the loads and the makeshift bathroom, Maxine loves driving her truck. How did you get into it initially?

This is Maxine. She is a 60-year-old long-haul truck driver based in North Carolina. How big is the truck? Oh, this is a 53-foot trailer. Oh, that's really big, right? That's it. Yes. Do people ask you to honk your horn all the time?

So you had your parents saying you were a good driver.

But what else was it about trucking that made you be like, oh, as soon as I get the chance to do that, that's what I'm going to do?

Maxine went to trucking school in Kansas, where she learned a bunch of driving techniques that would help once she was out there on her own. Like how to turn no matter how long the wheels span. How to keep control through high-grade hills. How to see the road in front of a long-nose truck. And she learned a healthy respect for the massive machines. Learned to stay vigilant all the time.

And she loved it. What is the best part of the job?

You're getting stuff to people that they need.

I think a lot of us associate driving on big, long, open roads the way that you do with freedom. Does it feel that way to you? You feel that. You do?

After the break, we'll dive in to Maxine's week.

Maxine took time off for a few other jobs, but she's been trucking off and on for different companies since 2004. She's driven routes all over the country, but right now she works what's called a dedicated route, which means she's always delivering home goods for a specific company through the same stretch of the country.

For new parents, having kids comes with all kinds of life changes. And it can bring up all kinds of anxieties, new and old, that you have to figure out how to confront. And a lot of times, those anxieties are around money. That has definitely been true for Jay. This week, we'll take a peek into his life with a toddler and a brand new baby in the house.

Total for day two, $108.00.

On day three, Jay also had one more expected expense. His mom's cat of 15 years died, and Jay offered to help cover the death expenses.

And listen in as the week of diaries shows him something he didn't expect. I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is what we spend. how would you describe your relationship with money?

With the medicine, cough drops, and wine, plus some propane for their stove and generator and Jay's phone bill, day three's total was $345. On day three, they also had a little extra money come in. If Jay's family history means he's always looking for corners to cut and occasionally having to help out his folks, his wife's family and their money situation creates a different kind of anxiety.

They've got money to spare.

Then, a few years later, when they wanted to buy a house, his wife's parents helped them again. This time with $25,000 towards a down payment, which Jay says would have otherwise used up more than half of their savings.

You talked in your diaries about her parents giving you all money.

What about it bothers you?

Right, it puts what you have done up to that point in a totally different light.

Tell me what that means.

Oh, I see.

It lessens it.

After a tip on the haircut and buying a box of tea, the total for day five was $61.

What do you think was the biggest abstract kid money anxiety before you met kids? Pre-kids.

Jay knows that money has colored everything about how he sees the world, but he's really been trying to change that. As a religious studies professor and also a religious person himself, the way he thinks about it is, what does my life revolve around? It's what one religious scholar he loves calls an orientation point. Everyone has an orientation point.

The struggle for you was how do I shift my orientation from money to religion?

Jay and his wife are both educators. His wife works for a Waldorf school and makes $60,000 a year. Jay makes $92,000 a year. How do the two of you manage your money together? Like what's your system?

I think that's kind of beautiful. That feels like a kind of surrender.

Well, I would like, I don't know if there feels, there feels like there's something like powerful in the idea that you're saying this is bigger. Well, I'll just, let me clarify.

how do you want to talk to your kids about money?

Jay's total spending for the week was $1,034. What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maddy Sprung-Kaiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Sheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornam. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com and tell us about yourself.

Let's get into Jay's numbers. Remember, their combined income is $152,000 a year. That's before taxes and health insurance. And they share their expenses.

Jay's referring to something called private mortgage insurance, or PMI. It's a fee that banks tack onto your mortgage when your down payment isn't big enough. So Jay is paying an extra $67 a month until they pay off 20% of their mortgage.

Their utilities really fluctuate in Maine. In the summer, they usually pay $300 to $400 a month, mostly on electric. In the winter, when the heat pumps kick in, it goes up to about $1,000 a month.

Does your wife have a phone bill too?

Transportation, $280 a month for their gas and tolls. Groceries, about $800 a month.

Their car insurance is a couple hundred bucks a month. And health insurance for the family is $383 a month. Medical debt, all baby-related, $170 a month.

And what kind of care is it? What are you paying for?

A family gym membership at the YMCA is $93 a month. And they pay about $50 a month for a combo of Netflix, Spotify, Amazon Prime, and the New York Times game subscription.

When do you think like this kind of relationship with money started for you?

Jay went on to college at a prestigious university that gave him a lot of grants. His parents did help him out a little too, taking out $10,000 in loans. And then he had a work-study job to pay for books and other needs.

Jay graduated with a degree in religious studies. After college, he worked for AmeriCorps for a stipend around $11,000 and just got used to living on very little. And then, around that same time, he had an experience that made him see money differently. His parents got divorced.

He didn't see it as a kid, but now as a young adult confronting the reality of his parents' finances, he thought about the ways his mom would spend money when he was growing up and the ways that was probably shaping his spending now.

Wow.

After the break, we'll dive in to Jay's week.

Our guest today is a 38-year-old religious studies professor in Maine. He's a parent of two kids, and he's asked us not to use his real name. So we're going to call him Jay. How old are your kids?

On day one, Jay also paid a credit card bill and sent a $50 gift card to his mom for her birthday, bringing his total for the day to $400.

And how many hours of sleep are you working off of right now?

By the end of day two, Victoria is getting by as she normally does. But then a couple of things shake her off her balance.

It's not just that Victoria wants braces. She really needs them. Her problem started with some tooth pain about eight months ago.

I'm like dying here. She eventually got on the dental plan that she's paying for monthly now and she rushed to the dentist.

At 30, Victoria is starting to feel desperate for a little more stability than 35K can give her. And there is one thing that would change her salary dramatically, getting that teaching license. But that costs money. It costs time. And Victoria doesn't have either right now.

In addition to paying for her insurance, on day three, Victoria also paid rent, her internet and utilities, bringing her day's total to $1,840.19.

Are there other people in your life that have a similar relationship with money and financial situation as you right now?

So Victoria was sitting with that feeling. And then she thought about this experience she had that made her feel like she was even more underwater than she thought. Recently, she was talking to someone at the bank and they told her a stat she hadn't heard before.

This week, we'll hear what it's like for Victoria to get by on a teacher's assistant wage while she tries to answer some big questions. How do I make my situation better? How can I set myself up for the life that I want? I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is What We Spend. What was money like growing up? Tight.

On day four, Victoria paid $18.12 for Spotify. Which brings us to day five.

Day six.

ECERS and TPOT are evaluation tools that teachers use in the classroom.

On day six, Victoria bought a gift for an upcoming holiday, bringing her total for the day to $84. Day seven.

On day seven, Victoria bought one more holiday gift, coffee and a snack, bringing her total for the week to $2,300.94. How much does it cost to get your teacher's license?

And how long will that take you to have that done?

What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josefina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Sheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornum. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

It was bad. What does that mean?

Is there a time in your life when you felt the most financially at ease? Looking back, yes. When was that?

Victoria graduated with a degree in art administration. She thought she might be a curator in an art gallery. But she quickly found that those jobs didn't pay enough. So after college, she experimented with a lot of different ways to make money. From working as an assistant, to teaching piano lessons, to teaching yoga, to learning to code.

So how did you end up getting to preschool teacher assistant? So...

So like that moment for you was in part like, I'm going to go find something where I feel more engaged. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Victoria did think being a preschool teacher might be a good fit because she knew that she loved being with kids. Growing up, her mom was actually a home daycare provider.

Do you talk to them about your financial situation now?

Let's go into Victoria's numbers. As you know, she makes $35K a year before taxes. She lives with her boyfriend, who tends to cover the rent and food. His income varies. He works on cargo and with cars. But it's always less than $80K before taxes. And their expenses?

She drives almost an hour to get to the preschool, so she spends about $100 a month on gas and tolls. She does own her car, but it's on its last legs.

Groceries, $400. Wi-Fi, $120.

Crunchyroll is $12 a month.

His name is Sir Wallace. Turtle care is $20 a month. Digital storage, $1.99. Therapy, $60. Medication, $25. And she's got a few different debt payments. $525 a month for student debt, $300 a month for credit card debt, and $125 a month for medical debt. And then there's insurance.

Get Covered New Jersey is a state-run website. It helps residents compare health plans and apply for financial aid to lower monthly premiums.

How big is the, like, margin between what you make and your regular bills every month? How much wiggle do you have?

Not really there.

This is Victoria. She's 30 and lives in New Jersey. And for work, I am a preschool teacher's assistant. How old are the kids in a preschool? Four years old. What is it like to be with four-year-olds all day? Oh, I love it. They're really sweet, wonderful. The idea of spending all day with four-year-olds sounds really fun and also challenging.

What would not behind look like to you? Like, where is it that you think you should be?

Yeah.

After the break, we'll dive into Victoria's Week.

For Victoria, the biggest challenge is the salary. It's no secret that teachers don't make a lot of money in the U.S., but Victoria makes even less because she's still working towards her teacher's license. As a teacher's assistant, Victoria makes $35,000 a year, $29,000 after taxes, and that doesn't include health or dental insurance.

Victoria's preschool provides breakfast and lunch for the students, which means Victoria can often get a free meal too.

Kelly's total spending for day two was $0, with a surprise income of $1,000. And that brings us to day three. Day three turned out to have another fun surprise. Kelly helped throw a lip filler party for their clients at the med spa where she works. So as a reward, her boss said she could get a treatment for free.

Because whatever you're buying or not buying or saving or spending, at the end of the day, money is always about more than your balance. I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is What We Spend.

Kelly got gas for her car, some pretzel bites, and a Coke, bringing her total for the day to $75.

Have you ever been that carefree about money?

Total spending for day four, $144.80. Day five.

After getting coffee, Kelly went to work. She ended up buying an audiobook for $15. And then after work, she went straight to PT.

You talked a bunch in your diaries about wanting a kid.

What is the number or the situation that will tell you that you can do it?

I turn 32 in one week and I live in Salt Lake City. Kelly is one of the 42.8 million Americans who has student loan debt. And also, like a lot of her generation, she wants to buy a home and have a baby, and she's trying to figure out if it's possible to make all that work.

Altogether, Kelly's spending for the week was $581.83. What was the experience of tracking your finances for the week like?

Kelly married her husband about a year ago, and eight months ago, the two of them moved from Tennessee to Salt Lake City, Utah. Ben is an engineer for a software company, Kelly's a director of client experience at a medical spa, and she's also an online mental wellness coach.

Kelly lucked out and didn't get selected for jury duty. And in the month after we recorded this episode, her debt dropped to $200,000. What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis.

Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira. Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josefina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Sheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornam. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you.

Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

Kelly is paid hourly, but she makes about $50K a year. And Ben makes about $78K. That's before taxes and health insurance. Together, that puts them just under the average income for married couple families in Salt Lake City. How would you describe your relationship with money?

You know how you always want to know about everyone else's money? You do, right? Like, you'll see someone buying something you want or taking some amazing vacation, and you think, how can they afford that? Or you meet your friend's new girlfriend, and she has some very impressive job, and you think, how much money does she make?

What do you do on a weekly basis to manage your expenses?

OK, yeah. So walk me through your spreadsheet. So I would love to hear what all of your regular expenses are and like what you kind of typically pay in each category.

Two gym memberships, $108. Car insurance, $254.

phone payment $75, pet insurance $76, and physical therapy for $250. It helps with Kelly's chronic back pain and osteoarthritis.

They have a Costco membership, but they pay that yearly fee with the cash back they get from their credit card.

We mooch off of our families. Some of the subscriptions are on them, though. Dropbox for $12, SoundCloud for $6, Spotify for $10. Hair.

I think when it comes to money, even if you don't want to admit it, we're all a little nosy. But I don't know, I actually think that's good. I think we should be talking about money more. And all the ways, big and small, that it impacts our lives. On this show, we are actually going to do that. We are going to go somewhere that we almost never get to go.

What does that make your expenses altogether, your regular expenses?

Kelly's degree cost about $40,000 a year. And after undergrad, Kelly went on to grad school at the same university. She has a master's in mental health counseling. But as Kelly sees it now, the math doesn't make much sense. I want to ask you something about that, and I mean no judgment with this. Okay. How did you think you were going to pay off that amount of tuition?

Or were you at the time like, I know I can't pay this off. How did you think about it then?

So that's Kelly. And this week, instead of just tracking it in her spreadsheet, she's going to tell us about every dollar she spends and every feeling that comes with it. How are you feeling about tracking your finances for a week?

Yeah, me too. I will check in with you on the other side of your week. Okay.

Deep into the heart of someone else's finances. Here's how this is going to work. Each week, I'm going to introduce you to a new person from somewhere across the country. And they are going to tell us everything about their finances. How much they make, how much they want to make, what they worry about, or if they don't worry at all.

Total spending for day one, $250.38. Day two.

PCOS, or polycystic ovary syndrome, is an imbalance of hormones. It causes all kinds of problems, including excess hair growth.

And then for one week, we'll follow them through their daily routine. Every day, they'll record an audio diary with all the nitty gritty details of how they're spending their money. I mean, the coffees, the groceries, the rent that's due, the car accident that suddenly upends everything. And after that, we'll talk about what the week brought up for them, what it's made them feel.

A debt snowball is a strategy to tackle debt. It basically has you pay off your smallest debts first, and then once that's paid off, you roll the payment you were making towards that debt into your next smallest debt. And then you roll that snowball on and on and on until all your debt is paid off. Kelly loves tracking her debt snowball.

Kelly grew up in Colorado Springs, where her mom was a substitute teacher and her dad was an IT manager. What was money like growing up?

Once she's collected her bonus points, she pays that card off. Then she puts it in her desk and mostly stops using it.

For Olivia, being an actor living in New York means her financial life has been unpredictable. Like she said, she's doing what every actor dreams of. She's been on Broadway, in TV and films. She has made it. But being a working actor means you have to just keep working, keep looking for the next thing. And you have to figure out what to do when there is no next thing.

Eventually, she switches to the next card that has something to offer. She usually only really uses about three cards at a time. It's all just a points game.

On day two, Olivia bought some eggs, some cheese, and paid for one subway ride, bringing her day's total, with her credit card payments, to $940.89.

With a couple more subway rides and an after-show slice of pizza, Olivia's total for day three was $11.70. Day four.

That means Olivia's financial picture is a mix of things we usually associate with success and things we associate with hardship. I mean, she owns an apartment in New York City on the Upper West Side. And she has a platinum Amex card. But she's also been on food stamps. And in the past, she's had to rely on unemployment. In fact, when we talked, she was about to be on unemployment again.

So like you're just going out there cold.

I loved hearing how you spent your days at the theater. And I was curious if being a standby was like, oh, hell yeah, I get paid to play Uno with these guys that I have fun with. Or if it's like, man, I really wish I was on stage. Or if it's something in between those things.

Like, no. Olivia had never been an understudy before COVID, but the first time she took an understudy role, when she really needed a job, she actually loved it.

This week, we're going to follow Olivia through her last week in her Broadway show, and we'll hear how she feels as she gets closer every day to another phase of uncertainty. I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is What We Spend.

After her second show, Olivia took a cab home for $26. She also spent $34 on two tickets to a movie, which brings her total for the day to $73.20. Day 5

Broadway Bowling is a weekly event when actors and staff of Broadway and off-Broadway shows go bowling together. So should you find yourself in Midtown at midnight, you could go watch Team Hamilton and Team Chicago face off.

Without any bowling expenses, Olivia's total for Day 5 was $25.80.

How does that kind of instability feel? I'm completely used to it. It feels like you're used to it. And actually, I had the experience listening to your diaries. I was like, oh, wow, she is talking about this really big shift coming in a very matter-of-fact way.

I guess I'm curious though for you, like when you are stressed about it, what is it that keeps you up at night?

You've never been stressed about money like that?

With one more train ride home, Olivia's total spending for day six was $184.80. All right, audio diary, final day.

On day seven, Olivia also bought tickets to three shows, which, combined with subway rides, brought her total for the day to $156.90. Altogether, Olivia's spending for the week was $1,401.99.

Olivia's dad was a sushi chef who moved to the U.S. from Japan in his late 20s. Her mom was a stay-at-home parent who moved to New York to be a ballet dancer. And when Olivia was growing up, they all lived together in a one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan.

If you had to describe to people the feeling of being an actor, how would you describe the feeling of the experience that you have?

All over the place. But also like it's helping me understand because in part it feels like you're not so so stressed about the instability and the downtime because in part that's like kind of where the good stuff is. Like that's how you know that you're getting to go like pursue other roles. Yeah. You're not going to be.

What we spend is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written and hosted by me, Courtney Harrell. Our producers are Margo Gray and Kristen Torres. Our editor is Jonathan Menjivar. Our executive producers are Maris Brunkheiser and Leah Reese Dennis. Theme song and original music by Matt McGinley. Additional music from APM Music. Mixing by Pedro Alvira.

Special thanks to Melissa Akiko Slaughter, Joel Lovell, Jenna Weiss-Berman, J.D. Crowley, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Sheff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman, and Hilary Van Ornam. If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast at gmail.com.

Will you walk me through what your resume looks like on paper?

Wow. And that's still your rule that you go back?

Let's go into Olivia's numbers. Olivia's income varies from month to month and year to year, depending on what acting job she gets. But for now, she's making between $60,000 and $70,000 a year. That's before taxes and health insurance. And about 50% of that money is from her most recent Broadway show. She lives alone, so all of her expenses are on her.

I rode 35 because that's what I was billed last month. So that's $2,122 a month for housing-related expenses. My phone bill is $50. We're on the family plan. We each pay 50 bucks. Transportation on the subway? About $200 a month. ClassPass for exercise classes, $17 a month.

You're doing a community service. I'm doing a community service, yeah. Her streaming services are about 60 a month. Groceries, 400 a month.

She already paid for her insurance for the year in one big payment that was a little under $2,000, so that's not a monthly consideration. But there is one more thing. She regularly buys tickets to Broadway shows.

It's up there with food.

Was there a moment in your life that you knew that that's what you wanted to do?

Olivia got that check thanks to something known as the Coogan Law. It says that 15% of a child actor's earnings have to be placed in a trust until they turn 18. How big was that check?

It may not be up to her, but Olivia says if you can get it, even a few days as a guest star on a network TV show can keep you afloat while you keep doing the theater that doesn't pay as much. But it's hard to know when those jobs will come.

Sometimes, even when she does get a gig, it doesn't last long. Like the job Olivia had during the week of her audio diaries. She knew that would be temporary, because the show had a limited run. For that job, she was offered the role of the understudy for one of the main characters.

As an understudy, Olivia got the same base pay as she would have if she were performing on stage, so there was no financial downside to taking it. But it did mean she wouldn't be acting every night, which is what she loves. What do you love about it?

After the break, we'll dive into Olivia's week.

Total for day one, $8.70.

You have the most intricate credit card system I've ever heard. I think that I counted 15 cards.

Basically, what Olivia does is she finds a credit card that has some kind of big points offer. Like, open this card, spend $3,000 in the first three months, and you get 100,000 bonus points.