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Comment by silisili | Hacker News Reader

Same. I make decent money and used to save thousands per month. Now I'm lucky to stash away high hundreds a month, but any expense like new brakes wipes that out.

I wonder how in the world everyone else is getting by. Maybe we're all just smiling and pretending here...

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How? Where is all of your money going?

Without going into deep details and a budget... everything has gotten more expensive. Groceries are at least double what they were, over $1000 a month. Summer electric bill is over $300. Internet is now $140 a month. Health insurance is now over $500 per month, and that doesn't even cover the out of pocket stuff I have to pay with the kid's various visits. All streaming services have increased in price. And so on and so on.

I could go on and on, I'm sure I sound like a 'back in my day' old man. But the 'my day' in this case was just 5 years ago...

Some comparisons. My electricity (large SFH with 2 people) is 35$ a month (11c kWh)(in Seattle I let the 2nd floor get hot and only turn on AC from like 4-7pm, and most appliances are fairly energy efficient. So I’m not sure how to spend more electricity without an EV). My internet is maybe 70$ for 1gb (which I’ve never maxed out and could lower to like 300mb if needed) for Xfinity.

Seattle is one of the most temperate regions in the USA. Outside of Alaska I doubt there's significantly lower AC use anywhere in the USA.

A quick Google search shows ~60% of households in Washington state don't even own an air conditioner. Compare that to nearly every home in the south, Atlantic states, and Midwest where AC is near universal.

No disputing that. Though the days of not having AC are numbered. Summers have been having many hot days. It’s 86F today.

Anyways all this really shows is to compare inflation what matters is price per kWh over time right? That excludes variations in usage.

Another thing to keep in mind, my utility company says my household is in the bottom 15 percent of comparable houses! So just because it’s temperate doesn’t mean individual choice can’t make a difference :)

I don't understand how it's possible to go from thousands a month in savings to almost none. That's at a minimum an extra 24k in spending. Sure prices have gone up but not that much

I live alone and just realized I’ve been spending $1300/month this year on groceries. For one person.

325/week ?? You live in a big city? We spend that for a family of 5 but we don’t buy a lot of snacks….

Groceries? That seems insane. I rarely eat out when I'm not traveling and I would be surprised if I spent a third that when I was home and don't especially go for cheap food.

Groceries are definitely my biggest pain point today. In 2018, for a family of 3, we used to spend about $120 to $150 per week in groceries.

Justed check July, and we spent over $1400 in groceries. That's from Walmart, not Whole Foods or some such. And we're in a low to medium COL city.

Sure, we could cut back to more staple stuff(more beans, less meats) if needed, I'm just illustrating how much the price of things have increased!

I don’t understand how you can spend so much. Even with inflation we (family of 4, cooling all meals at home) are at less than 800€/$ per month.

And we eat meat nearly all meals.

We spend less than that for a 4-person household in San Francisco. We buy at Costco, Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and the Asian markets. I think meat and fruit are our biggest expenses. If we only ate eggs and vegetables, spending would be much lower.

That's for one adult eating 3 meals at home, 2 eating 2 meals at home, and 1 eating 1 meal at home.

https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/03/29/killing-your-1000...

Inflation’s bad but it hasn’t gotten _that bad_ yet. If you’re spending $1300 per month for groceries for _one_ person you’re surely getting high end, organic everything.

That sounds like a you problem. I spend $400/month and that would be a lot lower without an obsessive cycling habit which necessitates eating about double the calories of a more sedentary individual my size.

Like please share a receipt that shows how you spent $325 for one week's groceries. $43/day?? Maybe you're eating fresh fish every meal?

I spend about $2,200 on a family of 4 and I really don't budget or plan meals very well at all so I think this is probably a choices thing on your part. If I did it properly I could probably get away with $1,500 a month. Not a critique though, if you have the money and that's what you want to spend, more power to you.

As many other have pointed out, that seems bonkers. We’ve spent $1,128 in the past 30 days for 6 people and that includes back-to-school supplies, some sports equipment for fall sports. We buy mostly organic fruits and vegetables, milk, beef, and chicken and have a meat protein in every meal. Even that seems absurd. We use Costco for everything we can, a weekly trip to Walmart to fill out the smaller things, and Sprouts for veggies and fruit.

If you’re paying that much for groceries, one trip to Costco or Sam’s Club will probably pay for the membership.

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