what do you do if it's costing you more to work then what you pull in each month?

Question

I'm a mom of one and I live in a area were job's are few and they don't pay well. Gas prices are crazy $3.15. Day care is expensive. I pay more to go to work then what I pay for bills sad huh and I don't want to go to Department of Human services cause there so hard to get any help from you have to be on the streets or have 5 kids to acept you and well I just don't want to go to that. So what do I do just deal with it I think it's too bad that they don't help out Mother's that want to work and do they just make it harder on us to get by. If anyone has any ideas on what I could do let me know. Thanks

Answer 1

First, you need to quit your job, if it is literally costing you more to go to work than you make. Then, don't assume you know how much aid you qualify, actually go there and find out. If you are a single mother with a minimum wage job, you should qualify for at least foodstamps. They may be able to help you find less expensive childcare. If your child is young enough, go to WIC. Figure out how to cut your expenses. Can you carpool, not have cable, turn your thermostat down 5 degrees, replace your lightbulbs with compact fluorescents, buy your clothes from thrift/consignment stores, get a roommate, etc? Now, find a job that pays more or at least costs you less (eg., closer to your home). Maybe you can babysit in the evenings for extra cash. My teenage daughter makes $8 - 11/hr this way. Do you like dogs? People pay $30 or more a day for petsitting. Are you a licensed driver who does not hate the elderly? You can probably bring your child along and make extra $ giving older people rides to the grocery store, dr., etc. What about child support? Most areas have free legal help to help you get it, and if you try to get welfare, the state will pursue the parent for it. Good luck, it's hard to get by when so much of your pay has to go to childcare, but it can be done.

Answer 2

I don't understand why you wouldn't even want to get their help with food stamps, medical and day care.

My daughter makes good money, but she's in a HIGH income level state. Her state considers anyone making less than $42,000 a year, LOW INCOME! I was shocked to hear this! But she does at least get help with her day care and the childs medical.

Keep networking in the mean time! Constantly be looking for that better paying job! May be consider takeing some school courses............low income people can find free schooling too or close to nothing!

Good luck!

Answer 3

I think that title 20 day care could help, also food stamps, and maybe some help with insurance for your child. You might also qualify for section 8 housing assistance.
Yes, you will have to prove your situation, but it could be worth it for the peace of mind it will bring you.
It would be good to have these things online, because what if something happens to your car? and you don't have the money to fix it?

We all do what we have to do to provide for our kids.
It might also be a good idea to go to the community college in your area and see if some of the technical classes are free there. They are in my area. If you improved your skills, you could get a better job, and this wouldn't be so much of a problem.

Good luck!

Answer 4

the government would not very own 0.5 the residences in this usa. i think that maximum residences have mortgages utilized to them and regrettably lots of those loans have defaulted and the banks are leaving at the back of those residences which then become the priority of close by governments. this is no longer a stable place for communities using fact the residences could be policed and maintained or torn down this is costing persons money. the priority is that investment banks did no longer do their suitable due diligence and then abandoned their duty and flow them to each physique individuals. interior the interim, using fact they have been waiting to renege on their household projects and positioned them on each and every tax payers, they have been waiting to earn checklist salaries and bonuses. do no longer confuse this difficulty. The nightmare is that this is a worldwide concern with credit crunch and scarcity of credit by way of many international locations who have been additionally enjoying charade earnings. an excellent type of world places are bankrupt which incorporate eire, Iceland, Greece etc - each and each for comparable motives. we could be very careful approximately making specific we positioned money into our baby's futures so as that we are able to compete against the impending economically stable so-noted as BRIC worldwide places.

Answer 5

We have a similar problem. It costs us more money to run our business than we make from it. There are the two of us, married, and two children. What i'm trying to do is to become as self-sufficient as possible, so we make our own bread, spreads for the bread, soya milk, soap, washing up liquid (both from waste cooking oil and caustic soda), muesli and we get a lot of food from wild plants. You need food, clothes and shelter. Shelter means paying rent for most people, but we have an arrangement where we look after a house for the owner to prevent it getting broken into, so our housing is sorted out. Food we get from the sources i mentioned, and it's a bit of a struggle. We could also get food from local temples which has been left as an offering, and get it from the market when it's thrown away at the end of the day. I'm also thinking of trying to grow fruit and veg in water with added minerals. Clothes are not much of a problem - we buy most of them in charity shops and they cost very little. Shoes are more problematic.

Heating - we use halogen heaters, which are the cheapest way to heat a house with bought stuff if you have electricity. We don't use gas. For the telephone, we are members of a telephone co-operative which pays a dividend and is much cheaper than the more popular 'phone companies. You might see a telephone as a luxury, but we need it because we need clients. We share the car with my brother, and it's our biggest expense. I personally see the car as a luxury. Incidentally, you can get restaurants to give you their oil and convert it using potassium hydroxide to use in a diesel engine, but there is a quota limit on that. Some engines will burn cooking oil on its own.

Besides that, we get free stuff on Freecycle. This is a group organised on Yahoo and probably elsewhere where people who don't want stuff can give it away to people who want it instead of discarding it. There's also LETS - Local Exchange Trading Systems. This is a scheme where you offer goods or services for which you get credit which you can then use to get other people's goods or services which you wouldn't be able to get just by swapping. Unfortunately it collapsed in our area due to a greedy farm, but it has recently restarted. I made candles by getting beeswax from a beekeeper, so that was lighting. Then there's just plain barter - do things for other people and have them "pay" you in kind.

You can also gather wood to burn for fuel and make burnable bricks and toilet paper out of junk mail.

It's very hard but not totally impossible. The biggest problem is housing, which is solved for us but i know we are very lucky. You need to know quite a lot to do things this way but it's very empowering because you don't need "them" if you live like this.

Our basic problem is that we can't get anyone actually to employ us, so we have to be self-employed, but we don't get paid much.

Oh yes, and historically we have also prayed a lot.

Answer 6

If you live in a neighborhood where there are lots of young kids around, why not find out from Family Services what it takes for you to get a license and watch kids in your own home during the day.
Then, you could also study courses on-line from home to help you get a degree.

Answer 7

Swallow your pride - go to the Dept of Human Services and see what you can get.
It's your duty as a parent to do what's best for the family.
Check local churches and such and see if there is lower cost day care available - sometimes they offer scholarships.
Good luck.

Answer 8

Since you have access to a PC go to www.west.com, www.alpineaccess.com, and www.liveops.com
All three are work at home and you can support yourself pretty well with one or two of the sites. You can work long hours too because you'll be at home. The only other thing you will need is headphones.

Answer 9

if the need is that extreme, you might consider taking in just a few children for daycare and charge reasonably. Their mothers will be grateful and you will not have to leave the house except for groceries.

Answer 10

If you are working to support you're child good for you. If you need help check what is available for you. Don't give up. You are to be commended for you're effort.