Poor Man Survival

Self Reliance tools for independent minded people…

ISSN 2161-5543

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

"Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple."
-- Dr. Seuss

States where the middle class is shrinking fastest

Every time I look, my costs for anything government related go up…My property taxes are going up, postal rates will increase again in late April, our water bill is going up again, our health insurance premiums have already more than doubled via Obamacare.

Even my electric co-op tacked on another $50 annual fee citing higher wholesale energy prices…funny, I thought they went down!?

The only thing that didn’t go up is my income [that has decreased as fewer folks are buying what we sell at either online stores we operate] but it seems politicians and the people who feed off the system are making a killing off the American taxpayer – there are now more millionaires in Baltimore and near the DC beltway than anywhere else.

The American economy is by many measures well on the road to full recovery. The national unemployment rate was 6.2% in 2013, down from 9.3% in 2009; U.S. gross domestic product grew 5% in the third quarter of 2014; and the S&P 500 recently reached its all time high.

And yet the middle class, which historically was the driver of economic growth, is falling behind. The average income among middle-class families shrank by 4.3% between 2009 and 2013, while incomes among the wealthiest 20% of American households grew by 0.4%.

Based on average pre-tax income earned by the third quintile, or the middle 20% of earners in each state, middle-class incomes in California declined the most in the country. Incomes among middle-class Californian households fell by nearly 7% between 2009 and 2013, while income among the state’s fifth quintile, or the top 20% of state earners, grew by 1.3%.

https://homes.yahoo.com/news/states-where-the-middle-class-is-shrinking-fastest-194711986.html

Fat Cats Feeding at the Public Trough at Your Expense are doing Mighty Fine

Thanks to wildly out of control government spending, the Washington D.C. region is absolutely swimming in cash. In fact, at this point the state of Maryland has the most millionaires per capita in the entire nation and it isn’t even close. If you have never lived there, it is hard to describe what the D.C. area is like. Every weekday morning, hordes of lawyers, lobbyists and government bureaucrats descend upon D.C. from the surrounding suburbs. And at the end of the day, the process goes in reverse. Everyone is just trying to get their piece of the pie, and it is a pie that just keeps on growing as government salaries, government contracts and government giveaways just get larger and larger. Of course our founders never intended for this to happen. They wanted a very small and simple federal government. Sadly, today we have the most bloated central government in the history of the planet and it gets worse with each passing year…and your tax dollars are allowing these parasites to breed!

“Do you have 3 months emergency funds to cover expenses in case of sickness, job loss, or economic downturn?”

When the coming economic crisis strikes, more than half the country is going to be financially wiped out within weeks. At this point, more than 60 percent of all Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, and a whopping 24 percent of the country has more credit card debt than emergency savings. One of the primary principles that any of these “financial experts” that you see on television will teach you is to have a cushion to fall back on. At the very least, you never know when unexpected expenses like major car repairs or medical bills will come along. And in the event of a major economic collapse, if you do not have any financial cushion at all you will be at serious risk.

>24 percent of all Americans have more credit card debt than emergency savings.

>That same survey discovered that an additional 13 percent of all Americans do not have any credit card debt, but they do not have a single penny of emergency savings either.

> At this point, approximately 62 percent of all Americans are living paycheck to paycheck

A different study discovered that less than one out of every four Americans has enough money stored away to cover six months of expenses.

Today, the average American household is carrying a grand total of 203,163 dollars of debt.

It is estimated that less than 10 percent of the entire U.S. population owns any gold or silver for investment purposes.

48 percent of all Americans do not have any emergency supplies in their homes whatsoever.

53 percent of all Americans do not even have a minimum three day supply of nonperishable food and water in their homes.

Resources you can use to save money

No More Dryer Sheets

Tired of paying for dryer sheets? Try wadding up some aluminum foil and tossing it in the dryer. There will be no chemicals used, and you'll find no static cling either!

Save Money With This Alternative To Dryer Sheets

Soap Making 101 - How To Make Cold Process Soap

30 Clever Hacks to Make Your Stuff Last Longer

Hints from Heloise have morphed into what we call hacks today. Did you know that a stalk of celery can keep bread fresher longer? How about storing ice cream containers upside down to prevent freezer burn? Here are more clever hacks.

Looking for freebies? Don't Google "free stuff!" Instead, here are some organizations, bloggers, and services that specialize in finding or offering everything from merchandise to a place to stay for free.

Fireplace Cleanup a Breeze

With a brutal winter in place many have given their fireplace a workout which means it will need to be cleaned. To sweep it out without getting ash everywhere, sprinkle damp used coffee grounds on the piles of ash inside the fireplace and sweep it out.

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How to Survive the…

War on Middle Class and All 10 Bonus Reports can be downloaded here:

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Yours for better living,

Bruce ‘the Poor Man’

I support you so it would be nice to see you support our efforts!