Thanks for visiting Ultimate Money Blog! If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Five years ago Mr. Money and I lived in Colorado. We were both working for a RadioShack store and Mr. Money was also teaching snowboarding. While we worked at RadioShack, we met this very nice woman who bred miniature horses. She was so sweet and kind, and the pictures of her horses she brought in were beautiful. She knew that I had grown up riding and training horses, and one day she asked me if I’d be interested in working with the horses. I couldn’t say yes any faster than I did. So I quit my job (with health insurance) and we moved out of our condo into a house on her property. We agreed that she would pay us $10 an hour each for our work. I would be responsible for cleaning barns, breeding horses, doing paperwork, and any other things she wanted me to do. Mr. Money would be the handyman. Fine and dandy, right? We thought that because [...]

Seriously? 17.5% unemployment? Yes, if the government would measure unemployment as they did 80 years ago.  The government’s calculation of 7.2% unemployment does not take into consideration millions of Americans who could not find a job or could not get full time employment.  So, if you’re that person with the master’s degree that’s working part time at your local grocery store, you’re not included in the calculation.  Technically you have a job. The government also tracks the “U-6″ rate, which includes discouraged and underemployed workers.  Right now it’s 13.5%.  Currently we’re at a 15 year high for unemployment.  The number of Americans filing for unemployment is at its highest level in a quarter of a century. During the Great Depression, unemployment hit 25%.  But that wasn’t until 4 years after the stock market crash.  1 in 4 Americans was out of a job.  We think 7.2% (or 17.5%) is bad?  Hopefully we won’t see 25%.  That would be devastating.   My advice?  If you’ve got a job, thank your lucky stars.  Keep saving all you can, and be as thrifty [...]

A few months ago I decided I had enough of my current position and that I needed a change.  I was tired of supervising and being responsible for everything on the teller line.  When they eliminated my office manager position in February, I decided to give the teller supervisor position a try.  I kept the same pay, but my job responsibilities greatly shifted.  Instead of being responsible for opening accounts, meeting sales goals, and managing the office, I was in charge of the teller line and spent every day working as a teller while supervising the staff.  It just wasn’t something I was interested in.  I figured I had a few options: quit and find a new job, look for a new position within the company, or go part time and transfer to a new branch.  All sounded good to me, but I didn’t really want to give up my 5 years seniority plus vacation time. I decided that the best idea would be to try to find a new position within the company.  I searched the available postings and [...]