Pennywise wrote: Buy only inexpensive cosmetics, or none at all. Cut your own hair. "I spend $7.99 on my hair color (thank you, L'Oreal) and get a lot of compliments. Just sayin'."

"Scavenge at curbs or nab discarded items on campus discarded by rich students."

Oh for the love of god. This is not why I went to grad school! I live in an expensive city. My haircuts cost an average of $180 a visit. I'm sorry, but I'm not a hobo.

If I can't impulse buy, I don't want to be part of your revolution!

Thanks for the laugh. But $180 a pop? Yowza. That's my family's whole grocery bill for a week!

It's not like I cut my hair every week. Once a month or once every six weeks usually does the job.

But seriously, I hope you're not serious about some of this advice. Don't have kids? Shop for the kids you do have at good will?

I would expect such tips if academics were a bunch of homeless people. If you're reduced to scavenging your campus for the droppings of rich students, it's time to get a new job.

Hey, I'm just summarizing what was said in the forum. You know, it's like Fox News: We report, you decide. Only here the emphasis is actually on report, instead of distort.

I don't follow all the advice. I'm just reporting some key themes, in the event they do someone else some good.

That said, yes, I've scored some amazing stuff at Goodwill. And I think that when you're on a posh campus and you walk past a very nice leather armchair someone has left on the curb, throwing it in the car trunk before heading home is perfectly legit. Perk of the job.

Well, pterodactyl123--
You must either be a business professor, a medical professor or an administrator because those are the only folks I know of in academia that are still doing well enough not to have to take cost-saving measures.

Let's review. I have $40,000 in student loans from a PhD I had to get in order to keep my job. As soon as I was awarded my tenure-track job after a nation-wide search, the state I teach in cut all our pay by 3%, my department changed a long-standing policy and only allowed us to teach one extra class per year during summer and winter breaks instead of two. Student loan payments kicked in at over $5,000 per year -- and cuts at work reduced my salary by over $80000.

I use Freecycle, I shop at Goodwill and Saint Vincent DePaul and I cut coupons. My splurge is also my hair, but I pay $55 every six weeks for a cut and color. You had better look fantastic for what you're paying.

Stop knocking others. It's easy to say "time to get a new job." Where? You remind me of the business professors at my university busy blocking a union because they get paid enough -- roughly twice what profs in other departments do.

Until you've experienced it yourself, I suggest you stop swinging at people for shopping at Goodwill. (By the way, it's good for the environment.)

"Bake bread"

Maybe to get really tasty bread this is the way to go, but I find bread is one of the cheapest foods you can buy. And baking it isn't THAT trivial.

Sometimes it's a time vs. money issue. I can save money by spending far more time doing something. But at a certain point you have to ask yourself how much money your time is worth.

I'm not saying that I haven't taken cost-saving measures. All I said was that if you're making adjustments that are more frugal than how you lived as a grad student, then it's time to reconsider your career options.

I teach at a large public school in the humanities. We have a good union. I just get tired of reading CHE's endless sequel about how much people must sacrifice if they want to teach in higher ed. It's ridiculous and does nothing to foster the kind of change that people keep claiming they want to see. Ask for a raise, darnit!

My hair does look fantastic, by the way! :)

If memory serves the person baked on a weekend evening and made enough for the whole week, probably the sort of person for whom baking is therapeutic.

As the discussion indicates, these things are going to be highly personal based on sense of dignity, estimation of relative savings, &c. (I, for instance, definitely missed the boat when it came to the thought of not having kids. And I'm very happy I did.) Money isn't money alone; it's psychology and values too. I'm hoping to write a bit more on that over time.

I'm still curious as to whether others have personal favorites as to how they are frugal.

pterodactyl123, What you see as undignified others may see as necessity or opportunity. You also see frugality as sacrifice, when I was hoping with my Freecycle examples to show that one can have one's cake--or mahogany bookshelf--and eat it too. (Well, not the mahogany bookshelf.) So what you see as ridiculous others might see as wise.

I wonder if pterodactyl123 has children or not. I shop at consignment shops & garage sales for the children & grandchildren and so do their parents. These are great places to find clothes that are name brand, barely used, or some even new with tags for cheap. Our family encourages the tykes to PLAY without fear of messing up their designer threads. I agree with bertnb - don't knock 'til you try it.

BTW - none of us have ever been accused of looking like a hobo in our gently used clothes.

Yes. Save money on clothes, furnishings, etc. at Goodwill, flea markets, etc.

Then spend a fortune exterminating the BED BUGS that you will also get with that bargain!

These critters are rampant, as you probably know, and RULE ONE to avoiding them is NEVER take used furniture of any type into your home.

I would think you could get them or LICE (another pest that is apparently enjoying a resurgence) from used clothing. And although it does not cost as much to de-lice a kid, the process is quite unpleasant, I understand.

Pennywise -- pound foolish.

I make my own compost out of grass clippings, leaves and other vegetable scraps from my kitchen. I cook most of my meals from scratch. I try to buy green when I can and use public transportation, commuter trains and buses. I buy at consignment, thrift stores, dollar stores, discount and sales racks and shelves. I try to reduce, re-use and recycle the things I buy and use. I use interlibrary loan, rather than buy a book. I use my university and local public library to borrow a DVD or VHS tape to avoid Netflix and Blockbuster. But yes, I splurge occassionally for a book, a restaurant, a movie in a theater, a gift for my wife or children, repairs to my 6 year old car, and a water heater that failed in my home. There are so many things we can do to cut our costs and live more simply. There are so many causes and issues that money could be put to good use or to invest for our retirement. It is a matter of awareness and conscious choice.

So far no lice from my mahogany bookcase.

Saving money:

1) At restaurants where some items are all-you-can-eat, eat those items for that meal and take home your actual "meal."

2) Never, ever buy fiction (use the library.) Here's how: every time you read a book review and have interest, add it to your request list at the public library. Go once/week to pick up all the books they have nicely assembled for you. You will end up often reading a brand new book no one has had before you, if you work fast.

3) Never ever pay for a beaty treatment you can do at home. Invest in quality manicure tools.

4) Drugstore makeup is little worse than high-end, but facial treatment products can be. Get samples of high-end treatments from Sephora, see which are worth the $ and buy them after googling for price. (If you become a good customer, you'll get 20% off sales for your pricey sera and creams.)

5) Never put high-end liquor in mixed drinks.

6) Join the cheese club at Whole Foods (ask about it.) Free cheese once/month.

7) Never eat little cups of yogurt (unless you're traveling.) Buy plain or vanilla in big tubs and mix in your own extras (generally much less sugar that way, too.)

8) Buy cheaper (or no) meat and better produce. More pleasure, better health, less money overall.

9) Carry protein bars or little bags of almonds with you at all times, plus water. Never ever purchase "snacks" when you're running errands.

10) Experiment with cutting your use of "product" in half. Most cosmetics, shampoo, cleaners, detergents, etc. can be used in much smaller quantities than you think with no decrement in effect.

11) Give yourself time to adjust to new temperature levels when you're reducing use of heat and AC. Over time, we are perfectly comfortable with 65 degrees in winter and 80 degrees in the summer. Adjust clothing to suit and move it one degree per month or per season.

12) Keep your eyes open for style (mags, internet, etc.) but purchase look-alikes at Target. The jewelry, e.g., that is touted for hundreds in Lucky can be found (no doubt different, but visually indistinguishable) at Target for tens.

pterodactyl123 says "ask for a raise." In some fields the powers that be simply say, no.
The consumption cycle must be reduced, the advice in this post promote things that will slow down this cycle. It is simply insane that when we buy a couple of green peppers we put them into a plastic bag and those polymers will be on this planet until the sun goes supernova in a few billion years.
Impulse buying is false expression of freedom within the ideology of consumer culture. It is not freedom though, it is slavery to the economic calculus, to the market as the source of all value. It is unique to our society of the past few decades.
In fact, what seems common sense to you, is actually the ideological apparatus of culture dictating who you will be and what you will do.
Posts like this suggest a means to reject part of that apparatus and are far truer expressions of freedom than a $180 haircut.

Saving money is much like how Carl Von Clausewitz's once described how to wage war. The rules are relatively simple to learn, but because of something he called "friction," even the simplist of things become incredibly difficult to do in practice.

That said, here are the Cliff's Notes for saving money: Try very hard to always want less than you already have. After that, everthing else is cake.

I have always been terrible at saving money and being frugal. Moving from one side of the country to the other (and from an extended day charter school to a Catholic school) saw my income cut in half...the kicker, I have more money saved away now than I ever did making 2x the money! Can anyone explain it to me?

Here are some of my tricks:

1. Transfer money from checking to savings the very day you get paid. For whatever reason, once the money is in my savings account I have a hard time spending it.

2. Determine a specific amount of money to put in savings at each paycheck.

3. Seperate accounts. Between my husband and I we have 5 bank accounts, we each have a savings, a checking, and then we have a joint checking account. Our household expenses come out of the joint account, we each contribute to the joint account which is for household bills, insurance, eating out, etc. We each save away money for both personal and couple things, and we have our independent checking accounts. We each have our little interests that we spend money on, and by keeping seperate accounts we don't pick at each other's spending habits!

4. 2nd hand stores, especially higher end store, like Buffalo Exchange. I find Marc Jacobs dresses regularly for a quarter of the price, and they are very selective about what they'll buy.

5. Biking to work/school-I will be biking to school every day, which saves me the ridiculous cost of a student parking pass, gas money, and car upkeep, as well as the mental exhaustion that comes with trying to find a parking space at my University!

6. Packing a lunch, though this has to include an initial investment. I hate eating the same thing day after day, therefore, I make sure to have yummy food at home to pack!

7. Find your local ethnic grocery. A local gas station sells all the middle eastern/eastern european food that you could want. Fresh feta for 4 dollars a pound!

8. Enjoy your backyard/front porch/neighborhood. We find such joy sitting on our cement slab of a porch watching neighborhood traffic- add a couple beers and some friends, and it's a great time! We take our dog walking along the river and go bike riding around town, all of which cost us nothing!

Pterodactyl is, unfortunately, typical of the attitude of the "haves" toward the "have nots": "I'm doing all right, what's your problem?" Such people always have an easy answer to everyone else's woes: "Get another job!" (Have you taken a look at the stats lately on academic hiring? Since, say, 1973?) "Join a union!" Nice if you can get one. But at the state-owned R1 where I work, unions were illegal until a year or two ago. And now that we theoretically have the right to form one, the bureaucrats are still arguing over what we're actually going to be allowed to do; and in any case, in the current political and economic climate any attempt at collective bargaining to raise our wages would create such a backlash of public hatred that the more likely result would be wholesale firings and/or a repeal of the law allowing us to organize in the first place.

The fact is, some of us entered higher education not because we wanted to be important or make a lot of money or "have the summers off" (and a good thing, too, since many of us don't actually get any of those things) but because it is our "calling"--the only thing we've ever really wanted to do, and in some cases the only thing we're really good for in today's society. That same society simultaneously generates high demand for what we do and holds us in contempt for doing it; as a result many of us are overworked and underpaid, with an hourly wage that is about the same as what high school students get for bagging groceries at the local mall.

For those of us in that situation, being frugal is not just a good idea; it is a necessity in order to survive. And for many of us, there is no realistic alternative, especially in today's economy. The bottom has fallen out of the American way of life, and it is unlikely to recover any time soon, if ever. The sad fact is that for all our intelligence, experience, advanced degrees, and all the rest, we are lucky to have any job at all--even if we do have to buy our clothes at St. Vincent's and salvage our furniture off the curb.

rachaelski recommended: "Seperate accounts. We each save away money for both personal and couple things, and we have our independent checking accounts. We each have our little interests that we spend money on, and by keeping seperate accounts we don't pick at each other's spending habits!"

I HEARTILY recommend this approach! My partner and I have set up our paychecks to go straight into savings, then we pull out just what we need to pay the bills and the household expenses. Then, each month we each get an "allowance" into separate checking accounts that covers clothing, personal maintenance, coffee and other "treats" (like ice cream), gifts for the other person, and discretionary fun things like movies/concerts/etc... basically all the things that we used to argue about when one of us thought the other person was spending too much. When one of us gives something (a card, flowers, or something bigger) to the other, even the small stuff still means something because it represents money the giver would have spent on him or herself. Plus, after being together for so long, there's something sweet about getting to take my partner "out" to the movies or being "taken out"...

I bought an iPhone4, I have an iPad, a laptop, 2 desktops, 2 cars, a house with mortgage, HBO(!), a family (with kids), I GIVE to goodwill, not TAKE because there are people worse off than myself, I donate to charity, not steal from starving mouths. We do this one ONE paycheck from a small private school that pays below the national average...because we know how to budget without being idiotic and scrounging in dumpsters. What's next? Hanging at the backdoor of the bakery for day-old donuts?

There is nothing worse than poverty snobs.

@septentriones: Ouch. It sounds like things are not going well in your neck of the woods. I'm with a for-profit, which has its own issues, yes, but at least it's hiring and seems to value even its composition instructors. PM me if you might be interested--we're in the midst of another hiring influx, so anyone with teaching experience will be welcomed with open arms.

As for all the other stuff, I'm one of those lovely crazies who bakes the family's bread on weekends, and yes, baking is therapeutic for me. If I had more time and air conditioning, I would bake every single day, and Spectacular_Husband, the Spectacular_Spawn, and I would all get fat from eating too much cake. Bread on the weekend, at least, is very easy to work into the routine. I also am very much for the preserving suggestion; if we weren't planning to move at the end of this summer (thanks to the online teaching that makes us both portable spouses), we'd be making jam, freezing, canning, and drying all sorts of seasonal fruits and veggies. Believe it or not, dried summer squash is really really lovely in winter stews--it doesn't fall apart the way fresh summer squash does.

We also shop at the discount store (yay, Marshall's!) and once my son gets big enough to really tear clothes up, I think we'll be doing more Goodwill trips. What's the sense of getting new stuff if he's just going to destroy it in the mud? And as for the lice issue, just wash the clothes in hot water before letting anyone wear them and you'll be fine.

Rachaelski's suggestion about separate accounts is also right on--we have the joint checking account, joint savings account, and then our own personal accounts. Most of the money goes into the joints for the family expenses, but then we also get a little spending money of our own that we don't have to clear with the spouse. Direct deposit can be your friend in this too, as it makes it that much easier to get the money straight into savings.

Some other tips:

For those who can't/won't give up meat (like me!), buy your meat in bulk. In fact, if possible, find someone selling pastured meat, get a big honkin' freezer, and buy yourself a half cow. When you get pastured beef by the side, it's really insanely cheap considering all the lovely steaks and roasts you get for the same price as the ground beef and chuck roast. Believe it or not, if you're buying pastured meat, chicken is actually the most expenseive thing you can eat.

Get board/card games! We've been having awesome weekly game nights with friends where everyone brings a dish to share at supper, and then we all sit down and play a game like Settlers of Cataan, Dixit, Apples to Apples, and suchlike. It's a really great way to spend time with friends without spending much money, and if you have kids over the age of five, you can often find games that will be fun for them.

At any rate, I find arguments that being frugal means living like a pauper to be silly and usually the result of a lack of information. Once you adjust your expectations and learn about the ways that you can get just as good of quality for much less (if you're willing to ignore certain status assumptions), you can often have a very comfortable life on a much smaller salary that you originally thought.

I don't even want to ask what a "poverty snob" is, but if you read the tales in the original Forum thread from the people who pick up items discarded by privileged students--the ones I was paraphrasing-- it's pretty clear that they do it because of their amazement that such items would be carelessly discarded by anyone, not because they are habitual dumpster divers. So far I've not scrounged in dumpsters or hung around for day-old donuts. Sigh.

Ah, medieval spectacle's crossed with mine, which was a response to the prior poster. (What a lovely handle, by the way, medieval spectacle.)

Thank you to trainer, optimysticynic, and rachaelski, among others, for the great ideas. Some new ones to me there.

How to live reasonably well at 150% of poverty level:

(1) First and foremost, get rid of your car(s). An automobile is an incredible resource hog, as well as your primary contribution to air pollution and global warming. This may mean changing residences so as to be closer to bus lines (preferably more than one), and taking into account which buses will get you to work and the grocery store.

(2) Second, if you own real estate, get rid of that as well. It's another huge resource hog, and more importantly it ties you down so you can't "go with the flow" of economic changes. If you live in an apartment and you end up with lousy neighbors, rising crime, or changed employment, you can move on with relative ease; if you're stuck with a house and a mortgage in a time of dropping property values and a deteriorating local economy, you may be stuck for a long time, or have to take huge losses to get out from under it. Better to jump than be pushed.

(3) Third, get rid of your cell phone, cable TV, any other monthly charges that you can live without. (In fact, you might want to consider getting rid of the TV entirely; it rots your brain, it consumes a lot of electricity, and time spent watching it is time you could be using for something more constructive.) The one exception would be decent internet service, which can largely replace all the other stuff, often at considerably less cost. And you might even be able to do without that if you have good access from work or are living near a library with free public terminals.

(4) Cancel most or all of your subscriptions to newspapers, magazines, newsletters, etc. These kill trees, take up space, distract your attention, often go mostly unread anyway--and most of the information in them is available online for free.

(5) Cancel all those "item of the month" memberships (books, music, coffee, whatever your personal vice is), and ask to be taken off the mailing lists for all the catalogs that flood your mailbox. If you don't know something exists, you won't be tempted to buy it.

(6) Get a phone with caller ID and a ringer that can be turned off; that way the phone becomes your servant instead of your master. Get a non-published or unlisted number, and sign up for all the official do-not-call lists. This may not directly save you any money, but it may reduce your stress levels considerably (thereby reducing the temptation to self-medicate with food and impulse buying), and you will not be constantly bombarded with phone calls from people who are trying to separate you from your money.

(7) Stop making long-distance phone calls if you have to pay extra for them. Many people have phone contracts with oodles of free minutes anyway; let them pay for it instead of you.

(8) Stop making all those mandatory pilgrimages to family reunions, out-of-state weddings, and other "must do" social occasions, especially if you're not particularly close to the people involved and are only going because you think you have no choice. You always have a choice--and you can choose to send your regrets instead. If they really want to see you (and not just have another warm body around the table) they can come and visit you--especially since they probably have more money and free time than you do anyway.

(9) Pay off all your credit cards and then stop using them except for dire emergencies or necessary purchases online--and even then, pay the entire bill in the next billing cycle so as to avoid paying any interest on it. Pay off all your other debts as well, and do as much as possible on a cash-only basis. This not only saves you a bundle on interest, but it also reduces impulse buying and the risk of fraudulent transactions and identity theft.

(10) Change your eating habits. Eat less meat; eat less overall; eat out a lot less, if ever. If you can get to a farmer's market, you can often get fresher, healthier foods there, and they may even be cheaper, especially if you buy in bulk. (And if you don't want to carry it all on your back, you can get a decent pullcart for less than $100, which will quickly pay for itself many times over.)

Obviously not everyone can do all of these things, but doing any of them can reduce your expenses and probably improve the quality of your life as well.

cseducation: Patronizing Goodwill or St. Vincent's is not "stealing from starving mouths." These aren't food pantries; they are stores which receive donations from the general public, recycle and/or refurbish them, and then sell them back to the general public--thereby conserving resources, contributing to the local economy, and creating jobs for people who need them. I buy from Goodwill and St. Vincent not only because they provide quality products at a better price (isn't that what capitalism is supposed to be about?) but also because it's a way of keeping people gainfully employed who might well be unemployed otherwise. I also donate to both of them, as well as to other charities, and so do many of the other people who patronize such places.

You simply don't know what you're talking about.

P.S. to cseducation: I should also add that with our local St. Vincent's stores (and I suspect many others as well), any surplus income they generate is donated directly the local food pantry. So patronizing St. Vincent's is not only not "stealing from starving mouths"; it is, in fact, helping to put food into starving mouths--food which would not be available to them if people like me stopped buying there.

Relevant to Conference Attendance - especially to people short on funds but in need of building vita and making contacts. The cost of these things - registration + lodging + food + rounds of drinks for companions + miscellaneous) are becoming outrageous.

Over more than 3 decades I have been to dozens of conferences (Geology) and do agree that, when possible pick places more fun to be around and visit when "off duty". Toronto, the
Caribbean and New Orleans were better and a lot more more fun (but not cheaper than Omaha, Detroit or Fargo).
If combined as a holiday or vacation and, within the limits of the law, at least partially an IRS deduction.

As soon as the conference is announced, begin to research the location and make on line searches regarding lodging near the HQ hotel which, regardless of "special"conference rates announced, often cost a lot more than is available at nearby hotels/motels. Especially with an AARP or AAA or other membership discount. If not within easy walking distance, then look into mass transit.
Do not reveal that you are an attendee at a conference, "just visiting friends". Likewise patronize restaurants and bars in the vicinity rather than the often rip off prices at the HQ hotel eateries and drinkeries.

Make every effort to team up with one or more other attendees to split the cost of lodging.
Tell the desk how many - I won't say how many we jammed into one room as grad students way back but that's illegal and can spoil the whole event in a local slammer.

Tempting as it may be, NEVER even touch the in room bar and snack fridge, nor order room service, nor use the hotel telephone - sometimes even local calls can be a buck or more (inquire). I have even been in some places where I could order delivery to my room of pizza or sushi or Chinese food from a nearby restaurant for only the extra cost of a few dollars tip. Some hotels may not permit this, however - then go out and bring back your own.
Then watch the TV, being careful not to order up the extra cost channels.

Airlines are getting more and more absurd in fare prices, extra cost for many things and lousy service. If available for where you want to go, and you can spare the extra travel time, check out Amtrak. They have improved their service a great deal- including reasonable priced real sit down table cloth meal service on some routes - but still have ways to go for more routes, faster transit times, and better schedule hours before they come close to matching Europe.

septentriones - I agree. I took seven carloads of stuff to Goodwill the last time I moved, and gave them top-notch stuff. I've also given away a desk chair on Freecycle that the guy who picked it up was going to give to his boy to use and really loved. So giving goes with the taking, no doubt.

Clearly, precisely what will work for one person--at one sort of college or university, in one part of the country, at one stage of life--will not work for everyone. But thinking seriously about how to consume less (thank you! says the landfill), give more back, and make judicious decisions about what trade-offs one can (and should try to) make is a Good Thing even when it is not a true necessity--as it is sadly becoming for so many people. Major moral theories converge on this. You will use less, spend less, give more, and be happier for it.

We freecycle, but where I am, the stuff people generally give away is largely junk, baby items, or hopelessly out of date technology not likely to be useful to most of the readers of CHE (coupons, ancient printers, candles, 'extra' cosmetics, etc). Freecyle in tonier areas is....well...tonier.

Things like t-shirts and athletic clothes, which are not generally things one wears in a professional context--and which can and should be washed, of course--housewares for children setting up their own apartments, sometime suitcases and things like rakes and brooms, are things that can be obtained from second-hand stores inexpensively. They won't be as gorgeous as the spiffy new ones you can buy at Target, but....really....do such things matter? If they matter to you now, is that something you should be proud of and happy about?

The swap shop at my landfill is my favorite "store." People bring what they don't need/want any longer, and others take. All year long, I pick up dictionaries, large and small, and the first couple of nights of class, I play a game with my ESL students and give them away (along with three-ring binders to hold the semester's handouts) to those who have correctly guessed the numbers I've written down. I also collect YA lit, and at the end of the semester, I bring books to the final exam, and they all get to take home whatever they want. I make them guess where the dictionaries and books came from (no, I didn't buy them or steal them from the library), and I tell them that probably their towns also have swap shops where they can get a lot more than books. I have all sorts of goodies, from hand-made oil lamps to refrigerator magnets, from the swap shop, and I make my coffee each morning in a pot that I got there. If your town doesn't have a swap shop, find out about starting one. It's more fun even than Freecycle!

Buy a PC without an operating system and install Linux (any distro) or Unix (e.g. PC-BSD).

Of all the bullet points, two I pass on are I don't scavage at the curb and I don't cut my own hair. I'm at an administrative location and not directly on campus with students, but when I was in college, I wouldn't have thought twice if I had the chance to scavange. My family inherited a lot of furniture when the campus renovated. Second, I don't cut my own hair, but I did find a cheap barber. That said, none of this is incredibly difficult to do, just takes practice and the ability to be humble regardless of income level (which I think is a life lesson worth learning).

If you would like to have children, then I hope you are ready and *really* interested in that adventure, and that you have the purse strings. Having kids is extremely costly (some estimates on NPR put it at around $250k over 18 years).

On the alcohol front; drink with spirits/liqueur and buy the jumbo 750ml or bigger bottles. The stuff keeps, you use it sparingly, and the cost is distributed over more drinks so that you end up paying cents per drink compared to beer or wine. Do the math, I find it's very tough (but possible) to find beer or wine cheaper per "average evening's buzz/effect" then it is for a comparable effect created by spirits when mixed at home and comparing similar grade materials. (comparing PBR to Don Julio is cheating, Abita to Don Julio isn't)

I like Prof. Pennywise's posted suggeestion "Don't buy magazines, newspapers, and books; use the library." Unfortunately, libraries today are facing major budget cuts which means canceled subscriptions to newspapers and magazines and lower (if not nonexistent) book budgets. It's worse for academic libraries but many public libraries are facing the same challenges. So, support your local university and public library. Use your library and voice your concern when possible budget cuts are publicized.

BTW, I'm enjoying the lively discussion on saving money.

KevinC
Reference Librarian
La Tech University

In many ways this is a commentary on not only frugality but just reducing consumerism and waste. One of the best things about buying or getting used things is the fact that you are recycling. The claims about lice and bed bugs are ridiculous, I've bought used clothing, furniture and dishes for over 20 years in five different cities and never once has this happenend to me. To anyone who questions the wisdom of this post and other comments, I suggest watching the Story of Stuff (http://www.storyofstuff.com/). It's time we really began to think critically as a culture about needs vs. wants.

That said, one of my favorite ways to save money lately is by sharing a CSA with another family. We get a weekly box of produce and it comes down to about 9 dollars a week. It's a very good deal, especially when you factor in that it is organic, locally grown food. And nothing is cheaper than growing your own. If you're new to the venture, or live in the city, check out Gayla Trail's books.

Finally, another cheap green solution is to make your own cleaning supplies out of vinegar+water (windows and countertops) and baking soda (for tougher cleaning). White vinegar is also great to throw in the laundry with clothes.

Finally, it may not sound frugal in the short run, but buying a house is much more economical than paying rent, if you can do it. Our mortgage is much lower than many of our friend's rents. And of course it's also not just money thrown away.

Maepress: Here is a link to just one of many sites and news stories noting the danger of bedbugs in used furniture. The significant increase in bedbugs and lice infestations is relatively recent -- esp. bedbugs.

http://bedbugger.com/2006/11/30/used-furniture-may-contain-bed-bugs/

I agree that most of us have too much stuff. I prefer spending money on experiences -- travel, dinner at a wonderful (and not necessarily expensive) restaurant, the theatre, ballet, etc.

One can have too much stuff no matter how it is acquired and I have found the people I know who buy at thrift shops, dumpster dive, buy from eBay, etc. have far more stuff than those of us who shop more "traditionally."

Just don't look at catalogues and magazines or go in stores unless you need something specific. I want things less when I put them out of my mind.

Join a museum, preferably one with evening hours, and go frequently. You get to know the collection really well and have a place to go out without spending $$ (Yes, I know many museums have free nights and that's great, but the crowds and specific times deter me.) Invite friends to join you there instead of meeting for drinks/dinner.

Meet friends for coffee rather than drinks when feasible. That $3 fancy coffee drink is still cheaper than the $10 cocktail.

It's important to me to cultivate friendships with people who wouldn't turn their noses up at the above suggestions as well.

Hey, this is great stuff, reminds me of the old days when people saved Green Stamps. But I think the BEST way for me to have saved money over the past few years would have been to NOT WASTE IT ON A GRADUATE EDUCATION. Please, kids, if you're reading this, don't make the same mistake. Maybe if enough people stop going to graduate programs that train bright people for jobs that don't exist (and we know this is nothing new, although it has gotten much worse), then the programs will be forced to change a bit and educate people in ways that are meaningful to the employment marketplace, as well as hiring new instructors in a way that also connects them with the marketplace, like, oh, say, hiring people with practical experience (read: connections to the real world) in preference, or at least on par with, people with a PhD.

KevinC, In all honesty I have to admit that a good newspaper--the Chronicle included--is one of my guilty pleasures. I love browsing in a good used bookstore now and then, too. So I don't necessarily succeed in following that one. A life of reading is why I got into this business, and alas we can't take the Internet into a hot bath. So newsprint is still a valued thing in my life.

Shiksha, fair enough, and I actually concur when it comes to beds, for sure. Never have wanted a used one. But on that very point bear in mind that travel, one of your pleasures, is also now a prime way people get bedbugs. They climb into people's luggage:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/14/business/14road.html?scp=1&sq=bedbugs%20hotel&st=cse

But I imagine this won't stop you from taking pleasure in travel, just as the furniture injunction won't stop others from getting a mahogany bookcase now and then, or a VCR, or a TV -- in none of which do bedbugs lodge.

Finally, to add to the giant and interesting list here, this morning I thought of one more random set of money-saver ideas: a brick down the cistern of the toilet and a water-saving shower head on the shower. Pay for themselves in no time. Water is a small monthly bill, but if your usage is monitored then conservation literally prevents pennies down the drain.

careerchanger writes: "the programs will be forced to change a bit and educate people in ways that are meaningful to the employment marketplace, as well as hiring new instructors in a way that also connects them with the marketplace, like, oh, say, hiring people with practical experience (read: connections to the real world) in preference, or at least on par with, people with a PhD."

While this may do a lot for the students, it will not necessarily improve the situation for those who teach them. I had fifteen years of real-world experience before I returned to grad school to get the Ph.D., and now I have more than a decade of experience teaching at a world-class university--and I still get paid at about 150% of poverty level. The students I teach do get jobs, even in today's lousy market, and what I teach them has a lot to do with their success--but they graduate into jobs that start at roughly twice what I get paid to teach them. And that's never going to change, except perhaps to get worse.

I lived in the desert Southwest for many years. We had a washing machine but no dryer....except the sun. I mentioned that and the snot replied that of course she used the dryer as the sun yellowed clothes.

Love the smell of sheets dried by the sun.

The best threads I have seen here stop making saving money an either-or proposition as though saving/sacrifice = good person and spending = bad person.

I used to spend like crazy and racked up $20,000 in credit card debt that I am still paying down because I didn't want to live without the extras on a humanities professor's salary.

I have also gone the other way and still drive my 13 year old car because I can't bear the thought of buying a new one and freaked out for two weeks about spending $29 dollars on three outfits for my brand new second daughter even though I plan to dress her most of the time in her older sister's clothes (and am excited about the prospect of reusing them!).

It seems like there should be room for a balance of spending and saving and personal choice. I know Pterodactyl's comment about the $180 haircut got a lot of grief, but honey, I hear you! I paid $220 for mine (plus color) and don't have a single thought of regret since I figure I'm wearing it with the five year old clothes (or older) clothes I have on. I choose to spend the hair money 5-6 times a year and then go without other things (cable, etc.) while still paying down my credit card debt.

You have to be able to have a little reward (whatever that may be for you) to stick with a lifestyle where you sacrifice most of the time.

I realize Suze Orman would yell at me about not putting that $1500 a year on hair toward my debt, but so be it.

I have to admit to being really tired of hearing about how expensive kids are. Unless you're paying tuition at a private school, you're probably wasting more on mountain-grown organic "green" coffee than spending on a kid.

Have you ever looked at those ridiculous "estimates" of how expensive kids are? They start with assigning a (fairly large) percentage of your mortgage and car payments, for a larger house and car, to the kid. Just for the record, my car is older than my child (who learned to drive in it), just because I like it, and it works perfectly. (Okay, so I live 3 miles from campus, and it still has less than 100k miles.) When she was born, I figured I'd get something with 4 doors and a bigger back seat, but it just never got to be important. And now, she'd rather climb in the back when necessary, and have something sporty to borrow when the time comes.

Besides the ($15k/year) tuition we're paying (as we go), she really doesn't cost much besides clothes and food, and not too much for either. Even a teenager doesn't eat that much expensive food, if you keep plenty of inexpensive food in the house; they prefer the cheaper stuff, normally. And our kid learned long ago that trying to match the "rich kids" for clothes was a loser's game. She would much rather get three really nice things from the "nearly new" shop than 1 cheaply made thing at Target. So when she wears something for the first time, it looks like the 5th time. And, she loves her Sansa "iPod" and thinks her friends with Apples are missing something.

If a child learns to appreciate what they have, there's no reason to have to spend a lot. If they don't, you'll never spend enough, anyway.

If YOU don't have kids, then the world will end up being run by WHOSE kids? Ignorant people? That'll work out well, don't you think?

professorpennywise: If you put a brick in the toidy, wrap it in aluminum foil first. After a while in water, they can start to lose particles, which can make the commode unhappy.

1 plumber visit = about 500 years of water savings.

I use a plastic bottle that reaches above the water line, filled to the top with water, with a cap. Remove the label before using.

Water saving shower heads are indeed wonderful; they also keep you from running out as easily (teenager in the house, again). Note that almost all are 2.5 gallon per minute, but if you look, you can find 1.75 or 1.8, which is a big difference, and even my daughter doesn't mind it (especially if it makes her parents stop complaining about her using all the hot water).

Dr. Jeff: I used a brick for ten years at one house with zero adverse effects, but now I use a gizmo specially designed for the purpose that cost me almost nothing, and it's plastic. On the Great Children Question, I do tend to think they are, indeed, expensive (mine seem to have the idea that they deserve a full plate of food at every meal), but worth every penny. You're absolutely right that they can be brought up in a manner that is not extravagant. Kids and money is a topic I might get to some day. I'm not at all against people having children. The point being raised by people, I think, was that those who choose not to do so surely do save a fair amount of money.

pats12: I agree, we all splurge, we all scrimp, each in our own way. Moralism doesn't help clarify things much. I was hoping rather to emphasize the sheer fun in pinching pennies (not often noticed in a culture that equates consumption with gratification). It's not deprivation, or homelessness, or dumpster diving -- it's Zenni Optical! (And did I mention mahogany bookcases?) I do think that if you can succeed in your trajectory and wriggle free of that credit-card debt, it will hugely improve things for your overall financial prospects. You're on the right track. The fees and interests, as I've written before, are killer on credit-card debt. Better to keep that money in your own pocket rather than in bonus for some fat-cat banker.

Wow. "Poverty snob." That's a new one.

What I do to save money? Buy stuff for half price on eBay, go to (and donate when possible) to Goodwill. True, college towns throw lots of stuff out, not just the posh ones. I've been to a few St. Vincent dePauls and Salvation Armies over the years.

Craigslist has yielded some very good finds for me (150 dollar guitar for 50 bucks.)

Used 3 dollar sportcoats that are indiscernible from 300 dollar ones.

Also, you can make your own booze and it's perfectly legal in most states (up to 100 gallons per year of beer or wine for personal consumption.)

I'm getting a little nauseous reading about bricks in one's toilet, but here is some advice for those of you who want expensive mahoghany furniture without the bedbegs or the stigma of second-hand. Go to Raymour Flanigan (lovely furniture store) and buy a table on lay-away. Come in once a month with your payment, and in less than a year, you will have your outrageosly expensive piece of furniture, but without having paid any credit. No debts to the evil overlords of the capitalist empire, no bedbugs, and you get free delivery. If it makes you feel better (and I'm sure it will), you can recycle the boxes at Whole Foods. Now run run run before there's a line at the store!

But, but... that would cost money! The spirit of the column this week is the joy of *saving.*

Stigma in secondhand? No, only virtue. And I guess I have to spell it out: lice and bedbugs do not inhabit wooden objects. Or metal ones. Or plastic ones. They simply do not. Oy, vey.

As for bricks: in the cistern, not the bowl. It's the big box on top. It's just water. No cause for upset. It saves the earth.



Ah, we see the world so differently, pterodactyl, you and I.

Thank you all for such a lively debate. Here's my two cents. At a small southern church-based school, we are the school, so long hours with little pay is the norm. Teaching, research, and writing are my passions, alas little choice in profession; plus, contact with the minds of subsequent generations is a joy. Passing on the gifts of learning so generously bestowed by my great teachers is the least I can do. Post Katrina, our small college library's databases have been a wonderful resource, but loosing state funds may pull that mainstay for all universities here. There are no neighborhood libraries on this side of town, so buying books to rebuild my (lifetime) 5000-book library loss has been a priority; I'm not counting, but actually more focused on the areas which feed me most: Culture, Folklore, History, Literature. After five years of renting, I've moved nine times, three states since Katrina; I'm rebuilding new. I'll take a little equity (cudos to Suze Orman, a good credit score, and some retirement savings) the neighbors from hell (everyone argues, you have to let people live; it's when the woman screams horror-film fear & furniture flies that I call the police regularly), 35 days of possums taking residence (the city is a little overrun with them and raccoons) after eating through wood to enter (so 35 days sleepless in New Orleans) and obscene rents (which only rise regularly) that give me little choice in the matter; peace is my goal. I confess, I'm suffering from summer-itis this year; pardon me if I think I've earned it. Finally, rested and refreshed, I'm at my desk reading this savings banter, thank you pennywise et al., and ready again to resume my research, writing, planning for the coming semester, thankful for the morning's Chronicle advice column, and all of you, who've encouraged my already frugal lifestyle, entertained me, provoked this brief reflection, and reminded me that I'm not alone, struggling in the academy, but first, a walk in the lovely city park. Red Beans & Ricely Yours.

Msaloy - What a lovely and moving way to round it all out. Best of luck to you with the books (what a loss to sustain), the peace, the research, and the teaching. Extraordinary.

In addition to the optical option listed in the article, I would highly recommend 39dollarglasses.com, which I have used for a couple of years.

In addition, Freecycle has been a great resource for our family. Not only did I get a $400 gas grill for free, but it helped teach our kids that there are options out there other than just buying stuff.

As far as pterodactyl123, this person feels like a consumer/capitalist plant.

Thank you so much, pennywise, for your comments and your very patient responses to one who seems, for some reason, to be insanely upset by the idea of consciously attempting to either save money OR to promote the health of our planet (and ourselves)...

A few small additional suggestions:

(1) have just one credit card -- hopefully one that will also give you points on Amtrak, which will also save you $;

(2) drink lots of water -- good for you, reduces snacking;

(3) get DVDs and your music from the library;

(4) make your own curtains -- you don't even have to be able to sew; just cut material to size you want and use curtain rings to hang the material; and a material store gives you lots more choice of materials than a curtain store does

(5) make your own baby food -- just pursee soups, etc., that babies can handle -- you'll save thousands of dollars!

(6) don't buy baby wipes -- they have chemicals the baby doesn't need on its behind, and they're a waste of money -- a damp washcloth works perfectly well --

(7) don't look down on people who get used furniture, books, clothes, etc. -- the value of what they are doing (re-using products) is tremendous.

@seiu615
I'm not insanely upset by the ideas presented here. I think they are generally a waste of time that would be better spent researching or grading or preparing a lesson. Make your own curtains? Make your own baby food? Who in academia has time for this? Maybe your salaries reflect your productivity...

The thrift stores/second hands in my area are full of junk and nobody seems to go inside them except to drop off more junk. They are firetraps waiting to happen. The city should shut these places down and take the contents to a landfill. That's my general sense of the "value" of second-hand.

1...avoid attending baby showers for the 4 week office temp with a minimum of $25 to be spent on gift

2...avoid attending the bon voyage send-off for that incompetent, hideously bigoted, homophobic, neurotic and very tired sorority queen who was your associate dean, thereby saving on parking fee, gasoline and the mega-tranquilizer you will have to take to get yourself past all the grinning hipocrites at the "cash" bar

3...avoid that next "dish-to-pass" diversity exercise-in-hipocrisy fiasco to YET again be subjected to the campus multi-cultural flunkies and their lip-synched...hate-duh-man diatribes. And think of all the TUMS you won't have to consume AND if you play your cards right, you can hitch a ride with the campus diversity queen in her option-packed Escalade as she drives to her mansion in the all-white university heights gated community. You will also save on wear and tear on your $300 cross-training "sneakers"

4...avoid the end of semester "wrap-ups" scheduled by coincidentally "absentee" administrators who "can't make it" 'cause they're Cape Cod cruise just happens to be leaving Woods Hole that VERY same day. Again save on gasoline, parking fee and psycho-therapy.

5...avoid attending that umpteenth FAKE search committee meeting for that "pivotal" student service administrative position that the entire campus knows is going to be given to the best friend of the associate dean DESPITE her years of unwavering incompetence, lethargy and sloth. Save on dry-cleaning that spandex and laundering those bandanas and save on wear and tear on that $10,000 European-designed "bicycle".

Just being frugal...Madison, WI-style

Pterodactyl: Did it ever occur to you that your personal experience of life may not be normative for the rest of the human race?

Not everyone can work full time. Not everyone who wants full-time work can find it. Not everyone who works full time gets paid appropriately for it. Not everyone who is inappropriately paid can find better work elsewhere, or negotiate for higher wages. Some people make their own curtains or buy their clothes in second-hand stores not because they are "poverty snobs", but because that's all they can afford on the lousy salaries they get paid, no matter how hard-working or clever or intelligent or loyal or productive they may be.

And not every second-hand store is poorly managed and full of junk. Some of them are quite nice.

You've been lucky. Good for you. But don't assume that everyone else could have that same luck if they were just smarter or worked harder, because reality doesn't work that way.

How is it that such a brilliant and successful academic as yourself could fail to see this?

Having "adjuncted" for 3+ years after grad school, I know very well what relative poverty looks like. Still, I decided that a print newspaper was one thing I was not going to live without. Same with contributing to NPR, either with cash or volunteering. I do try to save money on books, especially because of the small apartment. On the other hand, didn't I get into history because I'm a bibliophile at heart, even if I can't always get around to just plain old relaxing reading? So sometimes I allow myself to acquire a book. (Indeed, it is a sad irony that we are supposed to write monographs, but our primary audience can't afford to buy any, or only very few, thereby helping to feed a vicious cycle.)

Anyway, each of us has his or her own priorities, tricks, tastes, burdens, and so on. One thing that's helped me is living in an urban area where I don't need to own a car. My rent isn't cheap, but it's less than it could be, because I live in an old walkup with no dishwasher. I don't pay for television, and I only have a cell phone for actual telephoning, since I can access the interwebz enough already. At home I have a barebones landline and DSL connection. I also belong to a rock-solid CSA that manages to provide most of our nutrition for most of the year for a reasonable fee, despite its higher quality.

Where I need to improve is in lunch preparation. If the week stretches into 60 hours, it becomes very easy to rely on the local bakery or an all-you-can-eat buffet at a cafeteria, despite the good food we get from the CSA. Things work best when I cook more than we need to eat so there are leftovers for lunch.

Be that as it may, my favorite advice is no. 16. That's been my main tactic. Work on my desire to consume. That has been helping, no matter what happens to my plans.

One last thing: Sometimes I bake bread, but it is not to save money. That wouldn't be worth it. I do it, because it lets me get away from books and gadgets and just work with my hands. But doing that is impossible in this summer weather.

The only snobs would be those who would judge someone being of modest means and having to work their way through college--And that is ridiculous if not outrageous, because Poverty should not be a contemptible thing, it is something you are born into. You have no choice in the matter (see Economic Determinism), and it is very difficult to overcome, even through hard work or merit. Either lend a hand, give a job or raise to, or otherwise help, but don't judge people in need. We are already vulnerable and disadvantaged enough.

For me, it was a necessity to budget carefully all the time. From working class background, with little or no help from parents who didn't attend college, I lived below poverty level while pursuing higher education. This was good in a way because I learned how to cook quite well, and how to pick fresh, basic ingredients for delicious dinners. I got a one bedroom apartment close to university to bike to class and sometimes my campus job, pared down my cable Internet and phone, to a basic landline and a modest cable modem with 6 mbps down/300k up and only PBS and three other channels. I only drove my subcompact used car for short trips to the supermarket. I even took (and Fabrezed the dog smell out of) a couch left by the dumpster by my upstairs neighbors. I put my own blankets over it of course. I also found a hand-made wooden entertainment shelf, a heavy duty hotel table, and a love seat. When I left there, most of that furniture went onto a Goodwill truck. Now, after graduating I've had to move back with the parents which saves on housing, and I'm thinking of selling the car and moving to a place with cheap housing and good public transport near University. Oh yeah, no kids, no mortgage, so that helps. Student loans and part-time work paid for all of this, with housing being the largest expense by far.

What about that guy who lived in Costa Rica for one year. He spent less than a few dollars on a postcard, some tomatoes or something and stamps. He ate and drank whatever the howler monkeys ate. Now that's frugal living!

These are some interesting comments! One thing I want to reiterate from Pennyise (thanks man) is "Have no cellphone or get a cheap (prepaid, family, or broadband-combined) plan." Do you really need the fanciest cell phone when you have computers in your office and often also in your classroom? I also carry around a laptop to teach and campuses alwasy have wifi. Prepaid is so the way to go. I use Net10 and it lets me also text for pennies. I highly recommend it.

This column is the most depressing thing I've read in a while. I am a frugal person, and hope to remain that way when I have a full time job (hopefully this job market season), but you know, graduate students are hanging by a thread, on the hopes that when you finish and (if) you get a full time job, you will at least have the basics covered. I never thought I would be rich from academia, but I didn't think I would be eliminating my Economist subscription (support writers and the press!) and cutting out meat from my diet.

Some of the suggestions sound as if the basics are not being covered in these households. Is that true? (Translation--is the economic situation for academics even worse than I thought?)

The suggestions were from a forum thread and reflect the ideas of a wide range of Chronicle readers about how *they* save money. No one will embrace them all. So keep your Economist and meat!

As for the last point, there are university presidents who make a million a year who read the Chronicle, adjuncts who barely string together a living course to course, grad students, &c. All of them write e-mails to me from time to time, and the column I write speaks to all of them. (Staff too, by the way.) This particular column brought out those who, by necessity, must pinch pennies, a side I believe to be growing in higher education, as in the larger society. So the short answer is yes, some people do have a very hard go of it, even if Ph.D. can be tacked on after their names. Other installments of my column have addressed those who have higher income and wealth and wonder how best to put it to work for them. A range of topics for a range of people. The theme here, in any event, is that you can be parsimonious and still have fun. So don't get depressed. Go chill at the beach in your Zenni Optical shades.

As was noted above, things will differ depending on where you live and what position you hold and all that. Ironically, I felt like I had the most cash to spare during my three years as an adjunct. My living expenses were the same as I had as a grad student since I didn't move, but my pay went up. I used the extra to pay off all of my credit cards in year one. And in year two I saved up to buy a car that I bought in year three. My hardest years financially were on the tenure track when I had to move to an area that had a much higher cost of living and where I had more expenses like higher heating bills. I had to be more frugal on the tenure track than I did as an adjunct. And my point is simply that frugality is contextual. Not every adjunct is suffering financially though many are, and not every tenured faculty member is financially secure though many are.