My head is spinning after reading this on Oprah.com: The 6-Step Financial Reality Check for Newlyweds.
I know this is not real - though the people and their concerns probably are, alas.
Thirty seven years old and not yet embarked on his life career? And Maria, her most fertile years already behind her, although she does have about 10 years of fertility left the main bread winner for now.
It gets worse
And you know what - Clinical psychologists are a luxury item, they don't actually grow anything or make anything. When times get hard they are disposable.
After all it is the grain farmers of Minnesota who provide the wherewithal to feed the Victors and Marias of this world with the surplus being used to keep them in the style to which they are accustomed.
And I suspect that most of them started tilling the fields long before they were 38.
I know this is not real - though the people and their concerns probably are, alas.
Married last June, Maria and Victor Martin* are bubbling with plans. Within the next five years, they want to have two kids and upgrade from their recently purchased two-bedroom condo in Chicago. And Maria, 33, an assistant psychology professor, and Victor, 37, who is finishing his doctorate in clinical psychology, are eager to add to the $60,000 they already have in retirement savings.
Thirty seven years old and not yet embarked on his life career? And Maria, her most fertile years already behind her, although she does have about 10 years of fertility left the main bread winner for now.
It gets worse
When Victor graduates in 2013, he expects to make about $60,000, nearly quadrupling his monthly take-home pay to around $3,500. Yet he'll also have about $150,000 in student loans. Victor can consolidate these federal loans into one with a fixed interest rate that should be below 7.5 percent. The hard part will be choosing a payment plan. If he pays $1,100 a month, he'll be making payments for 30 years. I just don't think it's smart to be paying off your own loans when your kids are in college. If Maria and Victor commit to $1,800 a month-setting aside money from his new job and expenses they've trimmed-the loans will be paid off in ten years.Got that - if over half of what Victor earns when he finally starts his career goes into paying off his debt, it will be paid off when he is 48 years old!
And you know what - Clinical psychologists are a luxury item, they don't actually grow anything or make anything. When times get hard they are disposable.
After all it is the grain farmers of Minnesota who provide the wherewithal to feed the Victors and Marias of this world with the surplus being used to keep them in the style to which they are accustomed.
And I suspect that most of them started tilling the fields long before they were 38.