So, it’s tax time and you get to thinking about your budget and your income and all that other stuff. Brian’s W2 came this weekend, finally. That’s the first piece of anything we’ve gotten for our taxes so far. I don’t know how I ended up at EPI (Economic Policy Institute) but I was on their Basic Family Budget Calculator. The max I could generate with this tool was a family of five, 2 adults and 3 kids … and even by these calculations we’re considered poverty stricken. I should probably be starving in the streets by now. The result it gave for my area in Newport News, Virginia…

Basic Family Budget Calculator
Norfolk-Virginia Beach-Newport News (Va. portion), VA
2P3C
Monthly housing $ 1,087
Monthly food $ 744
Monthly child care $ 1,211
Monthly transportation $ 358
Monthly health care $ 444
Monthly other necessities $ 494
Monthly taxes $ 550
Monthly total $ 4,888
Annual total $ 58,656
Percentage of all people in state living below family budget line* 23%
Number of all people in state living below family budget line* 284,000

I’ll start by saying that our rent is $1200 a month, and that is typical for a 3 bedroom in Newport News, at least if you want a well lit street and minimal fear walking to your vehicle, if you know what I mean. Sure I could rent a place for $500 in a different part of town, but my kids would get 0 fresh air ever and I’d certainly not walk to the grocery store. Even more preferable would be across the bridge where we tried to buy a house over the summer, where there’s open farm land and fields of grass. Unfortunately you have to buy in that area unless you find a private residence for rent and we didn’t make the cut. I guess because we’re poor LOL

This also has $744 allocated for food. I wish I had 744 dollars a month to spend on food per month. That just doesn’t happen. Our food budget is much, much, much smaller.

Transportation is probably a bit off with what the gas prices are. I know we spend close to $100 a week on transportation cost, maybe more. And we are a one vehicle one driver family, I don’t drive. And I’m only talking about gas money and oil changes in that amount! Add to that our monthly vehicle payment of $385. Where does that leave us?? It leaves us wishing the bus schedule matched Brian’s work schedule or that it came even remotely close to where he needs to get to so that he didn’t have to drive there. Taking the bus would only cost about $50 a month, the cost of a monthly unlimited bus pass. That is a huge, ginormous savings. But the bus route doesn’t get him any where near where he needs to be at the time he has to be there.

Then there’s the line that says “Monthly other necessities $ 494″ I’m not sure what that category is meant to cover. Maybe that’s the shopping therapy you allow yourself to have because hey, you can’t get blood from a stone, right? So let’s go out and buy some Nike golf clubs or some new shoes, or maybe see an overpriced 9 dollar movie and order the 6 dollar nachos with a 4 dollar flat soda.

It’s all frustrating to say the least, and makes us miss small town living a little too much … unfortunately companies like Wal-Mart put all the small businesses in our small town out of business. Offshoring helped to make things a little worse, closing down the factories, processing and call centers. There was just no work. Newport News had lots of work, and in the field that Brian wanted to work. He got a job, in his chosen field.

Three years later we are no better off than we were in small town no where. The only thing that has changed is how we view the world when we open the front door. In small town no where we rented a nice little 3 bedroom house with a yard for just $450 a month. I had no problem with the kids playing in the yard all day long while I did the dishes or worked on the computer. I could leave the front door open, literally open. Locking the door wasn’t something I concerned myself with until Lucas was about 2 and started sleep walking and I put slide locks on all the doors to make sure he didn’t wander out.

In this place, things are much different and we all find ourselves missing small town no where and considering some serious life changes again. Unfortunately, moving doesn’t fit well into the budget.

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