Algo loves me @cryptolover561

I just paid $5.90 in Lisbon for two espressos, an Americano, and two bottles of water. The i did the math on what costs in San Francisco. Two espressos: $8.50 One Americano: $6.00 Two bottles of water: $9.00 $23.50 I read that number twice. $5.90 vs. $23.50 for the exact same order. Portugal isn't cheap. You just don't know America is expensive until you leave it. Then you get home... ....and $18 for a "quick coffee" feels normal again.

@skumWgmi Prices don’t hit different reality does

@skumWgmi Same schedule, different century.

People work 8-10 hours a day, 5 days a week for someone else's profit. Then they spend 4 hours at night staring at screens. Basically, living for weekends + 4 weeks PTO on repeat until age 65. While the government take 25-30% their income. And we're told this is "normal."

@skumWgmi Rent eats half her paycheck. That’s not living, that’s surviving.

A Walmart employee told me she works 29 hours a week, capped on purpose, so her employer doesn't have to give her benefits under the 30-hour threshold. She makes $16 an hour, which comes out to about $2,010 a month before taxes. Her rent is $1,400. We have decided as a society that this is her problem and not ours, and I think about every time someone tells me to just tip more.

@skumWgmi Damn. Math don’t lie.

Estimates to raise a child to 18 land well north of $250,000. Divide that by 18 years. Then by 12 months. That’s the number sitting under every grocery run, every daycare drop off every “just a small expense.” Now take one unpaid maternity leave out of that same budget. Six weeks with no income, stacked on top of a number that already assumed both paychecks would show up. Parents didn’t get less careful with money. Childcare, healthcare, and housing all climbed at once, and nobody adjusted the paycheck to match. You can do the math perfectly and still come up short every single month.

@skumWgmi Preach. Fix the waste, not the wallet.

Everyone shouts "Tax the Rich"... but look at the facts. A $150k earner pays around $30,600 in federal tax. A $25k earner pays about $1,200. It takes 25 people on $25k to contribute what one person on $150k does. So why drive high earners out of the U.S. when they already shoulder most of the burden? The problem isn't how much tax is collected. The problem is how much the government wastes. Stop blaming the rich. Start holding the government to account.

@skumWgmi car payment’s a hell of a down payment on misery

LET'S DO THE ACTUAL MATH NOBODY WANTS TO SHOW YOU. $85,000 salary. $54,000 after taxes depending on your state. $4,500/month take home. Rent: $1,900. Car: $520. Insurance: $180. Utilities: $160. phone: $85. Groceries: $380. Student loans: $340. You have $935 left. and then your boomer parents tells you to be more disciplined.

@commonsmade hey @commonsmade i vouch for @badviking1995

@skumWgmi Taco Bell don’t play.

You are being lied to. Today I present to you the only inflation index that matters. The Taco Bell chicken quesadilla inflation index. 2001 Chicken quesadilla: $1.89 2026 Chicken quesadilla: $6.19 This is a total inflation of ~327% or an annualized amount of just over 6%/уear. Don't let the lizard people in the government trick you into thinking inflation is 2-3% per year...plan accordingly.

@skumWgmi Banks rent your debt like it's theirs

I hate credit cards. Not the plastic. Not the convenience. The math. So let me get this straight: If a small business charges you 29% to borrow money, that's loan sharking. There are laws against it. People get to prison for it. But a bank can put "29.99% APR" in size 6 font on a piece of mail, and that's just..... business. Here's what that actually means. You carry a $5,000 balance. At 29%, you're paying $1,450 a year in interest alone. just to stand still. just to keep the number from growing. Minimum payment? Designed to keep you paying for over a decade. The bank doesn't want your money in one lump sum. They want it in installments. Forever. Miss one payment and the "promotional" rate you signed up for disappears. Not you're at penalty APR. Sometimes 34%. The bank calls it risk based pricing. Everyone else calls it a trap. they didn't lose money on you. They never do. You're not a customer to them. You're the product.

BOOMER: You should have bought a house when you were young. We did it on one income. MILLENNIAL: My rent is $1,900 a month for a one-bedroom. I've never missed a payment in sic years. BOOMER: Then save for a down payment. It's about discipline. MILLENNIAL: I've saved for four years. In that time the median home price went up faster than I could save. BOOMER: Sound like you're not budgeting right. MILLENNIAL: I have a spreadsheet. I have no debt. I still watched three houses sell for $40,000 over asking to cash buyers before I could even schedule a viewing. BOOMER: We had 18% interest rates, you know. It wasn't handed to us either. MILLENNIAL: I know. And the house was three times your salary. Mine is nine times mine. BOOMER:. ... .... MILLENNIAL: I'm not asking you to feel guilty. I'm asking you to do the math with me instead of assuming I didn't do it myself. The math changed. You just weren't the one who had to solve it.

@skumWgmi The biggest difference isn't that one generation worked harder. It's that the price to income ratio changed dramatically. you can't solve a structural affordability problem with budgeting advice.

@skumWgmi We fund stadiums, not kids. Pencils over palaces.