No free rides: This means you

By Liz Pulliam Weston

You're mad. I get that. But some of you are misdirecting your anger.

That's abundantly clear from the reactions to my recent MSN column "7 surefire ways to stay poor."

Judging from the feedback, most of you got what I was saying: that the consequences for mismanaging money are becoming more serious as incomes shrink, living expenses soar and job uncertainty mounts.

• Talk back: What was your worst money mistake?

"With so many headwinds," I wrote, "it's more important than ever to get the basics of money management right."

The seven missteps I warned about were:

• Getting the big stuff wrong by paying too much for shelter or transportation.

• Confusing needs and wants.

• Considering only the monthly payments of a loan or purchase.

• Failing to track where the money goes.

• Carrying credit card debt.

• Living close to the edge without an emergency cushion.

• Squandering what you have by raiding your retirement funds.

When you're broke, making any of these mistakes can guarantee you stay that way.

Some of you thought I was being unrealistic or unfair about the challenges of living on a low income. Some thought I was clueless; others, condescending.

Penny was typical. She blamed a late-in-life layoff, age discrimination and a relocation for scuttling her finances.

"Unfortunately, there (are) MANY of us (who) HAVE to live that way. It's not a choice," she wrote. "It's not confusing wants with needs, (it's) a choice of putting gas in the car or eating, having a 401(k) or paying your mortgage, paying the utility bill or paying your co-pays for prescriptions."

One reader even chided me for my definition of needs versus wants, in which I wrote, "Our wants are endless and quickly will transform a need like clothing (which can be Goodwill finds or hand-me-downs) into an extravagance such as a new suit."

"Liz certainly doesn't look like she shops at the Goodwill," reader Stacy snapped. "Can you leave the average worker with a pinch of dignity at all?"

(For the record, I have shopped at Goodwill in the past, and I would do so again if my economic circumstances warranted. There is nothing undignified about living within your means.)

Setting a few things straight

Part of the problem, I think, was that the headline writer used the word "poor." In the column, I used the word "broke."

I draw a pretty distinct line between the two. In an earlier column, "Lessons from living down and out," I defined "broke" as a temporary state of being out of money. Being poor, by contrast, is "not having enough or even the prospect of having enough."

If you are truly poor, you may not have the resources to turn your situation around. If you're just broke, though, chances are good that you can. People are doing it every day and talking about their progress on the Your Money and Women in Red message boards, as well as in the community that's sprung up around MSN's Smart Spending blog.

Continued: Scandals

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