(Guest post by Jessica Wagner)
When you or your significant other becomes unemployed, you may no longer be considered a DINK, but you can guarantee that will be here to still give you some financial advice. Getting by with two incomes in a relationship is definitely worth strategically planning for, but also figuring out a game plan for yourself if one of you were to become unemployed is beneficial too.
The reason why a majority of relationships fail is because of financial struggles. Lacking funds or poor money management often lead to damaging fights that can be difficult to recover from if not properly dealt with. To avoid having strong arguments in an already stressful time, consider planning for unemployment in the chance that one of you were to become so.
Even if you aren’t planning on becoming a single income couple, things happen, especially in the current job market and economy, and it will benefit you to have a plan in action. Don’t make combined purchases that you couldn’t afford if one of your were to become unemployed, and create prospective budgets should either you or your significant other lost their income. Doing this will allow both of you to know that you can survive should one or the other lose their job.
If you or your significant other becomes unemployed, you need to immediately reconsider your spending. While you should already have budgets created, you need to re-evaluate those budgets and make sure that you haven’t acquired any additional expenses since those budgets were created. If you notice that you have been eating out more, plan on cutting down again and trying to stick to cheaper home cooked meals. Also note that regular expenses, such as gas, will decline because one of you is at home.
While watching your spending is obviously something needed during unemployment, keeping a solid routine is often overlooked. If you or your spouse becomes unemployed, you will be home all day and this loneliness can lead you to become slightly starved for attention. While you were once able to let yourself and your significant other enjoy some alone time after work, you will now be desperate for conversation – which can often drive the working partner insane. Try to maintain other forms of socialization to combat the loneliness.
You also need to maintain a routine should you become unemployed. Whether you are looking for mechanical engineering jobs or electrical engineering jobs it doesn’t matter. You simply need to treat job hunting like a job. Activities that you should always continue doing even during unemployment include:
- Waking up at a regular time
- Showering and dressing in normal office attire
- Exercising
- Regularly socializing
Unemployment doesn’t have to be the end of the world, and it doesn’t need to destroy your relationship. Sure, it will put a bit of strain on you and your significant other should one of you lose your job, but with proper planning, you can avoid having unemployment become the bane of your relationship.
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Jessica Wagner is a freelance writer from lovely, almost-always sunny, San Diego, CA.
I think you point about staying active is well put. Just saw a story in the news about former football player Tiki Barber who said he was unemployed for a year and didn’t do anything except watch TV. He said that put him in a deep depression.
Due to my line of work, industrial construction, everyday I go to work I am working myself out of a job. Because of this I keep my bills as low as possible. I know so many people that freak out when they find out they are getting laid off. I personally can survive just fine on unemployment alone. When I am working, I buy the things I want after making sure my bills are completely paid asap. If at all possible I refrain from using my credit card for anything major, and finance nothing. I am looking at buying another truck soon, and probably will finance that, but I will make my payments 3-4x what they are supposed to be while I am working to get it paid off as quickly as possible. This strategy has worked well for me for years now, as I am unemployed considerably more often then most others. But that’s how things go for my line of work.