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financial independence

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mooface:
i am super super lucky and very grateful to my parents because if it wasn't for them i would never be able to go to university in rome.  up until my first year of college i was not allowed to have a job, which is pretty extreme and which i was always completely against.  but my dad always gave me two options:  either you can work but you have totally support yourself or you can't work but i will pay for everything.  this was pretty ridiculous and eventually became unfeasible because my family is not rich and i have a younger brother and sister who both also need to be supported.  so ever since the summer after my freshman year i have been consistently working.  unfortunately, part-time jobs are not really the norm in italy so i can only work at school, which pays very little.  i make enough to cover my rent and part of my bills.

i am really glad for their support.  without it there is no way i could afford to go to school anywhere besides my hometown.  also, the fact that i don't have to worry about having a job that covers all my expenses means i have more time for studying, pursuing whatever interests or hobbies i have, and it also means i will have the opportunity to intern & volunteer at places (FAO & WFP) which will give me experience for the career i want to pursue even if they don't pay me.  i graduate this december, though, and once i do i will be completely financially independent.  what i will probably end up doing is actually moving back home for a couple months where i can easily get a job that pays a lot & can save up enough to have something in the bank before i completely cut myself off.  i'm not going to do it because i feel like leeching (it's actually the last thing i want to do), but i feel like it's just the smart & responsible thing to do.

i can't wait for the day when i am totally independent - i am really looking forward to it.  but i don't feel bad that i rely on my parents for financial support because i am otherwise completely self-reliant.  i live on my own in another country where i take care of myself and my dog, rarely ask for more than my monthly allowances, work, study, and am graduating early.  also, my parents know that it is an investment in a way.  they know that when they are old and retired i will take care of them, and if my brother or sister need help that i can be there to bail them out instead of them. 

Social Bacon:
Wow, this whole thread has been a great read. Thanks for starting this fatty. :-D


--- Quote from: Dissy on 23 Jul 2008, 09:12 ---I was able to be financially independent for about 8 months, biking to school, paying for food and stuff.  Then, I got hit by a car, and chipped a bone in my elbow.  I was then too scared to bike for a while
--- End quote ---
I got hit by a bus once while biking and rolled through an intersection almost getting run over by a few other cars. But I was in a huge rush to get somewhere, so I didn't notice how close I came to dying and I just got up, apologized to the bus driver (it was her fault, but I just wanted to get going) got on my bike and kept going. It wasn't until I got home and found that my entire body was cut and bruised did I realize that the bumper of the bus was a few inches from my head when I was lying on the ground. I don't bike on the road anymore because fucking idiots don't know how to drive around bikes.

waterloosunset:
I found out a couple of days ago that I got my internship!! Starting work monday in a finance firm, through to the end of September when I go to uni.
for uni, my mum said she'll pay for my accommodation (get loans and grants from the government as well for fees), but actual living costs i.e clothes, going out,  I'll have to pay for myself.

blankfile:
I "Declared" myself financially independent back when i was 17. Had to choose between staying at home with my parents or going on my own to another school in Paris, and well, i chose the latter. I had some money saved because i was living in such a tiny village that there were pretty much no way to spend my well-earned money, and that kept me alive while i was in Europe. When i came back to Canada i was 18,  lived at my parent's place for 2 months  in order to fill some university paperwork and find myself an apartment, then moved to Montreal. I worked for 4 months on a few different projects and made a decent load of money, Since then, i'm going at university full time, while working on some web development by the nights. However, lately, finances have been dropping low enough for me to reconsider my full-time studies, so i applied for a few serious jobs, and got recruited by the CSA (Canadian Space Agency). Starting september 9th i will be working there full time, and following a few night classes at university.

So yeah, since i was 17 i did not ask my parents for anything but 2 months of lodging, and i hope i will not have to do so anytime soon. I've been enough of a burden for them already, and i do prefer living on my own.

At that pace, i should be getting my engineer diploma in 3.5 years from now, making me almost 24 years old.

evernew:
Attention: Long Post Ahead.
There's a list of bullet points in the middle that sums up some of it.
If you want the gravy, though, you'll have to read it all.

=== THE EDUCATION OF ME ===

I went to school for four years and am now two weeks away from graduating. During that time I did internships and two semesters abroad, all as a part of the curriculum.
My school's tuition is a lot higher than usual (until last year public university was pretty much free here) because it is a private school.

When it was time to decide what I was going to do after high school and this school came up, I asked my parents if they would support me going there seeing as I would have no time to work at all aside from internships over summer break. They said yes.

We only _really_ got down to talking about the finances of it when I was accepted and they realized that I'd actually cost them a lot of money over the next four years. Because of better employment chances, integrated exchange semesters, shorter study time and high quality of education, we decided it was a good idea.

During my first semesters, I lived alone in a small flat at the bottom of the rent scale. My parents paid my rent and a monthly allowance - the same that my older siblings who are also going to school get. There are federal programs to support students but because my family is over the income threshold, I did not qualify. Because of the same threshold, it was also nearly impossible for me to get a scholarship. This left me having to depend on my parents' support, pretty much.

During these first semesters, I worked in IT support at my school. The pay was sweet and the IT department trusted us a lot (we could bill hours ourselves without much checking) and that's where I made some pocket money.

My first internship was in England where I shelled out 60% of what I earned just for rent. But I scraped by and aside from the plane tickets I paid for everything myself.
In the second one I made a little bit more money while spending a lot less, so I ended up saving about 500 € a month there.
Then I went abroad for a semester (which I got an exchange scholarship of 600 € for) and pretty much squandered that and some of my savings.
Then I went abroad again and squandered the rest.

When I came back, I got the same money as before but since my new flat was more expensive, I was left with less money to live each month. Because I was also finally getting my driver's license and paying for the lessons myself, I needed more extra cash than the IT support could generate.
Fortunately, our student body has a company where we do project-based work for other companies and get almost double than what I earned for IT support. So I started doing more and more of these projects. Sometimes I did freelance translation works but not very often.

During my last internship I lived at home and only had to pay for my lunch and public transportation to get to the office - yet I didn't save that much because I wasn't paid that much either.

That's the story so far. The cornerstones:

* School cost me more money than I could have earned before.
* School took too much time to have a steady job (which would not have covered much at all either).
* Work on the side helped me save a little extra and afford some extravaganza's here and there.
* The further along I was, the better I was paid.
* I supported myself during all internships but could not do so during the semesters.

A thing about my school is that it's somewhat of a flytrap to rich kids. I'm not saying I'm not a rich kid by definition but the demeanor and the scale of the other students' parental support makes me look like a hobo around here.

I don't look down on people who get supported by their parents. For many people here, it's the only way.
But I also expect no being-looked-down-upon by those who can support themselves.

When I made the decision of going to this particular school, a key rationale behind it was that I would be through much faster and earn much more money than any other way I could have played it. My parents know that, too.

When they are mad at me, they sometimes accuse me of squandering their money without being good for anything and this riles me up so I tell them I'll pay them back and whatever.

This will never happen and we both know it. They see the cost of my education as an investment because I am able to support myself much faster (I'm 22 now and hold a Master's degree) than usual. Also, my siblings are all going to school for longer times than me and are likely to earn less at least in the beginning.
Since they serve as a basis for comparison, I'm not even that expensive.

I tried to be financially independent as much as I could - even to the point where I asked my parents to only pay the rent and nothing else to see how well I could handle it.

Side topic:
My former best friend pretty much kicked me out of his life because I went to a 'posh' school. He goes to school right where we went to high school and if I'm not mistaken he still lives with his parents. I'm not looking down on him for that. He looks down on me for what I did, however. (Also, he believes I'm the incarnation of the devil because I'm in business administration).
That holier-than-thou attitude pisses me off.
Sure I could have stayed at home and gone to school there but I didn't have to. And if there's one thing in life that everyone has told me and that I have also figured out myself it's that chances are there to be taken. In the end, he spent an entire year abroad in Spain on a government grant. Paid by tax money. So instead of having his parents or himself or a scholarship or whatever pay for it, he got _everyone_ involved. And still I'm the bad person for him. Meh.

I could have gone to school here without my parents' support as well. There's tons of financing programs like giving 10% of your salary for the first 7 years, getting an interest-free loan from the local bank and a couple of students each year get to study here without tuition fees as well.
But I'm glad that it worked out this way because I get to enjoy a full salary and no loans.

Because I went through the entire thing so quickly, I even get to slack and travel for half a year before jumping into the hamster wheel that is the corporate world, courtesy of my parents. I'm very grateful for that. It's my graduation present.

And since I'll be self-sufficient at the age of 22, I like to believe that my parents didn't cut a bad deal either. All my siblings have never had any kind of real job so far. So while yes, I relied on them for almost everything, I'm not even that bad.

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