Inflation is making it harder to make ends meet.
“We have cut back in ways we never knew we could cut back,” former alderman Laura Jo Smole said. “So are my friends with lower-paid wages. I have a friend who had to cut back a day from work. She lives a distance from her work and couldn’t afford the gas prices. It cost her about as much to drive there as she earned from the job.”
Smole changed her phone carrier and got a new plan that costs only 25 percent of the old one with the same service. “It is really worthwhile looking at plans,” she said. “I switched from Verizon to Mint. That saved me a nice amount of change. Food wise, we are buying less meat and cheaper cuts, and really paying attention to only getting what we know we are going to eat. We are cutting way back on how much we eat out, from a couple times a week to a couple times a month.”
While there are higher costs for air conditioning this summer, with temperatures predicted to reach 100° several days this week, Smole cautions against turning off the air conditioning.
“When you are ill or a senior citizen, you have to use it to stay well,” she said. “I have had some friends who got heat exhaustion because they were trying to save money by not running air conditioning. That is something that you have to avoid.”
She also suggests checking on car and home insurance rates to get the best rates.
Smole said the community is fortunate that you can always get a free lunch at Cup of Love, and the United Methodist Church is still doing their Answering the Call project helping people who are food insecure. The Flint Street Fellowship also provides free groceries and household supplies.
While money is tight, Smole said it is important to help others.
“I’ve been keeping an eye on the little food pantry by the community center,” she said. “For $20 spent at the dollar store, I can put 20 things in the free pantry like toilet paper, soap, toothpaste and menstrual supplies in the pantry. It doesn’t cost a whole lot to help.”
Local thrifty shopper Nancy Paddock stocks up when things are on sale, aware that sales usually have a four to six-month cycle. If a tube of toothpaste is marked down $2, she gets three tubes to last until the sale comes around again.
She grows a vegetable garden and puts up a lot in the freezer. Peppers and tomatoes don’t have to be blanched before freezing them, she advises. If produce is on sale, she buys it and puts it up in the freezer. She buys bulk items like beans, lentils and rice.
“I am a vegetarian and I find that saves me a lot of money,” Paddock said. “It is also much better for the planet. When I was using the clothes dryer, it added $20 a month to my electric bill, so now I dry my clothes on the line. I drive a car that gets really good gas mileage. I shop at thrift stores for a lot of stuff, but that is more of a hobby. I hardly ever buy new clothes except shoes.”
She is semi-retired but does several different kinds of part-time jobs. She said diversifying her income helps.
“When I was in my thirties, the first thing I did was build a house,” Paddock said. “Buying a home is out of sight for most people these days, but that really helps me out. My main thing, if I don’t need it, I don’t buy it. I try to not waste. We throw away so much food in our society. Get what you need and use what you have.
“I also cancelled all my newspaper subscriptions. I went down to a couple streaming apps. I also went through my credit card and got rid of any extraneous recurring payments. When I went to cancel the Washington Post, which was costing $100 a year, they knocked it down to $30 a year. You can always try to cancel and see if they will give you a good deal. Credit cards will usually drop your interest rate down if you call and ask.”
Carroll County Extension Office Family Consumer Science Agent Torrie Smith said she is definitely feeling the impact of inflation. Her biggest advice is to eat at home, taking advantage of locally grown produce at the farmers’ market, and buying meat from local farms that might have a better deal than you can get at a store.
“Instead of a big out-of-state vacation, try a staycation,” Smith said. “There are a lot of great things to do here in Carroll County. Having a home garden can be a great way to save, and also doing some food preservation to store those things for the long term, either following research-based canning recipes or putting things up in a freezer.”
Fabric costs have gone up a lot. She said now it can be cheaper to buy clothes than make your own. When you are not there during the day, turn your air conditioning up a few degrees. If it is a cool day, maybe raise the windows and turn off your air conditioner for a while. She also advises bulk purchasing, if you have space. But don’t get so much that it will expire before you use it.