MACON, Ga. — The COVID-19 pandemic caught a lot of people off guard, and the changes it brought put a lot of financial stress on families.
In 2017, before the pandemic, the website CareerBuilder.com found that almost 80% of American workers live paycheck to paycheck. As the country begins to recover financially from the pandemic, you can, too.
Financial advisor Sherri Goss shares these tips.
- Create a realistic budget so you know where your money is going.
- Open a savings account and put money in it every month.
- Pay off debt to save money and lower your monthly expenses.
- Review your career options to increase your income and decrease the chances you'll get laid off.
You can get started on this last goal by reaching out to Georgia's Community College System to learn about the 17 careers you can earn a degree for, for free.
Goss shares the success story of a struggling restaurant server who worked in downtown Macon.
"I said, 'Please call the career counselor tomorrow at the community college, please call and talk to them," said Goss. "Well, the next time we talked to him, he was already signed up and they were going to pay him to get his CDL license and place him directly into a job. He told me, 'I could be making a $100,000 in a year. I didn't even know this was here.' That's what a big deal this is."
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