It's True: You're Broke Because You Want To Be

I believe that within a modern society with a modern economy, people are broke because they want to be.  

Poverty is more a result of personal bad choices than we usually acknowledge.  Without acknowledging this fact we cannot adequately fight poverty.  

Poverty has little to do with our environment or race. If a person's fate in life is predetermined by his social and physical environment, then we should all still be living in caves. 

Pay close attention to the people you know that are broke and stay broke.  

You are capable of helping yourself by going out there and earning more money.
You need to earn more money, not expect others to give it to you.
Take responsibility for your own life.  It's your fault you're broke. 

It's not your depression or your anxiety's fault that things aren't going your way.
It's your fault you aren't following through on your applications which
is why you're still broke! 

Don't blame him or his job (or lack thereof) for the fact you don't have money.
It's your fault.  Get off your butt and go back to work!

They find blame for their misfortunes in everyone and everything but themselves and their lack of self control when it comes to money and their attitudes.  They deny their own responsibility in those choices.  

This is a relief

There is nothing more demoralizing than to convince someone they are incapable of taking care of themselves.  LDS gospel principles of church welfare and self reliance teach us the exact opposite of what society teaches regarding welfare and poverty. Some things they teach us. 

(1) Each of us has a responsibility to try to avoid problems before they happen and to learn to overcome challenges when they occur.  

I feel that so many members of the Church have a gross misunderstanding of this: Church welfare was set up to remind us that we are responsible for preventing need in the first place. We are responsible for preventing the outcomes that would make us go to our bishop or local welfare office for temporal assistance.  Church welfare wasn't created just in case we need it, a common belief I've noticed that is irritating. This attitude makes us void of personal responsibility and consequences for our decisions.  It destroys our temporal and spiritual progress. 

(2) We need to abandon immature strategies of blaming and victimhood and adopt a more self-reliant view of ourselves in the world.  

(3) Because of agency, we create our problems and therefore, we are capable of fixing them.  We're responsible for our situations and we can't just wish for something to happen.  We have to get up and do something about it.  Once we feel remorse for our poor choices that led us to being broke, we exercise repentance and change the behavior that made us broke, and prevent it from happening again.   

You Don't Have a Money Problem

Most broke people do not have a money problem: the money problem is a result of other problems! Discipline problems, self esteem problems, attitude problems, integrity problems, thinking problems.  Messed up priorities.  

Other Things
No amount of outside help like money from family, free rent,  Xmas presents from Secret Santas, or public assistance will help poor people out other than themselves.  Outside help tends to make the problem worse.  This is because before you can fix a problem you have to know you have a problem.  The sad truth is most of the poor people in your community or family you are trying to help, don't think they have a problem, so therefore they see no incentive to fix it. 

We do nothing for our broke friends and relatives when we tolerate their whining and moaning about what's wrong with their life, job, etc.  

We do our loved ones a favor when we cowboy up, look them straight in the eye and tell them, 

"You know what?  Life is your own damn fault.  It's your fault that you're broke" 

Long Term Benefits of Taking on Student Loans

Living in Utah, I've noticed that a lot of people around here are extremely debt averse when it comes to student loans.  So they consider working while in school and many people do. 

I do agree that having the cash ready for school is the best option.  This is why we opened a 529 account for our child.  (Don't do this until you are well on track to retirement first)

However.  

If you are a recent HS graduate that's single, no children to support, planning to attend an affordable program, and still come up short with paying for school, my opinion is that you will be much better off taking the student loans to meet whatever you need left to finish school in 4 years, rather than work full-time and take 8 or more years to finish an undergrad.

If you can finish your 4 year degree in less than 4 years, even better.  The concurrent enrollment with HS/community college is something more people should do instead of worrying about their social life their senior year.  AP classes and passing them are good too.  Take it from everyone that went on to finish college, and they will agree with me: At some point in college, you will be glad you took that advantage in HS and got your got classes out of the way sooner than later.  (College classes you want out of the way ASAP are US History, and math and English requirements at minimum.  If you are going on 18 months or two-year LDS missions, you will forget a ton of math if you hadn't taken math since junior year of HS...so please take 4 yrs of math during HS for your learning)

For everyone that isn't dropping out to be an billionaire entrepreneur or pro athlete (and congratulations if you are, none of this below will apply to you), the best long term money savings strategy is to get college out of the way as soon as possible and start acquiring real life post graduate work experience.  

Now why would taking out loans be a better option than working through school?  Who wants to leave school with debt? 

Let's consider the following that are true and keep them in the back of your mind:
1. Average wages for someone with no college degree aren't likely to increase much in a span of 8 years. 
2. Average wages for someone with a college degree are likely to increase a lot in 8 years.
3. Tuition costs and fees are likely to increase faster over 8 years than salary increases. 

Should you enroll part-time, the total cost of completing your degree will cost you as much or MORE money in the span of 8 years than for someone who took out student loans for the entire 4 years of school.  

"But Alina I'm working full-time at a company where they reimburse a good portion of my tuition!  I'll keep working there until I graduate" 

The truth is if your annual salary increases are lower than your annual tuition increases, you are losing money and the company tuition benefit isn't that great of a deal.  Jobs are an investment because they compound with interest annually (assuming you are at a decent employer that gives you an annual raise).  Smart investments will always trump the best deal.  While leaving school with no debt sounds great on the surface, getting more bang for your buck in 4 years, even with the loan interest and fees is better than paying rising tuition costs and fees over 8 years.

A student loan facilitates not having to work many hours during the school year just to pay for the cost of tuition. You would need to work just enough hours to meet your expenses such as rent and food, which isn't much for a single childless student.  And if you aren't working, or just working a few hours on campus, there's really no reason to own a car and the added expenses that come with it.  You can take the bus (free or heavily discounted for most college students), walk, or ride a bike to class. 

If you're working full-time during the school year, most of your earned income will go toward to maintaining your car on top of paying your tuition.  Keep in mind that you aren't making rock star wages at this point.  

Ideally you should focus on school and then get a car to facilitate obtaining internships and securing better employment after graduation. 

By not working full-time, you can actually concentrate on what you are really in college for: to study for 4 years.  If you do well in school, you get paid for your grades with semester scholarships.  There are even plenty of scholarships that do not require a near perfect GPA.

Most people think they can't afford college because they weren't awarded a huge scholarship during HS and their life is over.  Not so, there are always scholarships in college.  My first scholarship as an incoming freshman was only $500, just barely enough to cover textbooks. Each year, I kept searching and applying for whatever scholarship I'd be qualified for, and surprisingly, the scholarship amounts got more generous the closer I was to graduating.  My last two years were tuition-free.  Searching and applying for any and all scholarships is almost a second job in itself so several people that work full-time miss out on this.  In addition, you need to be enrolled full-time to qualify for a scholarship.  

So what happens when you have a loan and a scholarship?  The university will take the loan, award you the scholarship, and refund any money left over back to you by mailing you a check.  You set this money aside to pay your rent and other needed expenses or loan payments in the future.  

What student loan averse people fail to consider is that the biggest expense for part-timing your college education is the lost opportunity costs for your wages to increase exponentially after graduating on time.  

As a recent graduate, you could be making less than someone who has been working longer, but still in school.  

To illustrate a real life example: me and my husband.  I took about 4 years to graduate and he did the 8 years or more track.  When we met in 2011, I earned less than he did when I finished nearly two years prior because he had more work experience.  I took out loans to facilitate finishing my degree program on time, while Dave continued to work full-time, be in school part-time with no debt after graduating.  He graduated 6 months before we got married in 2012.  He also began college before I did.  Both of us went to junior/community college first and then transferred to the University of Utah to finish, which did reduce the amount of what we both needed to pay.  Community college and junior college are great money savers, but you need to go in with the intent of transferring to finish the last two years of university.  

Remember how I said it's likely that salary increases a lot within 8 years for graduates?  The chances of your salary increasing exponentially within 3-5 years post college are extremely likely.  The key thing to consider is who experiences this increase first: the one who finished college sooner.  

While you could be making less right out of college, you have a very good chance coming out ahead of everyone that is still working through college.  What ended up happening was that I experienced my 1st major salary increase sooner and outearning my husband right before our wedding in 2012.  He too experienced a big increase to his salary after his 3-5 year post grad mark...but by then I experienced my 2nd major salary increase.  Yep I became the sugar mamma in this relationship ;-)

My first increase in pay made it possible to pay off the entire loan sooner than planned, and avoided paying more in interest.  My last loan payment was when Baby was born in 2013 and a few months later in 2014 was when my 2nd salary increase happened. 

Guys, as long as the total cost of your student loans are less than what you're earning your first year post graduating, you'll be able to pay the loan back without any problem during the repayment period and fulfill your return on investment expectations for a college education. So if you went to an inexpensive program, borrowed all 4 years, got scholarships, and the amount of the loans was $25k, that would mean you would need to earn at least $12.50/hr post graduation to make the loan repayment for 10 years.  

It is important to remember that salaries do not stay stagnant, they increase as long as you keep working and acquiring more specialized work experience.  Most employers value the 4 year degree.  

If you don't have other obligations to consider and want to go to college, your priority should be to finish your degree program on time or sooner.  So do not rule out student loans as a means to facilitate finishing your degree on time. 

How Women Can Ask for a Raise Like a Man - Part 1

The number one thing I wish I had someone tell at the beginning of my career instead of later is this: that every time I was made a formal offer of employment, I do have the formality to come back with one counter offer.  

Looking back I pretty much shot myself in the foot the moment I stepped out of college.  While my external offers were huge increases in previous base pay, I could have asked for a little more of my offers.  Most of the time that I was interviewing externally, I simultaneously made it to final rounds at two companies and that really could have gotten what I needed or more.  

It never occurred to me I could ask for more after getting an offer.  No one told me this. I had never seen salary being approached like how I would negotiate for a car!  

What made it even more baffling is that not even my husband, dad, father-in-law, brothers-in-law, or uncles told me anything about counteroffers and negotiating--and they do it all the time.  I learned that men negotiate, women do not--but the question in my head was how come the men in my life didn't tell me this when I interviewed for my first job, and subsequent jobs after that?  

Why didn't my closest male relationships, the ones who provide, honor and protect me, teach me how to ask for a raise like a man?

A gender and leadership expert, Jeffrey Tobias Halter answered that question that kept mulling in my head for months.  He flat out explained that men do not connect the dots that the women they work with at the office is also another man's wife, mother, daughter or sister and I believe this is the case why didn't I get any advice or support.  It wasn't their fault, they just hadn't thought of it.  More on that HERE, it is a must read for any man that has daughters.  

Who then taught me this?  Other moms that worked. Not all of them though, because most of them leave before they leave.  Read "Lean In" to understand this concept more, it is honestly a fantastic and helpful book.  And "Lean In" was where I learned only 7% of female graduates counter offer their first job.  (My reaction when I read that statistic "Whaaat?  You can do that, ask for more money than what they tell you??  Darn!!")

Not long ago, I talked to a friend who's a working mom and shared some insights about salaries and raises, because I used to work at her current employer and remembered how much I got paid (peanuts).  It definitely was unsolicited advice, my bad habit, I try to mitigate it with a blog. 

A few weeks later, she followed up with me.  To my greatest surprise, she told me she had thought A LOT about what I said.  The result was that she went to her boss and ended up getting a raise and a promotion!  The thing that kept me up at night though was what she said after that:

"I wouldn't have done it if you hadn't reached out to me"

That time around, another woman received advice from another mom that worked.  This made me shudder.  
I wasn't told about it until I heard it from another mom, and my friend didn't know either until I told her.  I even confided in a colleague more senior than me asking if she ever asked for a raise or counter-offer her promotions.  Not even once. It had never occurred to her either that she could ask for more.    

I decided from there  I would go out of my way and reach out to other women, primarily mothers who work and/or graduated from college to not make the same mistakes I did with negotiating salary.  I would share anything and everything I've learned about salaries and negotiation.  

Why? Because chances are that no one told them yet either and they'll remain underpaid until another woman goes out of their way to tell them about it.  

While I work on Part 2, I want to ask these questions, no need to respond.  
Did anyone tell you about it?  Was it a man or a woman?

Why Part Time Work May Not Be Better for Young Moms

When I decided to go back to work full-time when Baby was 6 months, a common response I got was 

"Couldn't you just look at part-time jobs??"

Part time work was the first thing I looked at.  After a while I realized that part-time employment isn't what it's all cracked up to be, and decided to search for full-time employment instead.  I'm not saying that part-time employment has no value.   It can put a foot in the door for something better.  But more often than not, what you get in return for working part-time is not worth the time and the cost that it takes to earn part-time wages.  

I tell moms who are in a situation where they really need the additional income and still have young children at home, that part-time work, while well-intentioned, will not resolve their financial situation in the short and long term.  Their best bet would be to look at full-time employment and preferably in jobs where you get a salary, and not in jobs where you have to punch in and out for lunch or something gimmicky like direct sales.  

Here are problems I discovered that come with part-time employment which led me to reconsider and to go ahead with working full-time.

Consider this example. While the scenario is hypothetical, the facts are true.   
Two moms live next door to each other.  Both of them commute to work at the same place and both earn the same rate per hour.  

One mother is employed full time and the other is employed part time.  Here's where part-time starts to become a problem, financially.  

Transportation Costs:
The person that gets hit the most with the transportation expense is the part-timer.  What it costs for a full-timer to get to/from the job is exactly the same for the part-timer.  

Insurance premiums:
Both of them receive employer benefits.  However the health and dental insurance premiums for part-timers cost more per pay period than for the full-timer.  This is why you see more happy retired folks in part-time roles instead of young moms; they take the income, reap the social benefits but don't need to pay for health insurance because they're covered through Medicare.  

Childcare Costs:
Both of them have the same number of children with the exact same ages and go to the same daycare. Childcare tuition for full time, 5 days per week turns out to be less expensive per day than childcare for 2 and a half days.  This is because centers have to find more employees to ensure adequate child-to-caretaker ratios for all hours of the day they're open or get shut down.  Part-timer is hit again with the extra cost.  

After adding all the expenses for both moms, the full-timer comes out far on top.  

While the full-timer is working 40 hour weeks, she ends up earning and taking more in take home pay PER HOUR than the part-timer. These expenses are why so many mothers start and end up quitting part-time employment very quickly without realizing that they probably could have been far better off with full-time employment instead.  

Other problems with part-time employment:
The reason why benefitted part-time jobs are far and few in between across all industries is because an employer gets more value for one person producing in one job than two people producing for one job.  It's also a pain in the butt for an employer trying to get coverage for 200 hours of work managing 10 people instead of 5 people.  

Part-timers reach a cap in what they can earn per hour, especially in entry-level jobs.  The wages for full-time positions more often than not, pay a lot more per hour than part-time wages, around 30-50% more!

Also, people who are broke, or on public assistance work less hours on average than the middle class and the affluent.  So if broke is where you want to get out from, then cowboy up and work more hours by obtaining stable, full-time employment.  

  

Realtors

If you're shopping for a home, you should get a realtor.  It costs you nothing as a buyer to use one.
If you're selling your home, you are probably better off using a realtor if you want to sell quick.

However, some tips (as I love to give unsolicited advice...a blog is a great way to do that)

Please make sure your real estate agent isn't:

• A friend
• A relative
• A member you know from your church

Because if (s)he sucks, it will be hard to cut them off and lose more in your time and especially money. 



If nothing else, when checking out a real estate agent...if they tell you they're full-time, you got to find out what their definition of "full-time" means before going further. Real estate may be all what they're doing but involved in 1-3 transactions in a year.  You want someone involved in a lot more transactions per year than that. 

Think about it.  If you are planning to sell your home and get an inexperienced seller's agent, you risk having them sell your home at too low of a price so that a more experienced buyer's agent will notice it, and tell their buyers to go ahead and make an offer.  

When it comes to buyer vs seller, whomever's agent that has the most experience and knowledge of the market will win.  

The Best Priced Diapers to Buy

If disposable diaper brand isn't important to you (and why should they be -- they all end up in the trash after use!) but PRICE is, the best priced diapers that I've found that get the job done is...

Comforts by Baby*.  They are carried by any store that sells Kroger products.  
They are far better priced than buying diapers at Costco or Amazon Mom any day.  

They're the ones in the green box with the firefly that is mistaken for a bee.  I think they are good diapers, soft and thick.  Like any diaper, including cloth, as long as you change often and practice good hygiene, your baby won't get rashes.  

The best thing about these diapers is that if you have a Smith's app (or Kroger app), you can download Comforts for Baby coupons to your rewards card keychain.  The coupons range $2-3 dollars and you get one every month.  

Usually they retail at 18.99 for their biggest box. For Size 5 diapers, it is 20 cents a diaper.  With a $2 off coupon, they are $16.99, 18 cents a diaper. 

Sometimes though, when a good Comforts for Baby coupon is circulating, the price of a box goes up to $20.99, which is still pretty good for Size 5 diapers at 22 cents a diaper.  But most of the time, they sell for $18.99.

Compare this with the Costco brand, Kirkland Signature. At $38.99, for a box of 150 Size 5 diapers, 26 cents a piece.  Sometimes Costco has a $6 coupon, making it 22 cents a diaper.  
Guys, that is still more expensive per diaper than buying Kroger diapers WITHOUT a coupon!  

The Southern Savers couponing blog has a terrific and helpful chart reference on best diaper price for a variety of sizes.  I recommend reviewing it before you start price booking on diapers.

Boxes for Comforts for Baby start selling at Size 2.  I only buy small packs if it's $4.99 or less.  Once in a while, I manage to get a pack of Pampers for $4.99 but not often, it's only possible with a $3 coupon combined with a store promotion.  There is another Kroger diaper brand however, called p$$t! that has Size 1 diapers retailing for $4.99.  They are just like Comforts for Baby but thinner.  

Here are the quantities for boxes retailing at $18.99 as of 4/13/2015 with the exception of Size 1.  Comforts for Baby at Size 1 sells for $5.99 a pack.  I bought them only when I had a coupon (making it less than $4.99 a pack)


- Many times, I've managed to pay $16.99 for a box.  
- Boxes last a little over 3 weeks of diaper changes.  

COMFORTS FOR BABY
Size 1   44 ct = 14 cents
Size 2 148 ct = 13 cents
Size 3 128 ct = 15 cents
Size 4 112 ct = 17 cents
Size 5   96 ct = 20 cents

At the beginning of this month I bought a box selling at $18.99 with a $2 coupon.  
On 7/22/2015 we bought another box at $20.99 with a $3 coupon.  
That made it buying a total of 192 diapers at Size 5 for $34.98 at 18 cents a piece.  

From my last two purchases with coupons, I got about a week and a half worth of diapers than if I were to buy the store brand at Costco at retail for $38.99.  Another way to look at it is that instead of paying $4 more at Costco, I got an additional 42 diapers by buying Comforts for Baby.  That's like paying 10 cents a piece for 42 diapers of Size 5!!!!

Which leads to the next thing in mind: are cloth diapers worth the money?  

This will largely depend on whom you talk to, but in this case you are talking to me, a person that is very objective on price, and tells it like it is with how money is made.  The thing I'll point out about with what I see with cloth diapering that most people do not is that cloth diapers have become a huge business where one can easily sell diapers to parents willing to pay $800 to $1500 upfront and never come back again.  Kind of like wedding vendors and used car salesmen, the price for a good elsewhere is usually inflated a lot more when you attach "wedding", "used" or in this case, "cloth"  

I do not know how cloth diaper advocates come up with such high costs for disposables because in a year, we spend under $330 on disposables for one child.  The low cost is driven by the coupons and also the cash back for groceries swiping our credit card.   

If you are apprehensive about cloth diapering and worried about paying for disposable diapers, the good news is that you can still save just as much, or even more money using disposables instead of cloth.  Again, Comforts for Baby are the best priced diapers I've seen to date.  




*disclamer I receive no incentives promoting this product. 

How Salary is Really Determined

Most people come to the wrong conclusion that going back to grad school will increase their earning power.  

I'm not talking about advanced degrees like medicine, dentistry, or law where you have to have the degree to practice that sort of profession, or degrees where you really want to be a university professor, but degrees such as MBAs, MAs, and any other degree that is not really demanded by the market.  

Now I sound like I'm speaking heresy because I do not have an advanced degree myself, but I did seriously consider getting an advanced degree at one point.  When I was close to finishing college, I came to that wrong conclusion myself.  

Before graduating, the program director for the scholarship program I was in said to all of the scholarship recipients: 

"Stick with the last 2 semesters*, 

it will make a difference in your pay."  

*referring to MIS, MS in Finance, and MAcc

However, other things came in the way so I didn't apply straight out of undergrad.  Thank goodness other things did come my way because with more life experiences, I was able to do more objective research of considering whether it would be worth my time and money going back to school.  

I am more convinced than ever that going back to grad school is not an investment, it is a waste of money and lots of money.  Now, in all fairness, people who have graduate degrees earn more...BUT THE DEGREE ITSELF IS NOT THE CAUSE OF IT. 

Everyone must learn before going back to grad school is how salary is determined in the real world, not what you study in economics class, and especially not from college admissions people (what they won't tell you is that they need your money).  You may just discover a more cost-effective way to make yourself more marketable without going back to school!  

Salary Determination Primer
The first thing to keep in mind, is that all employers have a budget of what they can pay someone for a specific job.  This is usually known as a pay range.  Simply put, the employer pays someone what they can afford and at a rate the employee would be happy with.  

If the employee wants more (within reason), and the employer really needs to fill the position, they will review their budget and come back with a counteroffer.  Most big employers hire people known as "talent acquisition" who are expert at handling negotiation with potential hires and will do everything in the book not to budge with their initial offer.  After all, they are paid to get an employee in the door for the least possible amount of money for the employer.  If the offer is too low for the employee's needs, the employer will not take it personal and just keep looking for someone who will be happy to work for that pay range.  

The second thing to consider is what other companies of comparable size and industry are paying others for that type of job.  Companies focused on making a profit will shell out higher wages than non-profit.  Bigger companies also shell out more than smaller companies.  

Employers do a better job than job candidates knowing what a reasonable amount of pay would be for comparable job descriptions in various areas.  For example, they will not pay accountants in Texas, a New York or San Francisco salary.  So if you are working in San Francisco or New York, and hoping your previous base pay will influence your future base pay if you relocate to Texas, you are wrong. Your pay will first be reduced about 20%-30% to adjust for cost of living and then from there, the employer will determine an offer from that adjusted previous base salary and the job they're hiring for.     

Third is special skills.  This is HUGE.  The truth is, if you have the scarce skills demanded by the market, if you have the most complete portfolio of job related experience available, you will get the job with competitive pay, even over a candidate with a top MBA.  So think long and hard about whether you want to go back for two or or even more years of college only to have stiff competition with the non-grad school candidates with the 5-7 years of relevant work experience. If you are new to the job, you will be on the lower end of the range.  If you can already do the job, you are in the middle of the range.  And if you have more relevant job experience, you will be put on the higher end of the range quoted by the employer.  

"Sweet Companies only want Guys with Skills"

Fourth is previous salary history.  Many job applications ask what you made in your last job because this is determined in making a competitive job offer.  Switching to another company for comparable job skills warrant your biggest increases in pay.  That being said, DO NOT LIE ABOUT WHAT YOU MADE AT YOUR LAST JOB.  Employers do call your previous employer to legally find out and confirm your job titles, how many years you worked, and the amount of money you made.    

Fifth is your boss.  The higher up the chain you are, you are able to influence pay and needing to go through less approvals for salary adjustments.  If you do not have sponsorship from your boss or other senior leaders at your company, it is impossible to transfer internally or be considered for promotions, ever.  

In conclusion, the name of the school or ranking or the degree does not influence salary, it is really about what you're doing that is in demand right now by the market but more important, acquiring years of experience on the job to do it.  And once you're in a job, your pay will be judged much more by what you do on the job, how you get along with others, and even how you dress rather than where you went to school and what degree you got.  

I'll conclude with a quote from a talent acquisition director at Humana, a national health insurance company, along with the link to the article. 

"I haven't seen an automatic boost for any degree"

Reason to Lean In: A Man is Not a Financial Plan

My heart goes out to a young widow, two fatherless children and a man who died in his prime.  

For those that don't know who Sheryl Sandberg is, she is 2nd in command to Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook. She is Harvard educated and wrote the best seller "Lean In" 

On top of that, Sheryl is self-made having accumulated a net worth of over a billion dollars.  This is very rare since the majority of women who are billionaires become so through inheritance.

And get this: she made more money than her husband...but that wasn't an issue for him; a life with the woman he loved was far more important to him than how much either one was making.

Sheryl is my working mother hero.  Many women have criticized her decision to continue working while raising a family because she and her husband could have afforded a SAHM arrangement on her husband's income alone. Her husband, Dave Goldberg was the CEO for another Internet company.

The question I've been pondering after hearing the news about his death and want to discuss with my readers is this: Where would she and her children be today had she decided to Lean Back and be a Harvard housewife instead?

A man is not a financial plan.  Your husband can divorce, die, or get disabled without notice.

Sheryl had gone through one divorce (no children in first marriage) and now she is a widow with two children still in elementary school. But because Sheryl has been working full-time outside the home since graduating college, she does not have to worry about big financial issues that many widows/divorcees face such as having her house going into foreclosure, declaring bankruptcy or losing health insurance benefits.  Nor will she have difficulty finding employment that can earn her a living wage due to a 5, 10, 15 year employment gap.  Many women in this predicament do not have savings or money for retirement either.

Sheryl at the moment probably feels like she's lost everything because losing a spouse is a significant loss.  I bet she's trying to figure out how she will keep going through life without her companion.  But I know she will eventually figure out a way to keep going.  She can and will continue to take great care of and provide for her two children.

Mr. Goldberg chose wisely in having a smart, accomplished wife, rather than retreat from or try to dominate her.

If any of you are on the fence about continuing your career with kids, you can think about it this way:

Being a working mother is not something selfish that you do for yourself and to the detriment of your children. 
You are insurance for your family if something were to happen.