Margit’s Note: I Need a Dollar; A Dollar Is What I Need.

By Margit Detweiler

Happy Tax Day.

I will gladly hand you my hard-earned cash. No, no, you keep it. Enjoy. Make me a smooth paved, pothole-free road and we’ll call it even.

This week is all about the green stuff. Cash. Even if you are the kind of person who pays for your latte with a quick scan of the QR code, money is still money.

While technology has drastically changed the medium, our relationship to money has certainly not. (And I still find myself occasionally calling ATMs – “Mac Machines” — I know my Philadelphia peeps feel me on that.)

We wondered: what have we been we taught to think about money by our parents and how has that changed as we’ve gone off to college, moved into our work lives, paid taxes, created  joint bank accounts (or not), thought about retirement and investments (or not).

We can never have too much of it, but we can certainly have too little. It is one of our most intimate companions: it’s that invisible friend we never introduce at parties, yet somehow stands beside us the whole time, while people wonder who is that?

And as women, we make on average an estimated 77 cents compared to every dollar a man makes. (Note: African American women make 64 cents and Hispanic women 55 cents. ) Whatever your politics, there’s a wage gap — and we need to fix it stat. Money is mobility, work, power, relevancy, ambition and, of course, fairness.

This week:

• Jody Jones shares inventive tips from a “cheapskate” Dad.
• Elizabeth Plank gives us all the things women could buy — if we were paid the same as men.
• Daily Worth’s Terri Trespicio tries living only on cash for a month.
• Courtney Colwell shares how her mom’s illness changed how she “saved” money.
• In What’s Your System, we look at a system to teach your kids to give, save and spend. Does it really work?
• On a career-related note: Tamar Anitai offers a few pieces of financially sound work advice, courtesy of Mad Men.
• And in “Movie Night” Piers Marchant suggests four money-friendly flicks and one very broke buster.

Spend wisely.

Love,

Margit

Originally Published April 15, 2014. Updated April 4, 2021.