[填空题]Slash Your Bills — 6 Ways to Keep More Cash
Like a lot of hardworking couples, Ilah and Dennis Hardesty of Long Beach, California, live paycheck to paycheck. Their $1,200 monthly rent eats up about half of Dennis’s take-home pay as a manager for a racing car engine manufacturer. Private school tuition for their three teens takes another $400 bite. Income from Ilah’s two part-time jobs — as a fitness trainer and school secretary—disappears at the gas station and the grocery store.
The bottom line Even with no car payments and just $300 in credit card debt, the family barely gets by. "We don’t have a penny in savings", says Ilah. "No, I actually do have one cent in my account".
With inflation outpacing wage growth in recent years, it’s not hard to find families like the Hardestys running out of money before they run out of month. According to the nonpartisan (无党派的) Economic Policy Institute, which studies lower-and middle-class economic trends, the median hou