the recession diaries

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Naomi Campbell has ignited a controversy. But this time, it doesn’t involve someone’s billionaire husband or an accusation that the model I love to call Nay-Nay smashed someone’s skull with her BlackBerry. Nope. The last of the supermodels is again publicly calling out the fashion industry for its…

Previously, I wrote an entry detailing the growing number of artists struggling as a result of many of the odd jobs used to supplement their income while they pursued their passion being eliminated. The reality is as much as one can love their craft you have to eat. So can there be a balance between…

Oxford Analytica’s has unveiled a new report that sheds light on the psychological impact unemployment has on the state of your mental health. The report can be best summed with: If you have no job, you’re miserable. This just in: The sky still is blue. I know such a revelation seems pretty obvious. The same…

It seems more and more people are employing the broke guide to shopping in their daily routines. It’s been estimated that was much as 25 percent of shoppers’ trips to the store result in at least one item ditched. By comparison, in the recession of the early 1990s it was 15 to 20 percent. That…

Upon reading the article about the growing number of men with eating disorders, I almost felt compelled to kick off this entry with details about how great my BBQ chicken pizza was last night. But discussing male eating disorders in jest plays into stereotypes about men and women, and negates a very serious issue. Professor…

Granted, there are some people who know how to shake a bill collector as well as a stripper during NBA All-Star Weekend, but no one should be spoken to in that tone in a professional setting. Call it a hunch, but calling a person in debt fat, uneducated, ghetto, and a reject won’t lead to…

Have we reached the end of the road for the black middle class? Barbara Ehrenreich, president of United Professionals, a non-partisan and non profit membership organization for white collar workers, argues such a position in a piece entitled, “The Economic Fallout Has Decimated the Black Middle Class.” In it Ehreneich along with Dedrick Muhammad, a…

In a sure sign of the times, forty-five percent of employers reported in a recent CareerBuilder survey that they use social networking sites to research job candidates. That’s quite a leap from the 22 percent who reported the same the previous year. And just so we’re clear that this is a lasting trend another 11…

Despite the city of New York being recognized as the banking capital of the world, 12 percent of all households in the city still do not have a bank account. That’s 4 percentage points above the national average, according to recent data by the Pew Charitable Trusts. Though there has been considerable effort to lessen the…

Would you rather trust your financial future with Howie Mandel over Tim Geithner? If you answer yes, take an odd comfort in knowing you’re not alone. According to USA Today, a growing number of Americans have decided to take their chances with game shows with the hopes that they can win big to pay off…