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Frugal Friday’s Workwear Report: Classic Cap-Sleeve Wrap Dress

Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.

Lark & Ro, one of Amazon’s in-house brands, is a great option for well-priced, machine-washable workwear. The styles are usually classic silhouettes that come in a range of colorways, so you really can’t go wrong. This cap-sleeve wrap dress comes in 11 different prints and solids, but this emerald floral version is my favorite.

I would wear it with a navy sweater blazer on these cool fall mornings, and would rock the cap sleeves when the 70-degree afternoon comes around.

The dress is $42.80 at Amazon and comes in sizes XS–XXL.

This Gabby Skye dress at Kohl's is on sale for $75 and comes in 14W–24W (lucky sizes only).

This post contains affiliate links and Corporette® may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. For more details see here. Thank you so much for your support!

Sales of note for 12.13

  • Nordstrom – Beauty deals on skincare including Charlotte Tilbury, Living Proof, Dyson, Shark Pro, and gift sets!
  • Ann Taylor – 50% off everything, including new arrivals (order via standard shipping for 12/23 expected delivery)
  • Banana Republic Factory – 50-70% off everything + extra 20% off
  • Eloquii – 400+ styles starting at $19
  • J.Crew – Up to 60% off almost everything + free shipping (12/13 only)
  • J.Crew Factory – 50% off everything and free shipping, no minimum
  • Macy's – $30 off every $150 beauty purchase on top brands
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off, plus free shipping on everything (and 20% off your first order)
  • Talbots – 50% off entire purchase, and free shipping on $99+

Sales of note for 12.13

  • Nordstrom – Beauty deals on skincare including Charlotte Tilbury, Living Proof, Dyson, Shark Pro, and gift sets!
  • Ann Taylor – 50% off everything, including new arrivals (order via standard shipping for 12/23 expected delivery)
  • Banana Republic Factory – 50-70% off everything + extra 20% off
  • Eloquii – 400+ styles starting at $19
  • J.Crew – Up to 60% off almost everything + free shipping (12/13 only)
  • J.Crew Factory – 50% off everything and free shipping, no minimum
  • Macy's – $30 off every $150 beauty purchase on top brands
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off, plus free shipping on everything (and 20% off your first order)
  • Talbots – 50% off entire purchase, and free shipping on $99+

And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!

Some of our latest threadjacks include:

225 Comments

  1. What’s your ideal weekday morning?

    I know there have been a couple posts here about waking up earlier, and I’m having the same issue. One thing that motivates me to wake up is a nice morning routine.

    1. My current routine and one I quite like is:

      4:15 get up
      4:45 gym for a 5:00 am OTF class (4x a week)
      6:15 back home, feed pups, drink coffee, do 10 min meditation, and then morning crossword
      7:00 shower
      7:30 walk the dogs
      7:45/8:00 log into computer for work

      On the day I don’t go to OTF, I sleep in until 5:30 or 6:00 but the routine is otherwise the same.

      1. If I woke up at 4:15 I would feel like it’s time for a nap by the time 8am rolls around.

        1. Anon at 10:00 am here. I go to bed between 9:00 and 9:30 each night with exceptions made usually only one weekend evening. I live a super exciting life hahaha

        1. I do! I am a morning person. If I sleep in, I feel like I have wasted part of my day. Plus it means I have evenings free to do other things since I go to the gym in the morning. I used to be in the office at 6:30 am, by choice pre pandemic. My brain works better in the morning so this schedule suits me best. No judgment on those who would hate it, of course.

      4. Lol waking up at 4 something would never ever be my “ideal” morning. My ideal would be getting to work at like 11 am so I could do all the things and not wake up when it’s dark outside.

    2. Up at 5:50 with heated eye mask for eye (this helps with my dry eye syndrome) for 10 min
      6:00 coffee & turn on lights
      6:03 – listen to motivational/positive/affirmation podcast
      6:15 – meditation
      6:30 – elliptical workout @ home
      7:05 – stretching
      7:25 – shower
      7:35 – make up and fix hair
      7:45 – breakfast
      8:05 – get dressed
      8:15 out the door for work

      1. What kind of heated eye mask do you use? I’m in the market for one and there too many choices.

        1. My optometrist recommends Bruder. I’m perfectly happy with it though it seemed expensive to me.

          1. I’m the op at 10:13 and use Bruder. I tried many different kinds and this is really the best.

    3. I need time to relax in the morning before I do anything or I get quite cranky. This means waking up early enough to have a quiet breakfast (coffee, toast) while reading or working on a crossword in peace (3 kids under 6 = this is my only quiet time in the house). Then running, walking, or swimming– if I don’t exercise in the morning, it’s not happening.
      To do all these things, I’m usually up at 5.

    4. 7:00 Hit the first snooze button
      7:10 Hit the second snooze button
      7:15 Beg myself to get up and go to the gym
      7:20 Decide whether to go to the gym; usually get dressed and go
      7:30-8:35 Gym for strength training
      8:35-9:00 Breakfast
      9:00 – 9:15 Lie down from exhaustion from workout and try not to fall back to sleep
      9:15-9:45 Shower and grooming
      9:45 Commute or set up work station

    5. You asked, so:
      6:15 – lighted alarm clock goes off
      6:16 – turn off lighted alarm clock and go back to sleep
      6:40 – phone alarm goes off, this time I actually get up
      6:45 – coffee, talk to husband and son about day’s plans
      6:50 – get dressed (in leggings or jeans and a “Zoom top”), “do my hair” which involves brushing it and putting it into a ponytail; “do my makeup” which involves putting on tinted moisturizer and tinted lip balm
      7:00-7:30 – Read news online
      7:30 – bathroom business
      7:35 – drive son to school
      7:55 – back home
      8:00 – log on to WFH job
      Sometime between 8:30 and 9 I eat breakfast.
      My life is 1000% better now that I work from home and don’t have a 30-minute “getting ready” period and half-hour to hour commute to work in the morning. Also, I work out in the evenings – as you probably guessed from the above, I am not a morning person and while I have tried mightily over the years to get up in the mornings and work out, it just doesn’t work for me and I finally quit trying. I work out for an hour at home on Tuesday and Thursday evenings; I go to the gym midday on Wednesdays for 45 minutes and for about an hour and 15 minutes on Sunday afternoon/evening.

    6. I too am up very early every morning:

      4:00 AM get up, grab caffeine, start laundry, run dishwasher
      4:10 AM feed dog (get dressed while he eats)
      4:20 AM Walk Dog while listening to an audio book
      5:00 AM Put clothes in dryer then go for run (if I go for a short run, I vacuum when I get home from run)
      6:00 AM Shower/get ready (and fold clothes from dryer)
      6:45 AM Commute
      7:10 AM in the office

      Same basic schedule on weekends, except I swim laps after my run and head to the office around 9 — and sadly, yes, I am in the office most weekends for at least one day and often both days.

    7. Up at 430
      30-45 mins to get ready/make coffee and fast/walk dogs
      Online ~ 515a with meetings daily starting at 8 (on camera daily).

      We’re BOS to CO coverts. DH and I both WFH but he has local hours. My brain stays permanently east coast based.
      Wouldn’t change it!

    8. 6:15 first alarm goes off, Oscar the kitty appears beside the bed for scratchies
      6:15-6:30 scratchies
      6:30 second alarm goes off. Ideally we get out of bed, but more likely Hubby continues to snooze and I either read my Kindle or do more Oscar scratchies
      6:45 third alarm, up and at ’em
      6:45-7:00, make bed, make coffee, make breakfast (granola/yogurt or toast/jam), feed kitties (“who’s ready for delicious wet food?”) while Hubby moves my car out of the driveway (it’s long and narrow and I hate it), waters outside potted plants, and gets the paper
      7:00 Hubby and I eat breakfast, play Jeopardy! on Alexa
      7:15-7:30 pack gym bag if necessary, recreational internet time and coffee
      7:30 say “I need to get moving,” continue recreational internet time
      7:45 get moving: shower, makeup, dress
      8:15 out the door

      I really need to push this all back about 15 minutes because the traffic is back to pre-pandemic levels and the current schedule doesn’t really allow enough time to get to work by 8:30, which is my goal.

      Hubby is usually half an hour or so behind me in leaving the house (he has way more morning chores than I do — my chores are more in the evening), unless he has an early court appearance.

      1. I love hearing about the kitties and that one of them has a regular scratching session with you!!

    9. Who even are these early people! My ideal weekday morning includes sleeping until 7:30 and getting into the office at 8:30 (if home) or 9. Alas, now that we have a baby, my assumption is we’ll be up at 6 at the latest once I’m back to work

    10. I have a feeling that this might make a few people feel better

      8:50 alarm, take meds, brush teeth
      9:15 or so, make tea, toast, egg or yogurt
      9:45 get dressed
      10:00 start work

      I’m self employed. Shower at night.

    11. I’m young and hectic so both my night and morning routines are inconsistent. Night school ends at 10pm M/W and Th night sports league ends after 9pm followed by a trip to a neighborhood bar! I use a Phillip’s wake-up light to help me get out of bed in a timely fashion.

      “Early” Morning w/ in person work:
      – 7 egg scramble or otherwise “fancy” brekkie at home (likely in a house coat & slippers), tidy up chores
      – 7:20 stretch, walk, or mellow exercise depending on weather and mood needs
      – 7:40 dress in commuter clothes, pack lunch and potentially a change of clothes
      – 7:50 out the door on foot, bike, bus, or metro depending on my schedule
      – 8:15 stop by downtown coffeeshop for a cortado and spend time on personal “admin” tasks (doctor’s appointment scheduling, responding to personal emails & texts, update planner/calendar, budgets)
      – 9 get to office & get going

      “Late” Morning w/ in person work:
      – 8:15 get dressed in office clothes, snag to-go breakfast and coffee from the kitchen
      – 8:30 out the door by whatever means will get me to work on time
      – I generally plan on a noon workout, generally skip lunch and have an early dinner instead

    12. Who sets an alarm? Such an abrupt way to start the day. I wake up when I wake up, generally. I set an alarm only if I have a meeting earlier than 8 or for which I need to leave the house earlier than 8. I am in a much better place all day if I wake up according to my natural rhythms.

      1. Some of set alarms because we need to be on time? If I let myself sleep until I woke up naturally, I would wake up at 11 am. My body loves sleep.

      2. Basically everyone? If I waited until I woke up naturally, the only jobs I could get would be graveyard shift.

      3. Hahaahaha my “natural rhythm” would have me waking up at 9 and going to bed at 1 a.m. That unfortunately does not work as 90% of my work colleagues are in an earlier time zone than I am, and as it is, logging on at 8 a.m. I usually have 20 emails waiting in my inbox from everyone who’s already up and working. If you can wake up on your “natural rhythms” without an alarm, congratulations to you.

    13. I’m so impressed with everyone who meditates! I’m not a morning person and suddenly waking up about 3 hours earlier than I did during the pandemic because of school dropoff.

      6:10 bird chirping sounds, light goes on in other room
      6:45 rock music comes on
      7:12 I have a 10-minute classical music playlist that tells me to GTFO
      7:25/30 leave house for 30-min drive to my kids school
      8:15 get home then WFH for rest of day.

  2. Have any Texas lawyers taken a board certification exam? I’m taking mine on Monday and FREAKING OUT. Would love any tips.

    1. Don’t freak out. Are you taking at home or in person? If in person, especially if you’re typing, bring earplugs. Bring your own lunch so you don’t have to wait in line during the lunch break. Stay at the hotel so you don’t have to figure out parking. You know your stuff or they wouldn’t have approved you to sit. What area are you taking?

  3. I found Lark & Ro to have inconsistent sizing and poor quality (Seams/etc) when I bought a couple years ago. Anyone buy more recently?

    1. Same. I know other people like it and the Daily Ritual line but I find it Old Navy/Gap quality (at best) and much, much more annoying to return so I just stopped buying it. I find Jcrew Factory is better for this type of less expensive workwear, as is Lands End, and both are generally better quality.

    3. I have three Lark & Ro dresses I really like and two that are poor quality so it’s hit or miss.

    4. This is really unsurprising that the quality would be terrible considering the price and the source. A dress twice the price of the one shown above would likely be of mediocre but potentially acceptable quality.

    5. In most mass manufacturing, they cut a pile of fabric many, many layers deep into pieces according to patterns. The top layer will usually be about the right size. The bottom layers may be folded or may be stretched out when cut, but you can’t see it from the top. That’s why a bunch of items cut at the same time from the same pattern may be different sizes.

    6. My absolute favorite tops right now are Lark & Ro (a georgette sleeveless blouse with gathered waist). Bought 4 of the 5 colors and it’s a total workhouse that washes up nicely and looks expensive. All mine fit the same, so no inconsistent sizing issues (I’ve bought a couple other styles and no sizing issues there either). Have a georgette dress from them that I love as well. So might be a little hit or miss overall, but there’s some great stuff.

      1. Thank you! Just ordered a couple to try.

        I pulled out a gorgeous silk shell I used to wear all the time pre pandemic and saw two prominent stains and now I’m wondering whether I wore it that way prior to March 2020 or whether they somehow mysteriously developed in my closet? Anyway they didn’t wash out despite trying twice, so there’s a $90 shell in the trash. Polyester all the way for me henceforth.

  4. The news about holiday shopping delays has me stressing early this year. My in laws exchange Christmas gifts. My parents/siblings have decided not to and I love how stress free the holidays are because of it. How do I minimize my effort with the in laws while still selecting gifts they like? My husband currently splits the gift choosing with me so we each cover 2-3 people. They have unwritten rules that prevent me from phoning it in like no visa gift cards, no repeats. I stress all year trying to choose good gifts and worrying they’ll read into them in any wrong way, although they’re nice people and probably wouldn’t do that. I’m also annoyed they all individually contact me asking for specific ideas to buy my husband when he really does not care what he gets (and secretly loves my family’s gift moratorium). If this is such a beloved tradition why do they not select their own gifts? Is the solution to ask their spouses right back for specific items and be done with it? Sorry to sound like such a grinch! I really like them and want to honor their tradition. Any tips are appreciated.

    1. Are they “things” people? Would they be open to experiences instead, if they’re comfortable covid-wise? Cooking classes, museum memberships, etc. I think subscription boxes might also be a go-to this year.
      You could also suggest a theme that ties into the general zeitgeist – like you can only buy something you find at [local store], best toilet-paper related gift, etc.

      1. OR – could this be the year it ends? Would your husband be willing to bring up the idea of a “gifts for kids only” rule, or a secret santa where you only buy for one other person? I have a lot of siblings and the secret santa route makes life so much easier.

    2. I think you should stop putting so much pressure on yourself. Pick gifts that seem to make sense. If they are normal nice people they’ll be appreciative even if the gift isn’t perfect. If they are fussy or picky or looking for a reason to be grumpy you can’t win regardless so no use stressing.

      1. Yes this. You don’t need to stress for a year. Check out a few gift guides. Pick something. Buy it. Get a gift receipt. Move on.

    3. If they’re all asking for ideas, can’t you do the same and then pick from the list? It seems like you are putting unnecessary pressure on yourself to find the perfect gift all on your own.

      Failing that, I like to put together little “treat yourself” baskets including smaller things I think the person will like based on their general interests. Eg, pick out wine for the wine drinkers and gin for the gin drinkers, a fiction book for the fiction reader and a nonfiction book for the nonfiction reader. They’re bound to get something in the basket they like and it reduces the pressure to find the one “best” gift for them.

    4. One of the most successful gift-giving experiences I had for my brother’s family was to go to a sporting goods store and buy everyone a shirt or sweatshirt for their favorite college basketball team. Does your family-in-law have an activity like that that you can key off of?

      1. I love this idea. You can swap it out with anything – a local brewery or restaurant, a favorite vacation spot, a band (hats, shirts, whatever), etc. Totally stealing this one!

      2. I do something similar. Everyone gets a book, socks, and a type of snack/sweet/biscuit that they wouldn’t buy for themselves.

    5. Why are you hesitant to ask them what they want, and then just go get it? It seems that you’re putting a lot of emotion into their “approval” of your gifts to them.

    6. If they are asking you for ideas to buy for your husband, hopefully they’re also asking him for ideas for *you*. So you are well within your rights to ask them all for their own wish lists!!!

      We do this with my in-laws and it’s a mix of specific links to items (where exact choice really matters, like this year my MIL requested a specific new tree skirt) or general ideas (like she wants a new kitchen timer). Works great!!

      1. Yeah, I think there’s a possibility that their family culture is “ask the spouse for ideas” and you are unwittingly not playing along.

    7. A few ideas – Hubs and I both create online wish lists comprised of about 10 or so impulse purchase like items we agree not to buy ourselves until after the holidays – basically take your half a bottle of wine amazon purchases and save them to wish list – saves money and time, and then share the list with our respective families. On gift giving, we give ourselves permission to not give the perfect gift, and find something in the $100-$200 range that is serviceable – e.g., bluetooth headphones, nice barware, fancy coffee table book, etc. Alternatively, if there was something at your house that they really liked, then I will buy that. Short answer, we buy nice stuff just not particular thoughtful stuff.

      1. I love the specificity yet universality of “half a bottle of wine amazon purchases”

    8. Yes, if they’re asking you, then use that as a window into their tradition and ask right back with no remorse.

      And this is why Amazon wish list was invented. Both my husband and I keep one with things that catch our eye during the year but we won’t buy for ourselves. Then when holidays roll around and everyone wants ideas, I just pick a few things from his list to share. He does the same for me. It’s not much, but it at least takes away the emotional labor of trying to keep a running wish list of “things he’ll like” when all our parents ask ME for ideas.

      Also, my husband and I successfully switched his family’s tradition once kids started coming – we all decided to get the kids gifts, but then we all bring a “favorite thing” item for the rest of the adults/couples. He has four siblings, three of whom are married, plus his parents, so we each buy 5 sets of our favorite thing from the last year. We give one to each “family” and explain why we love it. My SIL gave us all wool dryer balls a few years ago and that was a big hit, last year a BIL gave everyone his favorite bottle of whiskey. It’s surprisingly touching to hear what little item they’ve loved over the last year, and every single time I do a load of laundry I think of my SIL. Way better than a random shirt I half-love or yet another pair of black gloves.

      1. I love this “favorite thing” concept and may introduce it to my family! Great, great idea.

      3. Oh I love this idea! Couple gifts are SO much easier also imho. I’ve also gone with consumables a lot recently – WilliamSonoma has great mail order food boxes that you can order in 3/6 month delivery options, Goldbelly is a big hit, and monthly flower/plant deliveries are always nice too.

      4. I have family members who do this, and it’s really wonderful! One year, everyone got a special copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, a microplane, and…something else (cant remember!) that tied it all together. I use the microplane weekly, and reach for that cookbook often, and I always think of them!

      8. I do this with birthdays for my siblings, the favorite things idea. They always love it, or at least that’s what they tell me.

      9. The “favorite thing” idea is fantastic! Totally using this with my friends and family this year.

    9. If this doesn’t violate the unwritten rules, what about some fancy food and a smaller personal item each year? e.g. this year everyone gets the same fancy cheese assortment plus a smaller thing unique to the recipient (winter accessory, novel, mug, candles, local to you fun item?) Next year everyone gets the same mulled wine kit / bottle of wine plus a smaller thing. (In my book the same fun yummy food could suffice every year. There is an assortment of local-ish to her food – a specific hot chocolate mix and some maple-based goodies – that my mom gets us every year and we all look forward to it.)

    10. This is a lot of anxiety over gift giving. If you stress out all year about this then something’s gotta give. Does your husband stress out to this extreme? If not then maybe he can take over all gifts in exchange for you taking over some other holiday chore.

      Otherwise, come up with a plan to free yourself of this anxiety. First, you can definitely ask for gift ideas – if they’re asking you then you can ask them too! Second, it does not have to be The Perfect Gift and no one is twisting themselves in knots to find offense over a gifts. Are you handing out self help books or gym memberships? No? You’re fine. Third, I think you’re reading too much into their “rules” about no repeats or Visa gcs. Sounds like store gcs are ok, feel free to lean into that. I would also interpret “repeats” really liberally. It’s ok to give wine, whiskey, coffee, chocolate, bath products, etc. over and over. If crazy Aunt Sue wants to say something just say oh I forgot. No one will care, least of all the person with free wine. And ymmv but I would not mind being known as the relative that always gives alcohol/tasty treats/fancy bubble bath.

    11. You give experiences, or locally made things. TBH, this shopping/shipping hype seems really over the top. There’s plenty of “stuff” to go around and most need less stuff, not more.

    12. My family is like this with the lists. Think about it like this: talking about the gifts is a love language. People enjoy talking to YOU, having something to discuss that’s fun and special, thinking about what to buy. The process is almost more important than the gift itself. You don’t have to love it, but it might help to think about participating in this tradition as part of the family love language.

    13. My husband’s family has a gift giving love language, especially for Christmas. I go to a small shop of locally made, nice things, then I buy something for each of them (any myself!). Each gift is the best item that was available when I was there for that particular person. It is maybe one or two hours every year, and it is very pleasant. No muss no fuss.

    14. Well, I would ask them directly for a gift list, and also ask their spouses. You need to get to a place where you don’t stress about this. In my large and complicated family people send each other emails with ideas that range from the obvious to the ridiculous–the humor cuts any bad feelings about the whole thing. My list once included a 6 figure necklace from Tiffanys, and a pony. My son asked for a ticket to Mars with Elon Musk. Experiences and memberships are great, too. Also, most years I make a shutterfly calendar with family photos that I get texted to me, or find on FB or Instagram. This personal gift goes over well and is a nice add on.

    15. Other people have weighed in with ideas, but I want to validate that buying gifts (especially with in-law dynamics) can be really stressful. Being the person who both comes up with all the ideas and has to procure them is not great fun for those of us who care about the in-laws but don’t necessarily share the gift-giving love language.

    16. I solve most gift-giving dilemmas with cheese. igourmet dot com is reasonably priced and always a hit.

    17. I repeating such a sin? I have extended family who do exactly this. One cousin (who lives in Florida) sends me a citrus fruit basket every year. Another (in another southern state) sends me pecans. Honestly, I love it. We eat it all and I know to expect it. I’m trying to come up with something like that.

      1. Right? My dad gets homemade peanut brittle from me, every single year. I love doing it for him, he loves eating it, and although it takes my labor, it also takes zero mental energy!

    18. I think you should just embrace being a generic and not great gift giver. I mean why not give them adequate but somewhat unexciting gifts? If they don’t take food, just give them something off of Oprah’s favorite things list and call it a day. If they do take food, fancy food items on repeat year after year.

    19. OP here I just wanted to thank everyone for all the kind advice. It’s really helped me think through the layers of this issue: gift ideas, letting go of the anxiety, understanding my in-law dynamics, and becoming more familiar with the gifting love language. This community is fantastic!

    20. My family switched to white elephant years ago and it’s amazing. All women buy one nice women’s gift, men buy one nice men’s gift (usually around $50), and all minor kids get their own gifts (one from each family unit). Each adult leaves with one nice gift, a fun time inspecting and stealing gifts, and kids get a big Christmas.

  5. So what’s everyone’s feeling on student loans? We have about $175K hanging out in COVID forbearance, and we were on IBR for a while before then. We’ve been saving the equivalent of our monthly payments each month since March 2020 so we have a sizable balance we can use to pay before the covid forbearance goes away on January 31st. There’s no way that this is going to be extended, right? And the news about our loan servicers stopping their contract to service loans soon — that means almost nothing to me, financial-wise, right? We should just plan on back-to-normal on January 31st?

    1. As someone who has worked for a loan servicer, all I can say is pay extra close attention to your paperwork, document EVERYTHING, and make sure they aren’t screwing up your account when it gets transferred to a new servicer. If you’re getting transferred from FedLoan/PHEAA good (they suck so hard), but they also are highly likely to screw it up. Good luck!

    2. Yes to all of that. And realize how lucky you are that a pandemic was a financial boost for you. That was not so for many people.

    3. Unless something dramatically changes, I don’t expect forbearance to be extended again. When forbearance was most recently extended, the announcement said that it would be the final extension, and I don’t see them expending any additional political capital on this. The loan services issue shouldn’t have any impact either.

      I’m dreading the end of forbearance. I’ve been throwing money at my loans the entire forbearance period and by the time repayment resumes in February, I will have paid off $40k in grad plus loans (7.9% interest), and I’ll only have $60k at the regular (yet still ridiculously high) interest rate of 6.8%. Ten years out from graduation, and I’ve paid at least as much as I borrowed, yet I still owe $60k thanks to the usurious interest rates. I’m not opposed to paying back the money I borrowed, I just wish interest rates had been set at 0%. With all the talk of cancellation, there hasn’t been enough emphasis placed on the impact of these high interest rates on student loan borrowers. To me, a reasonable compromise would be to set interest rates at 0%, but I have no idea if this is even possible in the current political environment, and there certainly hasn’t been any talk of it. Guess I’ll keep paying twice as much as my mortgage on student loans and daycare costs for a few more years.

      1. Yup. Just like the rest of us did. But congrats on being rich enough to still have a mortgage!

        2. Ok, but just because you suffered under a ridiculous system doesn’t mean everyone else should forever and always. I fully acknowledge that I’m fortunate, but there are millions of people who are far less fortunate and can’t afford student loans + housing + saving for retirement + childcare. The system is broken and needs to be fixed.

          FWIW, I only have a mortgage because my husband risked his life serving in the military, so we qualified for a VA home loan and purchased a house that costs less each month than renting would.

          1. I’m not interested in subsidizing loans for people richer than me when I sacrificed to pay mine off. Most people aren’t.

          2. Oh my goodness. The system isn’t broken. You over extended yourself and now expect someone else to cover for you. None of those things are a given, you weren’t entitled to them.

      2. I am slightly entertained by the suggestion that interest rate should be set to zero. Imagine the levels of student loan borrowing if this were the case—use someone else’s money for free for 10–30 years, while inflation means that what is repaid has a real value of less than what one borrowed. And the poster is not suggesting any sort of public interest or government test. Go to work for BigLaw, use the loan interest savings to pay the mortgage! I understand that higher education is very expensive, and people need to factor costs of a program against earning potential. Some of the suggestions are madness, though.

        1. lol I had the same reaction…. maybe this is actually a genius idea to get colleges to lower tuition, since the lack of financing sources would deplete their candidates!!

          1. Honestly this needs to happen too. It is wild how much extraneous stuff young people have to pay for relative to what was actually essential to their degree (e.g., the faculty, classroom, library, and possibly some labs).

          2. Yes, but colleges act like they will lose a lot of students if they don’t have a brand-new climbing gym. I’d rather be no-frills and lower costs, but that only seems to happen at the community college level, when they know that people have very little funds to start with.

          3. I assume colleges compete so hard for students because of the giant lumps of loan money that accompany them! I think it’s a self-reinforcing thing.

        2. It is done in other countries, but it of course doesn’t mean the government writes you a blank check. The size of loans is regulated (so universities are incentivized to offer a government rate-tuition, just like hotels and airlines are in the US).
          Repayment is also regulated and coupled to your income after graduation, so you won’t be able to just make a minimum payment and wonder why your whole loan is still there after 10 years.
          It’s a whole different system, not the same system at 0% interest.

        3. I guess I assumed they meant 0% going forward? Lenders have made PLENTY of money on a lot of borrowers already.

        4. Fair enough – then set it at the rate of inflation. Other countries set student loan rates at similar rates – Australia is 1.8%; Germany – 0%; Sweden – 0.13%; New Zealand – 3%

          1. Don’t those countries already really subsidize schools, so you aren’t really even borrowing exorbitant amounts relative to likely future income? The WSJ has had a series of articles about how student and parent student loan borrowing is allowed at amounts that make no mathematical sense for ability to repay (the law you follow for qualified mortgages in the US now so we don’t have another financial crisis). Our tuition is out of control high relative to many students or parent borrowers being able to manage absent winning the lottery. I think a lot of people will die in old age with student or parent loans outstanding, which should never happen.

          2. I seem to recall that other countries tend to not have the super-high earners that America does, at least not in appreciable numbers. When law schools tell you that their average graduate earns $120,000 a year (hypothetically), that $200,000 loan requiring $25,000 a year in payments doesn’t seem too bad. A lot of “studies” (quotes intentional; their methodology is garbage) say that the average college grad earns $50,000 a year. Of course $60,000 or $70,000 in UG loans seems appropriate!

            However, students in other countries likely have more modest expectations of their post-graduate income, and likely do not have the duplicity and mendaciousness that we have here. Ergo, students will not be as amendable to taking out large loans.

        5. Set interest rates equal to inflation plus one percent to cover the administrative costs, but use it to curtail forgiveness on the other end. (For example, for new borrowers, cap PLSA forgiveness at a certain dollar amount of principle per year, maybe $5,000.) Our current insane system is that some people pay many multiples of what they owe, even accounting for inflation, and other people can take out $300k in loans for law school and get $250k forgiven. What we need to do is to bring in the tails (huge extra payments, huge forgiveness) and make it clear to new borrowers that what they take out = what they pay back.

      3. Usorious isn’t 6.8%. A lot of people pay that on houses and cars, physical assets that you can actually reposess and sell if someone defaults. You can try to hide a car or wreck it, but not a house. Not everyone has stellar credit. But no lender can repossess your English degree, so what would the motivation even be to make loans? Like there used to be a world where only rich people went to college and we may force people back to as an unintended consequence. Student loans is a situation that will become untenable and when it blows up, I don’t know what will happen next.

        1. Right, but student loans aren’t dischargeable in bankruptcy, while other loans are. I’m also focused on federal loans, not private loans.

        2. 6.8% may not be usurious. But I will point out, my student loans are by far our highest-interest debt (because we don’t carry credit-card debt). Our mortgage is at 3%. My husband’s car loan, which is nearly paid off, is at 1.8%. We took out a HELOC on our last house to pay for home renovations; that interest rate was 5.8% which was still lower than my student-loan interest. I would like to understand why student loan interest needs to be as high as it is. It could be set to something above zero without being set several percentage points over other types of debt that are arguably riskier, given that student loans can’t be discharged in bankruptcy.

          1. Because car and home loans are secured by a tangible asset. No one can seize your degree if you don’t pay your loan back.

          2. No one can seize my degree, but at the same time the value of the degree lessens over time. People are still paying off degrees from 20+ years ago and in the meantime they’ve likely had to get additional degrees, undergo continuing education, or retrain to stay competitive in the workforce. Similar to how I can’t get a 75-year mortgage or a 15-year car loan, why do we give student loans and give people a 25-year repayment term at 6.5% interest?

            I am having trouble understanding why so many people here are defending a system that is transparently predatory and is massively contributing to income inequity. Is the mentality here, “I suffered so others must suffer also?” Because if so, I can’t say I understand that at all. It’s like people who were in sororities and got hazed thinking that hazing isn’t bad and should continue, because after all, they survived it.

      4. For many people, daycare > mortgage. It’s not remarkable and I don’t get the woe-is-you theme.

        1. But it shouldn’t be that way! If you want a fully productive society, childcare is essential. Yet many people can’t afford childcare, and it’s not like the childcare workers (or daycare owners) are living in luxury; many of them are living in or near poverty and can earn more working as a barista.

          1. In places with heavily subsidized day are, birth rates are still falling and are lower than in the US. IDK if anyone has figured that out, but it is a problem if you roll forward to 2121 and there aren’t enough workers paying for old people and working jobs. Robots, anyone?

          3. The hardships of a falling birth rate are worth it in the long run. And the advice here is always that people who aren’t really sure about wanting kids shouldn’t have them just because!

          4. Falling birth rate = not enough future workers to pay into the system to fund mandatory payments. Like 1 worker supporting 3 retirees and one disabled person and one social safety net recipient is never sustainable.

          6. Anonymous at 11:51, almost every country in the world has falling birth rates; the only differences are who are at replacement levels and who are not. We cannot import enough people to fix our problems.

          7. Look, I’m a big lefty but I have a lot of priorities about where my tax money goes before paying off your student loans because you’re whining about them. There are people living on the street in my city year round.

            I paid big monthly student loans payments well into my late 30s because I was a full financial aid kid (half of which was loans) and I expect you to do the same. I agree with a prior poster that you seem totally tone deaf complaining about your student loan, mortgage, and childcare payments. Those are all things you signed up for.

          8. Anon @ 12:50 – I’m not asking for anyone to forgive my loans or give me free childcare. Yes, I made a choice to take out loans (which was the only way I could go to school since my parents had no money), have children, and take on a mortgage (again, cheaper than renting), but keep in mind that childcare costs have grown 2x as fast as inflation, many states have significantly cut funding to colleges while colleges have substantially raised tuition and fees (my law school nearly doubled tuition within a 5 year period). And, when I was in school, student loan interest rates were more than double what they are today. To me, that shows that we acknowledge that the student loan interest rates were too high and we should do something about it.

            I completely acknowledge that, despite these costs, I’m in a very fortunate position, and I don’t expect a handout. But so many people aren’t. The higher education system needs some significant changes and we as a society need to do more to ensure that there is affordable childcare and affordable college. If that means raising taxes on high earners (including me), then I welcome it.

      5. I assume you’ve already thought of this, but in case you haven’t, or aren’t sure about it, refinancing would get you a much lower rate. I swear this isn’t a sponsored ad, but I used SoFi, and it went really really well (no charge to switch, easy transfer of accounts, the only thing I wanted more of was a longer schedule of payments online – they only list the last twenty payments? or something weird like that). My biggest concern I had was losing IBR benefits if my income went down but I believe they do address those situations in their materials, and luckily I didn’t need it. My interest rates were between 6.8 and 8.5% and they went down to 3.25 or 3.75, and this was back in 2018 – just gave me a bunch more breathing room. I recommend it.

  6. To the poster who commented yesterday about gardening for the first time in forever: thank you. I am like your BF – my drive has evaporated and it’s hard on my partner. I knew it was bothering him but seeing the situation through your words prompted me to make an appointment with my doctor and try to figure it out.

    2. OP here: good luck! For whatever it is worth, it is always super important to me not to pressure my husband physically/sexually, it just makes me sad but I try to deal with it on my own. When things are good, it’s like a honeymoon phase all over again. I hope it all works out for you. Be gentle with yourself.

  7. Do you have a non-racer back sports bra recommendation? I have only worn sports bras for the last year and noticed that my racer back sports bras are aggravating tension in my neck and shoulders. Ugh!

    2. Have had the same issue and good success with the A.C. sports bra from Title 9. Major bonus: it has sewn-in, very thin modesty pads.

  8. Best of luck. I hope your partner has as much consideration for what may be hard for you in your life. Has he tried to help reduce your stress levels and support you through a challenging time, for example? Nothing kills intimacy faster than a stressful time and an entitled (rather than supportive) partner.

    2. Sounds like a you problem and not an OP problem, because she mentioned nothing of the sort.

  9. I have been reading a lot about student loan forgiveness and whether or not to means-test child subsidies and I am wondering if this right is at the root of what else is going on politically — whether poor people (or people who didn’t go to college or went to community college and maybe got certificates or 2-year degrees and not $$$ college for a 4-year degree) are actually subsidizing middle class people (or feeling like they are). I know that with social security, a selling point had to be that everyone uses it, so no one will think it is welfare for older people. And yet many people, often lower income, will be in jobs not covered by it or will die before they can take it (I know their children / surviving spouse still benefits, but the worker who paid in doesn’t). But I heard a story on NPR yesterday about whether people making 400K should have subsidies and, yeah, it was really hard to bit for why that should be a spending priority. I know that not that many people make 400K, but drawing a line anywhere seemed to really be problematic for some people. I would say draw a line and move on, but it seems that we are really as a country stuck.

    1. I think most people would agree that people making $400K should not get child subsidies. But the thing is, if you introduce a whole lot of administration then it becomes more costly, and harder to get to the people who need it. The most streamlined way is to have no gating criteria up front and claw it back at tax time from higher earners.

      Policy is an art, not a science. If you want poorer people to get child subsidies — which have been proven to make huge differences in early childhood and mitigating child hunger — then you have to be willing to make some tradeoffs in the policy design. It’s a question of which tradeoffs you are willing to make.

      1. Tradeoff at 400K for sure, at minimum. Not the hill I would want other things do die on.

      2. When I think of how many non-city Trump voters are probably natural Democrats, historically, I think that this divide + polarization is how we got to 2016. When I was a kid, D was union, blue-collar, workers; R was more main street business owners. Now, I see Trump doing a very good job (still) speaking to people who are sort of forgotten in the dialogue. It is wildly oversimplistic, but simplistic came back to bite us in 2016 and almost did the same in 2020 (I’m not convinced the D’s won, more that had Trump kept his mouth shut, he wouldn’t have lost and wouldn’t have lost the two Georgia senate seats to Ds). TL;DR: I think this a priorities discussion very much in the balance still and will matter for midterms and in 2024.

        1. As a Georgian, the Ds definitely didn’t win – Trump lost and people hated Kelly Loeffler. All you have to do is look at other results from the same election and you can see that there were a bunch of people who voted Biden and then a straight R or mostly R ticket. I think Warnock will struggle to hold the seat in the midterms – he might be able to hang onto it but it’ll be very tight. Ossoff would straight up lose it, I think, but he isn’t up.

      3. Maybe I’m out of the loop here (no kids) but does “child subsidy” mean any subsidy, like the childcare tax credit? I would assume that people who have a HHI of $400k have pretty significant childcare costs. I don’t think they should be cut out of all subsidies just because of their income. One of the main purposes of the tax credit is to encourage women to work instead of being forced to stay home because the childcare costs vastly outweigh her income. That calculus doesn’t go away just because HHI is high.

        1. But chances are 99% certain that someone making substantially less than $400K is going to be subsidizing the child care of someone making $400K. That doesn’t seem fair. Or if everyone makes that and has kids, it’s just a circle of $ moving around, so you get subsidized but pay so much more in taxes that it nets out. I’m not sold on the math at 400K.

          1. I mean, I make $400k. I have substantial childcare costs (about $65k annually). My student loans are paid off, but I also have to save for retirement and my kid’s education, pay my mortgage, and pay other basic living expenses. I like in a HCOL (not a VHCOL), and after I’ve done all those things, no, there isn’t a pile of cash hanging around. But, you know, the norm isn’t supposed to be that after you’ve paid for childcare, housing, savings, and living expenses that there’s tons of spare cash in your budget. The fact that I don’t have lots of extra cash doesn’t mean that I have financial need. Giving me a subsidy would be nuts.

    2. What? Like this is a bunch of English words in sentences but as usual they just sound like anxiety soup.

    3. It’s true that free college is not a panacea, and we shouldn’t expect it to solve all social inequality.

      1. It would be a complete disaster if everyone had white collar jobs anyway. People really should resent how many schools push kids towards college and don’t prepare them for other futures.

    4. I think that some in the US want it to be more like Scandinavian countries where everyone pays and everyone gets. I don’t know that that will work here.

      3. And if we did, I think that people on the higher end of the income spectrum would flock to private schools / create workarounds that would deprive public schools of even more funding and parent participation. We also don’t means test for driving on roads, using public parks, or utility service.

    6. I’m in a group (just over income thresholds for most assistance, no dependents) that doesn’t tend to benefit from programs and I favor casting a wide net when it comes to offering assistance. Just because I had a hard time of something doesn’t mean I wish it on others.

      1. Same. Even though I don’t benefit directly from some programs, I benefit in having a more functional society.

        Actually, I am way over the income threshold for assistance, which I am grateful for. I think assistance programs tend to run into problems when they have abrupt cutoffs at tiny changes in income. Like, it would be better to gradually lower the amount of assistance a person gets as their income rises, rather than cutting it off entirely because they are $1K or so above the limit. I think that’s when people get angry – they get a job and are worse off because they lose some assistance, meanwhile their neighbor who doesn’t work still gets help.

        3. Or if you get married, your total income is above the limit but single people both skate through.

          1. Nobody’s skating through life on income levels bordering assistance eligibility. Life is hard no matter your marital status. Being poor is a lot of work and it’s expensive!

    7. It’s just a hard call where to draw the line. We make just under $400k and obviously don’t need child subsidies. We have 4 kids so we still get money in our accounts from the IRS each month (I think it’s just under $200).

      But I think drawing the line is hard. Voters just on the other side of the line are extremely vocal. If you draw it down at families that make $100k, you hear complaints about families of 5 in SF that can’t afford housing. If you draw it at $200k you hear the dual income families in new england complain that their neighbor that makes 180k gets the subsidy and they don’t and it shows up in the votes.

    8. Public schooling should extend through early adulthood for those who want it; you should be able to get everything from a BA to trade school certificates. I would also like to see work study expanded so kids who need school-friendly jobs to pay their living expenses can get a decent placement. Maybe some kind of stepped down military service, except they have to actually let you go to school. I don’t think it should be limited by the parents’ income, but parents who can afford fancy private schools might continue to send their kids there instead of public school, just like they do with K-12.

    9. If we’re going to do those things I would absolutely means test and I’d set the test way lower than $400k, but I’m also in favor of a social safety net, not a social welfare state.

      1. I’m with you — safety net, yes. But at a certain point, our world is aging too fast to make anything sustainable for more than 50-100 years. Look at Japan — it is happening there first, but Western Europe will be there next and then us.

        1. I’m with you — safety net, yes. But at a certain point, our world is aging too fast to make anything sustainable for more than 50-100 years. Look at Japan — it is happening there first, but Western Europe will be there next and then us.

          1. I’m the commenter at 10:55 AM, and in general, there isn’t great evidence that cash subsidies and social benefits like those raise the birthrate at a societal level – you see this in Europe. For me, that’s a reason to have a much more liberal immigration policy – there are lots of very hardworking people who would love to come here, and we make it far too hard for them to do so. That being said, if you asked me to choose between spending on early childhood education/childcare and spending on student loan forgiveness, I would 100% choose ECE/childcare – the societal benefits are clearer and it helps put families on the road to self-sufficiency (or keep them there). But again, I’d means-test it.

    10. I’m pretty sure it would benefit just about everyone (besides some of the lenders) to relieve the debt burden. And a fair amount of student debt is held by people who never even graduated, let alone made it into the middle class. But definitely there’s a lot of resentment towards educated and well off people who are perceived as elitist and condescending.

  10. I’m ready to bill the time it took me to shower, dress, do my make up and do a full blow-out, then sit in an hour of traffic each way because my client is insisting on an in-person meeting vs a zoom.

    I’m kidding, but man, I don’t miss this. I am so, so much more productive WFH.

    1. I cannot understand why some firms are so insistent about coming back to the office. They seem to think associates are just hanging out at the beach. The hours do not reflect that at all, associate hours have remained steady firmwide. If you think AN INDIVIDUAL is sitting at the beach doing nothing then fire them, don’t punish the entire firm over it. It’s so frustrating.

    3. hmm, my repair man charges for the journey to my place, even if it’s just for a quote…Maybe this isn’t all that far-fetched.

  11. Does anyone have Farm Rio winter or non-summer clothes? I found them this year and have some summer items that I adore. But I think of them as a summer brand (and does Brazil even have winter?). Some of their new offerings are very cute and my old formal workwear both doesn’t work now that our office is casual (but not athleisure casual) and I’m back in it and doesn’t fit, so I can’t really wear a tucking-in slim fit silk blouse with my elastic-back mom jeans.

    1. I tuck shirts into my elastic-back pants. Granted I work in an informal department of a biz-cas office, but also I don’t care if people know I’ve got some help in the waistband department.

    2. I’ve never heard of this brand, but doing a quick scan of their sweaters for fall — um, I will just say that’s quite a leap from your prior dress code.

      If you blouse the back of your silk tops generously enough, btw, you can easily disguise any waistband. Or just do a front tuck.

      1. I am also not super-familiar with the brand but just perused their website. I had to laugh, because I grew up in New Mexico, and many of the clothes on the site remind me of stuff that was very popular for middle-aged women to wear in Santa Fe in the late 80s/early 90s. There was very much A Lewk that was popular at that time, with wild prints, sweaters with animal graphics knitted in, big sleeves on sweaters, bold colors in unusual combinations, etc. I doubt anyone who didn’t live in NM in the 80s/90s would recognize it but it’s very recognizable to me. How funny.

        1. I was a young adult in the late 80s/early 90s and an avid knitter. Every knitting pattern in Vogue Knitting was exactly what you describe. I knitted them anyway and wore them here in California. I don’t know what I was thinking!!

  12. I got Botox last year thanks to this site and I’m loving it. Now I have dark under eye circles (thanks to my infant twins, whom I love dearly even at 3AM). I know the solution is to get more sleep, but are there any products for this? I tried under eye concealer about a decade ago and it was too crepey for me. I’ve tried fancy ones and the Maybelline that everyone raves about. No dice.

    1. Shape Tape from Tarte is the only one that works for me. I’ve also played with the idea of under-eye filler…

    2. Dark circles are mostly genetic and can sometimes be caused by a deep tear trough – the fat pads along your cheekbones cast shadow on your tear trough. Things that can help:
      1) Caffeine products
      2) using a highlighter on the dark circles to create more light in the shadowed area
      3) concealer – I have always liked Shape Tape and Benefit products for this
      4) Your botox provider can probably advise on whether you can use a filler under your eye to get rid of the deep tear trough and the shadows
      5) Learn to live with it because none of this stuff really works :)

      Good luck! And if something helps, please circle back and post – I have done all on this list except number 4.

      1. Number 5 is definitely it for me. I will have darker circles under my eyes no matter how much sleep I get, it’s just the way my face is.

        1. I agree with this. I think where people go wrong with concealer and other products is trying to cover something completely so that they can no longer see it when they scrutinize themselves in a mirror. That is always going to lead to too much product that doesn’t look natural in person. The trick is a light hand and using products that lightly camouflage or bounce light, not spackling an area into oblivion.

          Forget what you see online. That’s all filters and lighting. Those people would look very strange in person.

    3. Becca Under Eye Brightening Concealer, which I like to top with NARS Radiant Creamy Concealer

    4. I like the thinner textured light-reflective concealers for a more natural look. They look great on zoom and in photos. The one I’m currently using is Trish Mc Evoy Instant Eye Lift, but there are several on the market. Be sure to apply some sort of moisturizer or eye cream first and let it settle for a minute.

      I put the concealer on early in my routine using a brush, and then pat it lightly with my ring finger just before I’m done (after doing my hair and everything that comes later). That seems to keep it from settling into fine lines for the rest of the day.

      Another tip is to use a light hand with the concealer. Applying too much is always going to look crepey.

  13. Similar to the other gardening comment, I want to share that I recently ended my nine year cold snap(?) of not gardening with anyone else. After college dating wasn’t a priority and I never met anyone I trusted enough, and finally I did. Was kind of terrified (maybe more so than as a teen?) but it was great. So if there are any other perpetually single ‘rettes wondering if it will happen… it will.
    (Didn’t meet him through the apps but rather at an event in person.)

      1. Unfortunately it’s long distance (why, Universe?!) – neither of us live in the same city as the event we met at. But he’s coming to visit me soon. The seven hour train journey to his the other weekend KNOWING the cold snap (ridiculous metaphor) would soon be over was bizarre.

    2. Yay! Happy for you! It definitely is possible even after a long time. It can be so hard to put yourself out there – I am glad that you did!

  14. Yet another student loan question for this morning:
    I am in the 9% of borrowers that kept paying on my loans during the pandemic payment moratorium – my payment amount isn’t a burden to me (I am paying the minimum payment + $150 a month, my total payment is $400/month), my student loan is my highest-interest debt, and I felt like it was a good thing to knock down the principal when interest rates were at 0%. I only have about $20k left to repay at this point (off of an original $42k). The minimum payment I have been paying was calculated on the original loan amount. Is the minimum payment going to be recalculated based on the balance of the loans as it stands when repayment starts in February? Or will the minimum stay what it was when the loans originated? I haven’t been able to find any info online. I am one of the FedLoan Servicing folks being moved to a new servicer, FYI.

    1. I don’t really understand why this matters, given the math of compound interest. If you can afford to keep making 400/month payments, then that’s what you should do. If you can comfortably do a bit more, then go to 500.
      The longer you draw out paying off a loan, the more of your money goes to interest. The faster you pay off any loan, the more of your money you get to keep.

    2. Curious – Is it 9% of those whose loans were deferred or 9% of all borrowers? A lot of us did not have loans deferred and I am curious what that chunk of the borrower population is.

    3. This made me laugh, thanks! I’ll try a few products recommended here and report back.

  15. For people commenting on how tight it is to live with student loans (especially if you have children before loans are repaid and then have to fund a larger home and daycare), do you feel that you got adequate counseling on finances and realistic income / debt funding once you were in repayment? Like maybe if you knew how it would be, you would have held off on a graduate degree or gone to a less expensive college or done a combo of 2-year degree and transfer for a BA? I feel like especially for graduate school or any time there is parental borrowing (where you jeopardize retirement), this is not a thing and needs to be a thing.

    1. I am not living tight, although I have to stay in certain jobs to pay and live a luxurious life (I know, WOE IS ME), but I absolutely did not receive anything that could be considered useful debt counseling from my law school, lender (hahahaha), or anyone else. That said, the only thing it would have changed is me taking out the max loan amount. If I has understood the pay back situation better, I would have lives more frugally. I still would have gone to law school bc I was 25 and I knew everything lol

    2. My parents paid for undergrad, but we had the conversation at that time about how they weren’t going to pay $$$ for a school that wouldn’t generate an ROI – i.e., provide me with an excellent education and a name brand to carry forward. I applied the same thinking forward in choosing my law school. I graduated with $175K of student loans but from a school that funneled me straight into Biglaw, and had them paid off about 4.5 years after graduation.

      I would not expect the student loan companies themselves to provide this counseling bc it’s a complete fox henhouse situation. Schools have no incentive to do it because they want $$. So unfortunately it’s mostly up to parents, siblings, etc to do this, and not everyone is well educated on it.

      1. What on this specific comment went to m-d? (I just scanned it for the usual suspects like tr-ns, s-te, c-ll-ar……)

    3. My law school loans are paid off (I had a full scholarship plus a campus job for undergrad, so no debt from that), but while I still had them it definitely limited me financially and I couldn’t save much. I do remember my post-graduation exit counseling, and I don’t think it was particularly good, but at the same time – it didn’t really need it. I was old enough to understand that I was borrowing a huge amount of money (I think my student loan paperwork had the estimated monthly payment in it) and that I would need to stay in jobs that would enable me to pay it off and sacrifice other stuff. I think it’s hard for an 18 year old to understand but at 23 or 24, it was quite clear to me.

    4. Ok I am not in favor of paying off other people’s loans as a taxpayer, but I am 100% in favor of financial literacy at every age. This should be taught in high school and college!!

    5. I managed to buy a house and pay off my student loans in less than ten years, so I’m probably a success story, and I absolutely did not get any financial counseling or advice. I think a schedule, showing the minimum payments for various income levels would have gone a long way, along with prospective (and realistic) salaries upon graduation. I feel strongly that BigLaw salaries skew the statistics, and law schools need to do a better job of clarifying what someone not working in BigLaw can expect to make. My first job I made $100k less than an average first year associate in the nearby big city, and I qualified for IBR for the first eight years of my career.

    6. Definitely not. Part of the problem is that there isn’t (or at least there wasn’t) realistic information on post-graduation income. The survey my law school put out claimed that the average salaries of first years was around $120k. That was…not my experience, especially since I graduated during the great recession. There was fierce competition for jobs paying $40k, despite being a tier 1 law school. I also didn’t factor in the cost of retirement savings, the cost of health insurance, life insurance, etc. Better financial education would have helped.

      1. My law school did something similar: advertised average salaries of around $100k a year, cost of attendance almost doubled in the time I was there. Employment numbers were fudged to begin with and just comical during the Great Recession.

        The biggest change that needs to happen is for the employment and income numbers to come from a third party that gets them from all schools, reports them the same way, and does not have a financial incentive to massage the numbers. Also report percentage of students who have paid off their loans at the 10 year mark.

  16. I’m about to get a job offer from a large company in the Bay Area. I’m currently in the Midwest. I expect the position will be remote at first due to WFH policies, but that they will want some sort of commitment to relocation in the future, timeline TBD.

    A relocation consultant reached out to me today to talk about relo benefits, but I have not even received an offer letter for the role yet.

    I find this a bit strange – wouldn’t you want to understand the general compensation package prior to considering relocation? How would a relocation package substantially change the decision about whether to a) take this job and b) move or not?

    I consider relo costs to be one-time expenses that are absorbed over time with an increase in salary.
    (And yes, I do realize that housing and related transaction costs are extremely high in the Bay Area – I have friends there so I’m not naive about the implications of moving from a LCOL to a VHCOL area.)

    Anyhow, as the consultant said that the company insists I talk to her first, any tips on what to ask re: relocation? I’m thinking of asking about support re:
    – allowances for visits prior to starting the job
    – real estate agent fees
    – transaction fees (e.g. closing fees, inspection, …)
    – help with finding a school/daycare (I have 2 kids, 3 and 6)
    – moving costs (e.g. movers, truck, storage)
    – lump sum allowances

    1. I relocated from Canada to the US in 2017 & this is what relocation covered. I believe this was considered their “executive”/best package (new grads get $ to hire a uhaul).

      – up to 90 days in company paid housing (it was a furnished 2 bedroom apartment)
      – real estate fees on the selling transaction
      – referral to a local realtor who took us around. We made 2 weekend visits to buy before I moved.
      – commitment to buy our house cash if it didn’t sell within a certain # of days (90, I think)
      – local guide to show us local neighborhoods, find a bank, insurance, PO box & otherwise get set up (take us to social security office)
      – shipping cars / import cars paperwork
      – rental car to use until our cars arrived
      – full-service movers, including packing, shipping, storage, unpacking, removal of empty boxes
      – lump sum to help with misc expenses (1 month’s salary) – we used this for fees related to boarding/moving pets

      Overall, I believe they spent about $130,000 on my move (which I would never spend doing it myself!). The relocation was outsourced to a big company that specialized in this.

    2. Hmm, I’ve never heard of real estate-related costs or childcare help being covered in relocation packages, but to be fair in my company you’re lucky if they toss in a few hundred bucks for movers. Are you going to ask about all of those things plus a lump sum? What will the lump sum cover then?

      1. Real estate related costs are always included in relocation packages for higher level jobs. OP should ask for what it’s going to actually cost her to relocate and no less. Real estate fees are one of those costs.

        To OP – some relocation programs buy your old house and sell it for you so you don’t have to worry about the transaction while starting your new job. If they do that and are willing to pay a price you’re happy with, I’d absolutely do that.

    3. In addition to that, if you’re a homeowner sometimes they will buy your house for you if you’re having trouble selling it. Likely not a problem in today’s market, though.

    4. Just to clarify: I’ll be in listening mode mostly, as I do not want to discuss specifics until AFTER receiving an offer letter.So, this is not a negotiation regarding relo, just trying to find out what all they could offer.

      And I have interacted with this corporation before (another subsidiary), and know some of the things mentioned above could be a part of the relo package.

    5. I turned down a job during the Great Recession because of the relo package offered. Any way I did the numbers, I was going to lose a lot of money and it just wasn’t worth it to me. In hindsight, turning it down was absolutely the right decision.

    6. Ask whether there are any benefits for your partner (assuming you have one). My husband’s relocation package in the past had included a short period of income replacement because I quit my job to follow and career services/resume help for me.

      Do moving costs include travel costs for you as part of the move? How many nights in hotel rooms en route and on each end? Will they ship one or more vehicles?

      Do they buy your house (and potentially cover loss) as part of the move? Do they provide bridge loans to cover the cost of you buy before you sell?

    7. The waitlists for high quality childcare are really long in many places around here. That said, I think the help that most companies would provide re childcare would be a waste of time because most big companies around here are now using a mediocre large national provider for childcare help.

      Help from a high end nanny agency or consultant would be worthwhile, but there’s a trend away from these small providers as an employee benefit.

    8. I am at a place commonly trying to recruit people that will have to relocate. We engage our relo specialist before we make an offer to help get the candidate excited about our location and smooth over any apprehension they may have about the move. That way, when we make the offer, we have a better chance of getting a yes.

    9. I live in the Bay Area. I suspect that they are trying to figure out if you are serious about relocating. Many people say they want to relocate. But when they actually look at the cost of housing here, they back out. My guess is that this is an attempt to make sure you’re informed and serious.

  17. I would like to thank the anonymous poster who recommended following Sali Hughes on here several months ago. I’ve been following her Instagram since then and I’ve learned a lot about makeup, as well as really enjoying her fragrance videos. I also joined Beauty Pie at her recommendation and am loving that (and if I could stop buying all the candles I would probably be saving a lot of money on makeup and skincare!)

  18. Has anyone read the LeanIn.org/McKinsey report on Women in the Workplace? The main takeaway is that for all of the women who decided to or were forced to stay home during the pandemic, white-collar women as a whole made strides. This is counter to the comments here and in the media that many women were taking steps back, and maybe it’s the anomalies that get the most attention. Certainly, if my kids had been in the early elementary school years and I had to home-school in addition to working full-time from home, I might have been one who had to step back, so I completely get why some women did take a temporary hiatus or permanent move out of the work force.

    The study also examined women growing as leaders and making more efforts at diversity, equity and inclusion and supporting their team-members, in contrast to men at the same level who didn’t have that commitment. However, the article summary mentions that white women are still failing to mentor and prevent discrimination or speak out against it.

    Comments?

    https://womenintheworkplace.com/ https://www.wsj.com/articles/womens-careers-pandemic-toll-11632520837?tesla=y

    1. It’s not my job to mentor or prevent discrimination. My responsibility is to deliver my work, make money, and live my life. If you want to mentor or be on DEI committees, that’s great. I don’t, and it shouldn’t be expected of me because I’m a woman.

      1. So don’t do what you don’t want to do but I will say that this reads very much as “I got mine and everyone else can get f’d.” As a woman and a professional, I feel like I do have a responsibility to mentor others and make the road to success a little easier, and smoother than the one I walked. I hope you realize that by taking the attitude of “it’s not my job to help anyone; I’m looking out for number one and that’s it” you’re contributing to the perpetuation of a lot of negative experiences and conditions for women in the workplace. You likely had people who helped you, directly or indirectly, and all women in the workplace owe something to the women in the 60s, 70s and 80s who put up with a lot of discrimination, harassment and other BS to pave the way for all of us here to experience the success we’re experiencing. If they hadn’t done what they did, we would not be where we at, and I do feel a responsibility to pay that forward and make things better for the generation of women coming in after me. If you don’t see that, I’m not sure what to say to you.

      2. It may not be my job or your job or other women’s jobs to mentor or help DEI. And I’m not here to say you are deficient because you don’t. But in my opinion, it is a responsibility of anyone in a senior or management position, simply to make it a better work environment for everyone.

        But the main point is that women are doing more than men and perhaps we’re at a point where managers who are invested in DEI will do better in corporate metrics than those managers who don’t. Not everyone is a manager who needs to worry about DEI or managing a team, but those that do should be rewarded. I think it’s also part of a larger conversation on work and equity.

        The other side is that women still earn less than men and are slotted into caretaking – is the fact that they’re mentoring and working on DEI hurting or helping their advancement.

      3. If you are an individual contributor, then I agree your deliverable is your work. If you are in any way managing people, in the leadership role of a department or program, then I think mentoring and creating the environment to enable all staff to succeed is very much part of your job.

  19. Here’s a low stakes Friday question for the group:

    Do you all have any recommendations for notebooks you love for work? I am an office supply nerd and have done some research via the Wirecutter, but I’d love to hear your thoughts and comments if you have any. My only requirement is that the paper be lined.

    1. This is mine

      https://www.leuchtturm1917.us/bullet-journal-edition-1.html

      I use it more for note taking than bullet journaling, though I do like the habit of making a daily to-do list.

      I like quadrille dots better than lines because I can make vertical delineations as well as horizontal – like indenting for example

      I like that it has an elastic loop to keep it closed in my bag, as well as more than one ribbon bookmark. I have been using this since 2016.

    4. I normally get Moleskine but have also gotten a lot of fun notebooks from cute boutiques when I travel because it’s a fun souvenir that is actually useful (I use them for note taking and to do lists for work). My current one is from Shakespeare and company in Paris and it’s really great, so now I’m wondering if they ship.

    5. Here are the ones I like: https://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Limited-Business-Notebook-Wirebound/dp/B0000AQONK/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=Cambridge%2BLimited%2BBusiness%2BNotebook&qid=1634320925&s=office-products&sr=1-3&th=1

      I take notes in the lined area of the page and then use the blank area on the left to call out action items for myself – schedule this meeting, send email about this, remember this priority, etc. I use those four-color Bic pens to color-code my action items or switch colors as different people talk in meetings.

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