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Have you noticed that your paychecks have been a bit larger than normal lately? That’s because in 2011, the government is cutting the social security payroll tax paid by individuals from 6.2% to 4.2%.
How much is that in stone cold cash? If your annual income is $40,000, that’s $800 over the course of the year divided among your bi-weekly or monthly paychecks. If you earn $80,000 annually, your extra pocket money is $1,600. For those who make $106,800 or above, you’ll see an extra $2,136. Since social security is taxed individually, married couples could get up to a $4,272 take home pay boost for the year.
Now, what should you do with your extra moolah? Sheryl Garrett, the author of the Personal Finance for Dummies Workbook, a Certified Financial Planner and founder of the Garrett Planning Network, suggests these 10 ways to wisely spend your money, in order of importance for increasing your financial standing for years to come.
Balance Your Budget
If you live paycheck to paycheck, or on a tight budget, the extra $66 per month (if your annual income is $40,000) could mean the difference in paying your electricity bill this month – or not. This month, balance your budget with the fatter paychecks. Next month, adjust your budget so your expenses and income balances when the payroll tax cut expires. Since this bonus money is a one-year deal, don’t rely on it next year to cover basic expenses. Focus on other expense-reduction strategies: negotiate your next lease, use coupons at restaurants, ditch buying grocery items that are spoiling in your fridge, or change your IRS withholding if you get a refund every year.
Settle old debts
“Wouldn’t it be nice to pay off your mom and dad for the money they lent you for an apartment deposit?” says Garrett. Use this money to pay off any money you borrowed from family or friends.
Pay Off Credit Cards (and keep them that way)
Credit cards are easiest to attack, since you see the bill each month. If you use Mint.com, you can set up a goal to pay down your credit-card debt, and Mint will prepare a customized plan for you based on your cards’ balances and interest rates.
Boost Your 401(k) Contributions
If you’re currently not taking advantage of the full amount your employer will match on your 401(k), use your extra cash here. Once you’ve fulfilled this amount, deposit any remaining funds in a Roth IRA.
Contribute to a Roth IRA
Unless your adjusted gross income is higher than $122,000 if you’re single, or $179,000 if you’re married, filing jointly, you are eligible to contribute up to $5,000 in a Roth IRA. (The contribution limit is $6,000 if you’re 50 or older.) If you haven’t already made that contribution for 2010, you have until April 18, 2011, to do so. You can also, of course, contribute another $5,000 for 2011. While the amount you contribute is not tax deductible, you’ll reap the benefits once you start making withdrawals: all your withdrawals, earnings included, are completely tax-free as long as you’ve held them for at least five years. (And, of course, you need to be 59 ½ or older to make penalty-free contributions.)
Buy Yourself Marketable Skills
Enhance your ability to earn money in any of a number ways. If you’re actively looking for a job, consider hiring a resume service to help polish your resume. If you’ve been thinking of going back to school, take your GRE or GMAT test. Take a continuing education course. Buy a snazzy suit for interviews. The key is to spend cash in a way that will boost your income, now or in the near future.
Invest in Your Health
If one of your New Year’s resolutions was to improve your health, now is the time to see a nutritionist. If you’re a smoker, join a stop smoking program. Buy a bicycle to save on gas, or caulk your windows or insulate home. With every investment, think: will this save me money next year by doing this action?
Shop for Organization Tools
Luckily, Mint.com and basic tax software is free, but consider upgrading to the non-free version if you have a home business or more complicated tax forms. If your important documents are scattered across the house, buy a file cabinet or an expandable file organizer. The better organized you are, the easier it will be to manage your money.
Take a Vacay
If you already have all these categories covered, take a vacation. A yoga retreat, cruise or weekend with your honey at a B&B may be just what you need to return home and spend quality time tweaking your budget to perfection.
Reyna Gobel is a freelance journalist who specializes in financial fitness. She is also the author of Graduation Debt: How To Manage Student Loans and Live Your Life.
Evan here. Please check out our daily blog at www.theasiachronicles.com where we will have more posts than those that appear here. Today, for example, we have this post and also a post from Alexis Lamb regarding the Singapore market – “Singapore Swing.”
Please note that Robert Kinney and I will be working from our Hong Kong offices for a few weeks later this month and can be available for meetings with our readers then. Alexis, of course, is based permanently in Hong Kong.
Three Quick hits of the day (a new feature at theasiachronicles.com): One US firm in Hong Kong now has an expat / cola allowance of over $90,000 for single associates and over $100,000 for married associates; Almost every strong US cap markets practice in HK / China is hiring lateral associates now; It has recently become more common for US and UK firms in Singapore to offer an expat / cola allowance, albeit much smaller than in HK (for years, most firms offered no allowance in Singapore).
While interviewing for a US associate position in Asia can be quite different from interviewing for a spot down the street in New York or another major domestic market there are also some similarities to a job search in any domestic market. The key determining factors on whether you will have a chance at interviewing are top firm experience and impressive law school academics. The other obvious factor determining whether you will be asked to interview, at least for most positions in Asia, is language skills (Mandarin, Korean, Japanese).
However, once you are in an interview, whether by phone, VC or in person, your stellar resume is not going to help you as much as it would in an interview for a US position. Overseas partners are looking for the right personality fit much more so than in a large domestic office. A major reason for this is because the offices are much smaller overseas, making it harder to hide a misfit (even a junior associate can be the face of the firm), but there are other reasons as well.
At a basic level, the factors that are especially important to demonstrate in an interview overseas are these:
• you have an entrepreneurial nature;
• you have a high level of maturity for your experience level;
• you have an outgoing personality (not overly “academic” in nature);
• you are able to fit in with different cultures;
• your personal presentation is generally positive; and
• you are a team player (no prima donnas need apply)
• you have a demonstrated interest / connection to your target market
These are obviously all factors that are relevant in any interview at least as “plus factors”, but these particular factors are especially important in Asia.
Keep in mind that within minutes of your first interview, most partners can pretty much figure out whether you have these attributes. Any of us at Kinney Recruiting can figure this out about candidates we speak to in minutes as well.
There is a much less structured environment for associates in busy overseas U.S. practices (at the smaller offices or newer practice groups it can be similar to working in a exciting start-up company, albeit one extremely well financed).
The market is such in Asia, especially in China, that firm clients are not nearly as institutionalized as in the major US markets. Sure, many US firms in Asia opened offices there initially to follow major clients. Nevertheless, the pitch environment is much more of a free-for-all in Asia, especially in China. A firm not being on the preferred vendors list at an i-bank, fund or other entity often does not even prevent representation from happening in Asia (while it is more difficult, a series of one time waivers for a firm by a client are not uncommon). In China especially, considering all the state run enterprise business, the vast majority of the IPOs being handled by PRC banks, and many emerging companies and funds, there is a lot of pitching going on by firms for this work. Further, while in New York deals are done mainly over the phone, in Asia there are a lot of in-person meetings throughout the process.
Needless to say, there is a lot of client contact for even junior associates, especially when in China a non-Chinese partner may be leaning heavily on his Mandarin-fluent associates for a lot more than due diligence. Mid-level associates in Asia are typically running their own deals.
In many instances in Asia your training is one-on-one mentoring from a partner or two, quite commonly with no senior associates in between.
Maturity is especially important in Asia because associates are given as much responsibility as they can handle. Simply put, a mature person can balance his or her workload between competing demands more than an immature one. There can be a lot of travel to meet with major clients and each associate, no matter how junior, is usually a vital part of their office’s overall practice and client development and retention. Each associate is also expected to be a self-starter and figure out things on the fly much more than is the case in a domestic office of the same firm.
The smaller offices of course make personality fit and personal presentation more important, for obvious reasons. As an associate at a top U.S. practice in Asia, you are more of a vital piece of the entire office’s practice and your personality is going to directly affect the firm’s practice. Senior partners overseas, especially those that moved to Asia from U.S. offices, have in many cases put a tremendous amount of effort (and some career risk) into building their book of business and reputation in a foreign country. Thus, they can take a lot of pride in their accomplishments, as they should. Understandably they want to avoid placing their reputation and practice in the hands of an associate with whom they do not have a strong personality fit or who cannot be counted on to be at his or her best every day.
As an associate in a large New York (or other major US market) office, with hundreds of attorneys, you surely know a number of very impressive young associate colleagues who are perhaps a bit over academic, but perform just fine in that large office environment. However, being too academic and not well rounded will not serve well in an entrepreneurial and less structured environment of a busy small overseas US corporate practice of a top firm. We have seen countless cases where the less impressive candidate on paper wins out over the more impressive resumed candidates, due to being better rounded and the right personality fit.
Most US partners who have been in Asia for a few years or more have experienced a hire gone bad simply because the US associate ultimately could not commit to the geographic market. Asia, especially China, is hot now and is considered “the place to be.” There are many very well intentioned and able young professionals in the US who believe they would like to relocate there, but ultimately find out later that the region is not for them. Thus, many US partners will take a jaded approach into an interview with a US associate who does not have an obvious connection to the particular target Asia market. Of course, a connection to the market is not a requirement to land there (if it were, most partners you are interviewing with would never have landed there to begin with), but the lack of a strong connection will need to be dealt with in an interview. It is ok to want to be in Hong Kong, for example, because it is an exciting market, has great deal flow, and you have visited there a few times, but the message has to be conveyed loud and clear in an interview and you need to be prepared to take on this elephant in the room early.
Keep in mind that U.S. firms have more risk with hires they make overseas, due to the high level of responsibility each associate has, and also because associates are simply less fungible in small, busy overseas offices. The past two years of economic downturn in the West caused full and partial hiring freezes at firms globally, even during most of the recent 20 months boom in China. Many U.S. practices in Asia have found themselves to be severely understaffed when just one or two associates leave, combined with increased deal flow. In a busy and competitive lateral hiring market in Asia, it can easily take a U.S. practice up to six months to replace a key associate that has not worked out.
Further, there is the added cost a firm takes on when hiring a U.S. associate lateral, especially if from the U.S. markets, such as annual housing / expat packages (which can run from $40,000 to $140,000 depending on the Asia market and firm) and international relocation costs, which includes up to two months in a luxury serviced apartment. Some firms even handle private school tuition for associates’ children.
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