Oh yeah, I use Mint for the same. It's really fun watching my cost-cutting measures getting eaten alive by inflation in real-time :) I also find myself slowly sliding down Maslow's hierarchy. I used to be focused on achieving my dream job, now I'm strongly considering work I don't like because it pays more (being the sole income for my family is a major factor there as well). "Good enough pay for awesome work" is not a viable objective at the moment. And I'm lucky to even have that option.

Something's got to give. Thankfully we're starting to see some actual government investment in US industry for the first time in forever, but it'll take years for any results to bring down prices.

Yeah it's amazing how much you can accomplish just by minor things like not using DoorDash constantly and having caps on spending on electronics on Amazon.

YNAB is much nicer than Mint IMO. Mint feels more like a toy.

With YNAB you do something called "envelope budgeting" (just a digital version) https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-envelope-budgeting-129368...

I've found being obsessive with tracking expenses is a good way to lose motivation (like going to the gym) so it's good to have a simple pattern to get used to.

Yeah its been wild seeing my grocery budget max out before the end of the month, despite having a good buffer a year before. YNAB has a great "cover overspending from" feature that got a good workout this year. Fortunately I got a raise so I used that to bump my food budget.

Anybody who doesn't demand a raise in this environment is a fool.

I'm feeling that Maslow slide too. Expect a really clever money-making idea to come along any time now.

Have you not heard of the wonders of NFTs?

i honestly hate when everybody's answer to inflation is "just make a budget lol". i haven't used one historically bc i'm a pretty thrifty person but i decided to take somebody up on it and actually make one. you know what i found that could easily be changed? not a damn thing. like i'm a 20 something bachelor so basically my only luxury is buying new guns (which i don't do unless i have a lot of extra cash) and going out with friends (does not eat up much $). so am i supposed to cut like my 1 luxury and just be a machine who goes to and from work? aint like i got a bunch of streaming subscriptions or whatever to remove instead. i make my own coffee at home instead of starbucks and don't eat avocado toast... your move boomers, what's your solution now?

anyway sorry for the vent/rant, but what we need to do is stop loose monetary and fiscal policy that transfers wealth to people who got assets like real estate and stock (boomers, the rich) from people who don't (young people, the poor). but nobody wants to do that...