A new reality-TV show has been created to spotlight the struggle young American’s face in dealing with mounting student loan debt. Titled “Going from Broke,” the Ashton Kutcher-produced series airs on Crackle’s free-streaming service and aims to tackle the country’s student-loan crisis. The fact that there is a need and market for a show like this indicates a glaring red flag of what condition our society is in today. Even though this is a TV show, I was excited to see how the polarizing issues of personal finance and debt would be portrayed. I couldn’t watch fast enough!
“Going from Broke” is comprised of 10, 30-minute episodes with each show featuring an indebted millennial living in Los Angeles. There’s the first problem: choice of living location. Dan Rosensweig, the CEO of Chegg, and financial expert Danetha Doe are the show’s hosts who are painstakingly tasked with speaking the harsh truth in advising the millennials on how to ease their debt load. The show has a very similarly-produced feel to CBS’s “Undercover Boss.”
All the shows present the same overarching theme: a flat-broke, 20-something, recent college grad with around $80K in debt moves to LA (one of the most expensive places to live) and lives a lavish lifestyle of a celebrity (even though they are not). The 20-something is frustrated that they are being asked to change their lifestyle, work for money, and live below their means. GASP! Here’s a synopsis of a some of the episodes:
Episode 1: Obi
In this show we meet a former college athlete named Obi Nwankwo who ran track for Boston College. Even though he was a Division I-athlete, he was not awarded an athletic scholarship and was forced to incur $75,000 in student loans. The 23-year-old lives in Marina del Rey, Calif., where he started his own sports marketing and agency business. Unfortunately, he can’t seem to make ends meet despite making $80,000 a year. Mind you, most 23-year-olds would be so blessed to make such an income at that age. Later it is revealed that Obi’s lavish lifestyle, which includes a Jordan shoe fetish of collecting $800 sneakers, is prohibiting him from paying his everyday living expenses.
Episode 2: Miracle
In episode two, we meet 28-year-old Miracle, a media planner who dreams of making enough money playing the violin around the world to quit her job. At the start, she’s earning $3,600 and spending $5,000 a month, putting herself $1,400 in the hole. She also owes $74,000 in student loans and isn’t making her $1,000 monthly payments.
Episode 3: Megan and Max
Episode three focuses on Megan, 28, and Max, 32, a married couple with two children. Max is on disability leave from his job as a firefighter following a car accident, and Megan was recently laid off from her job as a behavioral therapist. These are the unexpected things in life that you can’t plan for but establishing an emergency savings fund will certainly help in times like these. Between Max’s disability leave and Megan’s side hustle selling elderberry syrup, they’re earning $2,300 a month but spending $5,000 — leaving them $2,700 in the red. That’s created a huge problem: living off credit cards to fill the gaps as they were saddled with $100,000 of debt across 14 credit cards.
Student Loans Not the Only Problem
Young people’s debt problems are not just student loans. Slightly more than half of millennial respondents in an Insider and Morning Consult survey said they carried credit-card debt. Of those with credit-card debt, more than half said they owed less than $5,000, while nearly a quarter owed $5,000 to $10,000.
In each episode, the millennials receive financial homework. Max and Megan are told to journal their spending habits, and Miracle is tasked with reducing her expenses. Both groups are told to find ways to increase their income.
Is Perception Reality?
Remember, life does not mirror reality TV. You will not be able to clean up your finances in 22-minutes like the subjects of the show do. It will take hard work, sacrifice, and most importantly – time.
Episode five subject Alana Hunter said, “When I started college I was in the mindset of ‘this school is expensive, but I’ll be able to pay it off in a couple of years.’ I never really thought it would take that long or be so hard to save money.” Despite being in this situation, Alana decided to quit a very good paying job because working 40 hours a week was too hard for her and she wanted to focus her efforts on her YouTube channel.
“If I want it, I buy it.”
It seemed like the underlying mentality of the show’s subjects was instant gratification – “If I want it, I buy it.” Show host Rosensweig offered some wise thoughts when he said – “Dreams and opportunities come all through your life. But you’re in no position to take them unless you can afford to take that risk.” Meaning, when you are buried under massive amounts of debt, your options are limited. You become a slave to your job or jobs, but if you are debt free, a whole new world of opportunity arises. You are able to make decisions much easier.
Final Thoughts
For many of us, it’s easy to get caught up living a backward lifestyle. Living like a rock star while not making a rock star salary is a recipe for disaster and it always catches up to us. Believe it or not there are ways to enjoy life without living vastly above your means. The Going for Broke show’s core principles are spot on – live below your means, keep a budget, journal your spending habits, don’t blow money on frivolous things, seek out extra streams of income, avoid debt, and make wise financial decisions. It all seems so easy packaged in a TV show, but we all know that’s not the reality of life. It takes time, hard work, determination, and willpower to set yourself on a solid, healthy financial path.
Jason is the author of Margin Matters: How to Live on a Simple Budget & Crush Debt Forever.