Savings or credit card, if needed right away.
If I’ve got a few weeks to scrounge the money together, I can easily do without one paycheck in a month- I’d just cash that.
This makes me sad. Right now, my family would have to stop eating and stop paying for all bills and expenses to scrape together $2k in about a month and a half (three paycheck cycles). FWIW, we are both only working part-time and just recovering from coming over six months of unemployment. Savings are completely depleted.
And I have to figure out how to afford a move in a couple of months, which should require at least that much.
I was going to say the same thing. I have more than that in the house.
In college and the two or three years following, the answer would have been certainly no, or a weak maybe if I could beg my parents mercilessly, but I grew up very poor, so I’m not sure how much of an option that is. My parents are old so they could come up with $2,000 but it would have to be a very dire emergency for them to give or lend it to me. My dad’s depression era. Homie don’t part with money.
Now the answer is sure. Hell, I just dropped something like $2k in April for moving expenses. I didn’t like it, but moving trucks, labor and rental deposits aren’t free.
Same here - I could come up with the $2k every day of the 30 days - I wouldn’t like it! Depending on how the market is doing, I’m up or down 10 times that amount in a day.
Are you participating in the summer post card exchange? Any trips planned soon (like within the next 30 days?)
Just asking? Nothing special.
I think it depends a lot on where you are in your life. Right now it would be easy for me. 30 years ago when I had two kids and was in grad school there where times we only had 5 bucks in the checking account and nothing in savings. Five years before that when both of us were working and had no kids, no problem.
I think my kid’s generation has it pretty bad. I don’t think my daughter, a clinical psychologist, and her husband, a grad student, could come up with 2000 bucks in 30 days without racking it up on credit cards or borrowing from family. Many if not all of her friends are in the same boat. One, who was transferred to the other side of the country last year, had to borrow 25k from her parents to sell her house at a loss*.
*And don’t bust in here and tell me it was her own fault for getting in over her head. The house was extremely modest <120k and well within her means. She just happened to purchase it at the height of the bubble and had to sell after the burst.
I would take it out of my savings. We are also fortunate to have family who could (and would) lend us money if we needed it.
looking at the poll results and the OP’s link, might one make blanket statements like 90% of people who have access to the internet has more than 2k emergency funds while 25% of people in America has no access to the internet?
I doubt it, most college students have access to the internet and don’t have 2k of emergency cash lying around. Young people are more likely to have internet access than the older generations and less likely to have emergency money saved. A lot of the people in this thread (and the other one with a higher level) stated that they’d get the money from their parents after all.
yes you’re right, both their computers and emergency funds would come from their parents.
I’m 45 years old. If you accept credit card or check, I could come up with $20k in 30 SECONDS.
A poll like this is going to have selection bias. I would bet you that of everybody who saw the poll, a much larger percentage of those who could answer yes chose to answer the poll than those who would say no.
Yes. I actually considered whether I should out myself as a broke-ass fool who can’t get $2k together in a short period of time. On the other hand, much sneak bragging is happening in this thread from all y’all who have enough money to buy and sell me twice a week.
i agree - i am making twice what i was making in 2008 and still feel poor here.
Absolutely agreed. I had a time in my life that I was barely making ends meet and remember some truly humiliating times. For me the fact that i am financially solvent is a HUGE deal. I am not rich or even well-off but I am being sensible with my finances - but this place, and posts like this:
Make me go :dubious: and then 
It’s a matter of age, location and profession.
It takes time working a particular job to accumulate money, make investments that pay off, etc.
Obviously, some types of job are more financially rewarding than others.
Plus, if you are working in a big city, your income is likely to be larger on average as well (as will your expenses).
Myself, I’m in my early 40s and I’m a lawyer working in downtown Toronto in a big firm. However, in the past, I used to be a potter’s assistant. I can remember being poor all right - like having to eat Ramen noodles, because it was the week before payday and the money was all gone. 
This.
I’m pushing 50, and hold a senior level position at a well-respected organization in the NY/NJ/PA pharmaceutical corridor, for which I’ve worked 14 years. I’m finally at a place in my life where I’m financially very comfortable.