{"id":4747,"date":"2024-07-09T11:51:35","date_gmt":"2024-07-09T11:51:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/09\/laid-off-from-a-nearly-six-figure-job-this-61-year-old-is-driving-for-delivery-apps-i-dont-get-a-day-off\/"},"modified":"2024-07-09T11:51:35","modified_gmt":"2024-07-09T11:51:35","slug":"laid-off-from-a-nearly-six-figure-job-this-61-year-old-is-driving-for-delivery-apps-i-dont-get-a-day-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/09\/laid-off-from-a-nearly-six-figure-job-this-61-year-old-is-driving-for-delivery-apps-i-dont-get-a-day-off\/","title":{"rendered":"Laid off from a nearly six-figure job, this 61-year-old is driving for delivery apps: \u2018I don\u2019t get a day off\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=''><em>This is part of NBC News\u2019 Checkbook Chronicles, a series of profiles highlighting the financial realities of everyday Americans.<\/em><\/p>\n<p class=''>Becky Melvin can usually be found on her phone \u2014&nbsp;but not for the reasons many other Americans are.<\/p>\n<div id='taboolaReadMoreBelow'><\/div>\n<p class=''>Melvin, 61, of the Jacksonville, Florida, area, was laid off from a nearly six-figure public relations job in Nashville, Tennessee, in 2019. Since the start of the pandemic, she has worked seven days a week picking up and dropping off orders on delivery apps \u2014 typically for 12-hour stretches.<\/p>\n<p class=''>\u201cIf I don\u2019t carry my phone with me to the bathroom, I might miss an order,\u201d she said. \u201cOr while I\u2019m doing laundry.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr class=''>\n<p class=''><strong>Primary source of income:<\/strong> Shuttling orders on Shipt and Instacart, earning about $50,000 before taxes last year. She expects that to rise to about $75,000 annually if she makes it through the hiring process for a 911 dispatcher role she\u2019s pursuing. Before she lost her PR job, Melvin said, she made close to $100,000 annually.<\/p>\n<p class=''><strong>Living situation:<\/strong> A three-bedroom, two-bathroom home, which she owns, with monthly homeownership costs totaling about $2,900.<\/p>\n<p class=''><strong>Economic outlook:<\/strong> Melvin said her life could be worse but isn\u2019t great right now.<\/p>\n<p class=''>\u201cI sound like I\u2019m doing OK, but I have all these things hanging over me. If any of them go at one time, it\u2019s like a domino effect,\u201d she said. \u201cDon\u2019t think I have it easy because I\u2019m not on food stamps.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<div>This post appeared first on NBC NEWS<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is part of NBC News\u2019 Checkbook Chronicles, a series of profiles highlighting the financial realities of everyday Americans. Becky Melvin can usually be found on her phone \u2014&nbsp;but not for the reasons many other Americans are. Melvin, 61, of the Jacksonville, Florida, area, was laid off from a nearly six-figure public relations job in <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4748,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4747","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}