Personal Finance for PhDs

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Emily

How to Save Money as a Funded Graduate Student

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In this episode, Emily explores how to save money as a funded graduate student so that you aren’t in a constant state of financial stress. The first step is to open a savings account and establish a regular savings rate, even if it’s only $5 per month. Second, you must either increase your income or decrease your expenses. Both may seem impossible in your current circumstances, but Emily introduces numerous accessible options that grad students have used in the past for each approach, including the unique opportunities available to you as a graduate student.

Links mentioned in the Episode

Welcome to the Personal Finance for PhDs Podcast: A Higher Education in Personal Finance.

This podcast is for PhDs and PhDs-to-be who want to explore the hidden curriculum of finances to learn the best practices for money management, career advancement, and advocacy for yourself and others.

I’m your host, Dr. Emily Roberts, a financial educator specializing in early-career PhDs and founder of Personal Finance for PhDs.

This is Season 24, Episode 1, and today’s solo episode, I explore how to save money as a funded graduate student so that you aren’t in a constant state of financial stress. The first step is to open a savings account and establish a regular savings rate, even if it’s only $5 per month. Second, you must either increase your income or decrease your expenses to increase that savings rate. Both may seem impossible in your current circumstances, but I introduce numerous accessible options that grad students have used in the past for each approach, including the unique opportunities available to you as a graduate student.

The day this episode is published—June 15, 2026—is the estimated tax payment deadline for quarter 2 of 2026. It’s a sneaky deadline because it comes a month earlier than you would expect it to. The whole estimated tax requirement is a sneaky process in itself because your university might not be super proactive about telling you that it might be required of you. But I will right now: If you’re a graduate student, postdoc, or postbac and you’re a US citizen, permanent resident, or resident for tax purposes and you’re not having income tax withheld from your paychecks, you might very well be required by the IRS and your state tax agency to make manual income tax payments throughout the calendar year. This is very common for PhD trainees who are funded by fellowships or certain federal grants. Basically, since your university is not withholding income tax on your behalf, you are required to send in those payments yourself unless you fall into an exception category. If this is the first you’re hearing about fellowships and estimated tax and you need help understanding whether you’re required to make the payments, in what amount, and how to do so, join my asynchronous tax workshop, Quarterly Estimated Tax for Fellowship Recipients through PFforPhDs.com/QEtax/. I’ll show you how to fill out every single line of the Estimated Tax Worksheet from IRS Form 1040-ES and address common scenarios like how to handle switching funding sources midway through the calendar year. I also answer your questions during live calls and via written submissions. For more information and to join the workshop, go to PFforPhDs.com/QEtax/. I would be happy to help you with this process today or whenever you’re hearing this episode.

You can find the show notes for this episode at PFforPhDs.com/s24e1/.

Without further ado, here’s my solo episode on how to save money as a funded graduate student.

Introduction

If funded graduate students want to be financially healthy during training, they must have access to cash savings to pay for unexpected expenses and emergencies. It’s all too common for graduate students to rely on credit cards or frantic, last-minute cuts to discretionary expenses to pay for unexpected expenses or emergencies when they arise. How many times have you heard of graduate students charging conference expenses to credit cards and paying a high rate of interest for months until they are reimbursed (or not)? And that’s only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to these kinds of expenses. In the course of a year, you can expect to encounter at least a few, such as university fees, car repairs or maintenance, tax payments, travel, medical bills, annual or semiannual insurance premiums, electronics replacements, and home furnishings purchases.

The financial chaos I described is due to managing finances reactively instead of proactively, which itself is a natural result of graduate students’ low income. When most of your income goes toward paying fixed and/or necessary expenses like rent, transportation, and food, you’ll almost certainly find yourself living paycheck-to-paycheck or accumulating credit card debt unless you put serious intention behind saving money and exerting control over your finances.

In my opinion, the real motivating reason to have healthy finances during graduate school is to keep your stress low and minimize the time you need to spend on making decisions about money. Your focus during your PhD needs to be on your research, publishing, and professional development. Experiencing financial stress impairs your ability to perform at the highest level in your scholarship. It’s in the best interest of your advisor and program to pay you enough to make healthy finances possible, but it’s also incumbent upon you to manage your money in such a way that you experience low stress. And that means saving money—both so that you have access to cash in the case of unexpected expenses and emergencies and so that you have flexibility and agency over how you use your money. Saving moves you from reactive to proactive in your finances.

How do you actually start to save as a graduate student or increase your savings rate? First, you must establish a location to house your savings that is separate from where you manage your regular cash flow. Second—and this is the reality of the math of personal finance—you must either increase your income or decrease your expenses to free up money to be saved. Neither is trivial for a graduate student, but one or both is necessary. When it comes to which to tackle first, I suggest exploring how to increase your income before trying to decrease your expenses. Frankly, most graduate students don’t have a spending problem, they have an income problem, and attempting to spend less is like getting blood from a stone. Therefore, in this piece, we’ll discuss increasing income before decreasing expenses.

Establish a Savings Rate

This first point may seem trivial, but don’t skip past it. Your first step is to open a savings account if you don’t already have one. If you try to save money inside your checking account, into which your paychecks are deposited and from which you pay all your expenses and credit card bills, you will find it almost impossible. Vanishingly few people who earn at the level of graduate students will see their checking account balances gradually increase with time no matter how good their intentions.

Your new savings account could be at the same bank as your checking account or not, but it is imperative that the bank does not charge any fees for it. You cannot afford to pay banking fees on a stipend, and in my opinion the mental load required to avoid potential fees is also too taxing. The most common type of fee on a savings account is a maintenance charge that is waived if a minimum balance is maintained. However, if you’re just starting to save, you are unlikely to be able to maintain a minimum balance. The purpose of the cash savings is to be available to you in its entirety when you need it. And if you’re only able to save $5 per month, as I’m about to suggest as a starting point, that savings rate will be more than negated by typical banking fees of $5 to 25 per month. (If you’re currently paying banking fees for checking or savings, you have an immediate opportunity to change banks and establish your savings rate!) 

Once you have your savings account open, create an autotransfer between your checking account and savings account for near the start of each month (or right after your paychecks are deposited). This is the ‘pay yourself first’ principle: Before you send your money to everyone else—your landlord, your debtors, the grocery store, the gas pump—set aside money for yourself in your savings account. If you’ve never saved before and you’re currently spending all of your income, start with an amount you don’t think you’ll miss, such as $5 or 1% of your income. It may seem like a trivial amount of money, and that’s kind of the point. Right now we’re focused on setting up the infrastructure for you to save and training your mind to believe that saving is possible. By following the tactical suggestions in the rest of this piece, you can increase that rate over time, but you have to start somewhere.

When you successfully increase your income or decrease your expenses, you have to actually save that money. In our culture, we often use the term “save” to mean “spend less,” such as “I saved $10 using that promo code!” In that scenario, you spent $10 less than you could have, but the money wasn’t saved unless you moved $10 into your savings account. If you set up a recurring revenue stream or decrease a fixed expense, follow through on the process by increasing your autotransfer to your savings account by the same amount (or a fraction of it). If you receive a one-time influx of cash or decrease a non-recurring expense, make a manual transfer to your savings account.

Emotionally prepare yourself that you will need to draw down your savings account from time to time. The purpose of the money is to be available to you for emergencies or irregular expenses to reduce your stress and mental load, which means you should actually use it if the circumstances call for it! Over time, hopefully the balance will grow, but there will be some ups and downs along the way, and that’s to be expected.

Increase Income

The necessary first step to increasing your income is believing it is possible. Graduate students face more obstacles to increasing their incomes than the average person, but it is virtually always possible to do so: where there is a will, there is a way.

I want to first acknowledge some of the barriers to increasing income:

1) Student visas. International students are incredibly restricted in the manner in which they may work or generate income in the US. Violating these restrictions puts your status in the US and your degree at risk—not worth it!

2) Contractual prohibitions. Sometimes the terms of a graduate student’s funding, whether an assistantship or fellowship, prohibit or limit outside work.

3) Departmental or advisor expectations. Some advisors and mentors seem to believe that any income-generating activities would detract from your ability to pursue your graduate degree, and therefore implicitly or explicitly ban them for their students.

4) Workload and other obligations. Some graduate students have little to no time or energy available to increase their income between the demands of their programs and the demands of their personal lives.

I know that sounded like a lot of barriers, but I’m naming them explicitly because I want you to take an honest look at the barriers you actually face or don’t face, and those are going to be different for every individual. When I was in graduate school, I had the general impression that outside work was ‘frowned upon.’ And maybe it was frowned upon, but frowning does not create a contractual obligation. As I went through graduate school I discovered more and more of my peers who had side hustles or businesses or otherwise found ways to increase their incomes. A lot of these were kept quiet from advisors, but sometimes advisors were aware and supportive.

At a high level, you can pursue increasing your income within the academic system or outside of it. The more of the barriers that I just listed that you have in place in your life, the more you should lean into strategies for increasing your income inside the academic system or outside the academic system via passive income. The fewer of the barriers there are for you, the more options there are for you outside of the academic system. I’m going to take each of these categories, within the academic system and outside the academic system, in turn.

Within the Academic System

I sometimes call methods of increasing your income inside the academic system ‘advisor-approved’ because it’s quite likely that your advisor will have either no objection to you pursuing these methods or will actively encourage them. These methods are usually quite compatible with student visa restrictions, although you must verify that before engaging in them.

The following are ideas for increasing your income inside the academic system.

1) Apply for fellowships, scholarships, and grants, everything from multi-year full funding packages down to poster awards and travel stipends. Regularly applying for funding should be in the official job description of a graduate student. If you end up winning an award, your advisor will definitely be pleased and you can add it to your CV. Honestly, even when you don’t win awards, the experience of writing the applications is great professional development. However, if your primary goal is to increase your income, you should selectively apply for awards that will actually affect your bottom line. Some awards will go to your advisor or program and simply replace the funding they were already providing to you. It’s worth an extra few minutes of investigation to figure out whether an award will actually increase your stipend or be sent directly to your bank account. You can ask your advisor while applying or after winning an award to provide you with a real increase in pay so that you can share in the benefit of receiving the award. I’ve discussed increasing income by this method many, many times with podcast guests, and some great interviews to listen to are Season 8 Episode 3 with Dr. Sam McDonald, Season 10 Episode 4 with Dr. Alana Rister, and Season 4 Episode 3 with Dr. Vicki Johnson.

2) Increase your pay rate for your assistantship. Setting aside the prospect of being funded by a fellowship, you might have the option to change the type or amount of your assistantship work to increase your pay. You have to look into your own university’s policies carefully here. Sometimes different assistantship titles have different pay rates, so 20 hours of work as a research assistant might result in a bigger paycheck than 20 hours of work as a teaching assistant. You might also be able to increase your overall appointment percentage, even going above 50% with special permission. Podcast episodes that discuss these matters include Season 5 Episode 6 with Dr. Sarah Frank, Season 5 Episode 16 with Dr. Kelsey Wood, and Season 19 Episodes 5 and 6 with Elle Rathbun.

3) Do an internship or professional fellowship, either a classic full-time summer internship or a part-time internship in any season. This method also has the added benefit of augmenting your CV and making you more competitive for post-PhD jobs. Like with the suggestion to apply for funding, if your primary goal is to increase your income and you are going to forgo receiving your stipend for a season, make sure that the internship pays more than your stipend plus your extra incurred costs for that period of time. Podcast episodes that discuss internships include Season 6 Episode 6 with Dr. Gillian Hayes and Season 7 Episode 7 with Anonymous.

4) Negotiate—collectively or individually or both. I’ve been so pleased to see the increases to minimum stipends that have been won by graduate student unions and unionization movements across the US in the last handful of years. If there is a union or unionization movement at your university, please lend your support. This is the best way to achieve permanent and widespread improvements in stipends and benefits, especially for your less privileged peers. Even informally banding together with other grad students in your department and asking for a stipend increase can sometimes be effective. In terms of individual negotiation, which I also encourage, this is most effective when you have a point of leverage. The first point of leverage is as a prospective graduate student when you are being recruited. After committing to a program, your remaining point of leverage is when you win outside funding. Grad students often receive stipend increases above their previous level or the level specified by the fellowship, a one-time bonus, or agreement to pay the higher fellowship stipend in non-fellowship years. Effective arguments I’ve seen for both collective and individual negotiation include affordability or cost of living in the university’s city and comparisons with what peer institutions pay. Podcast episodes that discuss collective negotiation include Season 12 Episode 7 with Dr. Alex Parry and Season 20 Episode 6 with Garrett Dunne. Podcast episodes that discuss individual negotiation include Season 2 Episode 2 with Dr. John Vsetecka, Season 19 Episode 7 with Dr. Wen, Season 11 Episode 1 with Maya Gosztyla, and Season 8 Episode 7 with various contributors. I also have one crossover episode that discusses both approaches with various contributors, which is Season 15 Episode 4.

Outside the Academic System

There is a great deal more variety in methods for increasing your income outside of the academic system. Broadly speaking, you can 1) have a side hustle that involves working for someone else, 2) start a business, or 3) generate passive income. I’m quite partial to the latter two options, but I’ll go through them in turn. No matter which method you pursue, try to chase either high pay rates so that you can minimize hours spent or activities that will do double duty to enhance your CV or resume.

1) A side hustle working for someone else. In this scenario, you would be a part-time employee of a business. The advantages of working for someone else are that the work is teed up for you to perform and the pay rate and hours are most likely reliable. The disadvantages are possible rigidity in schedule or volume of work, which might be incompatible with your role as a graduate student, and that the pay rate is not set by you and probably on the lower side.

2) Your own business. This is not as intense as it sounds. It basically means that you determine the work that you perform, with whom you work, and your pay rate, of course depending on what the market is for your skills. Think freelancing or the gig economy to start out and perhaps becoming more formal with time. The advantage of having a business as a grad student is that you can set your hours and modulate them to complement your workload at the moment. The disadvantage of this route is that you have to spend time attracting and landing every client or customer. Honestly, a lot of academics are self-employed on the side of their main appointments, so this is not an unusual model. Selling services is the fastest way to get started. Season 3 Episode 12 with Dr. Toyin Alli is a great primer.

3) Passive income. This is a very popular method among graduate students, even those facing the most extreme barriers to increasing their income. You may be able to generate passive income without working at all through credit card and banking rewards. Of course, perfect behavior with your credit and finances is a prerequisite for this method. Podcast episodes that detail credit card and banking rewards include Season 2 Episode 9 with Seonwoo Lee, Season 7 Episode 8 with Dr. Julie Chang, Season 20 Episode 8 with Brendan Henrique, and Season 20 Episode 3 with Kyle Smith. A crossover method with business ownership is generating passive income within your business, such as by selling digital products, which Dr. Toyin Alli and I discuss in Season 11 Episode 8.

The most ideal way of increasing your income outside of academia, in my opinion, is to be paid at a high rate to work what I call a career-advancing side hustle. This is a side hustle that you can put on your CV that helps you gain new skills or demonstrate the skills you already have, expands your network, adds a new mentor or recommender to your circle, or otherwise increases your employability post-graduate school. You’re most likely going to be paid a high rate if you take the rare and valuable skills and knowledge that you are developing inside academia and apply them in a non-academic setting.

Let’s assume that you’ve found a way to increase your income. Fantastic! How do you actually translate that into an increase in your savings rate? I suggest creating a rule that you automatically save a set percentage of your net income—that’s your income after business expenses, if applicable, and taxes. It could be 100% if you’re quite aggressive, or perhaps 50% or another compromise fraction if you would like to both save and reward yourself for your great efforts. It’s going to be really tempting to just let your extra income go into your checking account and mix with everything else, but this is a recipe for lifestyle inflation. That money will be spent before you know it! Instead, if possible, automatically deposit all or a fraction of your additional income into a savings account or set up an autodraft that moves the correct amount of money from your checking account into your savings account. If your additional income varies, you’ll probably need to carry out these actions manually, so add it to your task management tool or tie it habit-wise with another action that happens around that date.

My Season 1 Episode 5 podcast interview with Dr. Jenni Rinker illustrates a different approach that can be quite effective. Jenni set a goal to pay off her undergraduate student loans during grad school. She used her stipend income for her necessary living expenses and student loan payment and paid for discretionary expenses with her side income. By funding her discretionary expenses with her side income, she incentivized herself to work more so she could spend more but did not put her basic expenses or financial goal in jeopardy if she was not able to work on the side for a period of time.

Commercial

Emily here for a brief interlude.

Would you like to learn directly from me on a personal finance topic, such as taxes, goal-setting, investing, budgeting, or designing your financial life, each tailored specifically for graduate students and postdocs? I offer live workshops, asynchronous online courses, and cohort-based programs on these topics, and I’m now booking for the 2026-2027 academic year.

If you would like to bring my content to your institution, would you please recommend me as a speaker or facilitator to your university, graduate school, graduate student association, medical school, postdoc office, or postdoc association? My workshops are usually slated as professional development or personal wellness. Orientations, postdoc appreciation week, or close to the start of the academic year would be a perfect time for tax education or general personal finance content. Ask the potential host to go to PFforPhDs.com/financial-education/ or simply email me at [email protected] to start the process.

I really appreciate these recommendations, which are the best way for me to start a conversation with a potential host. The paid work I do with universities and institutions enables me to keep producing this podcast and all my other free resources. Thank you in advance if you decide to issue a recommendation!

Now back to our interview.

Decrease Expenses

When I was in graduate school and trying to increase my savings rate, I turned to decreasing my expenses through frugal tactics. Certain of these tactics made a big difference and greatly increased my savings rate, while others had only a small effect. In retrospect, I realize that the most effective tactics were the ones that took relatively little time and effort, while the tactics that were most time-consuming and tedious to carry out tended to only have a marginal effect on my savings rate.

With your limited time and energy as a graduate student, I want you to generate the greatest effect possible. To that end, you should focus your expense decreasing efforts on 1) your large, fixed expenses, 2) the remainder of your fixed expenses, 3) your large, variable expenses, and 4) the remainder of your variable expenses. Your budget game is honestly won or lost on your large, fixed expenses. If those are not properly scaled for your income, it’s going to be incredibly difficult to save much of anything, so definitely evaluate those first.

However, before we dive into various frugal tactics that you can implement personally, I first want you to check into any benefits you might be eligible for as a graduate student and/or low-income individual or household. Getting a product or service for free or at a reduced rate that you otherwise would have paid for fully is the first and best way to decrease your expenses. These benefits might come through your university; the local, state, or federal governments; or your community.

I won’t exhaustively list all the benefits you may be eligible for, but I will mention the most common ones that graduate students use:

  • Subsidized housing from your university. If it’s offered and you’re not already in it, get on the list ASAP. People already in such a lease may need a roommate, so search for that opportunity. It can be life-changing.
  • Resident advisor positions and similar titles. This is a combination of a benefit and a side work opportunity. Basically, you help facilitate housing for the university and in exchange they reduce your rent. Among my podcast interviewees, I’ve commonly seen a 50% rent reduction, but Dr. Adrian Gallo in Season 1 Episode 3 received completely free housing and a meal plan from a fraternity.
  • Childcare subsidies and grants from your university or the state or free drop-in childcare. I have a forthcoming podcast interview with Madeline Hebert in which she details how she receives completely free daycare for her two children thanks to subsidies from a state program and a grant from her grad student union.
  • The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program aka SNAP or food stamps and Women, Infants, and Children aka WIC.
  • Free food at seminars and events on campus. Not a joke. You can replace multiple meals per week if not daily if you keep your ear to the ground.
  • Food pantries on campus and in your local community.
  • Emergency grants and loans from your university.
  • Subsidized personal travel when you pair it with work travel, such as paying to stay an extra couple of days after a conference when your airfare was paid on your behalf.

If you’re not sure what benefits might be available at your university and in your state at your income level and household size, please make an appointment with your university’s financial wellness office. They can point you to relevant resources and perhaps even help you apply.

I trust that you will look into all these possible benefits and more as your first step toward decreasing your expenses to increase your savings rate! Having done that, we can discuss the more conventional method of decreasing your expenses through your own decisions and efforts.

I’ll go through in the priority order that I mentioned earlier the various strategies for reducing each category of expense:

  1. Your large, fixed expenses. For virtually everyone, that means housing. If you have a young child, childcare qualifies. If you own a car, your car payment, if applicable, and car insurance likely also qualify. This is the most difficult and daunting category to make changes in, but like I said earlier, it’s pretty much the ball game right here. If you are looking to increase your savings rate by reducing your expenses, do not skip this category unless the sum of all of your necessary expenses is already less than 50% of your after-tax income. Yes, it will take time, research, effort, and probably money to reduce one of these large fixed expenses, but if you manage to reduce one, that is money that stays in your pocket month after month in perpetuity without you needing to expend any additional effort. So for each of these large, fixed expenses, research its market thoroughly and re-evaluate your needs as they may have changed since the last time you made a choice. There will of course be reasons to stick with the status quo, but if you truly want to increase your savings rate by reducing your expenses, you owe it to yourself to honestly evaluate your current options. Almost invariably, when I interview someone on my podcast who is paying below market rent or owns a very inexpensive car, they cite the legwork and patience they put in up front when deciding on that purchase.
  1. Your other fixed expenses. That’s everything from renter’s insurance to fixed-price utilities to your memberships and subscriptions, and don’t forget those that are paid less frequently than monthly. The first question should always be whether the expense is a need, and if it’s discretionary, if it’s more valuable to you than increasing your savings rate. The second question is whether what you’re receiving exceeds your need or want and how to downgrade if so. For example, on your insurance policies, check that you’re not over-insured and consider raising your deductibles. The third question, if you’ve decided to keep the expense and have right-sized it, is whether you can get a better price through another provider.
  1. Your large, variable expenses. The trouble with variable expenses, and the reason I want you to address your fixed expenses first, is that the amount you spend on your variable expenses depends on your consumption behavior. Yes, it is easy to reduce spending on certain variable expenses. It is even easier to resume spending at the higher level, because nothing contractual or structural changed to lock in the lower spending rate. To sustainably reduce your variable expenses, you must change your habits, which takes consistent and conscious effort at the beginning. Your largest variable expense is likely your groceries, especially if coupled with other household consumables. There are many ways that you can reduce your grocery spend, and I suggest picking one method at a time to test out and develop into a habit before moving on to the next one. Here are just five ideas of dozens: 1) Shift where you primarily grocery shop to a lower-priced alternative like ALDI, Costco, Walmart, BJ’s, or a local discount store. 2) Meal plan and meal prep to reduce waste, buy in bulk, and save time. 3) Eat less of the highest-cost food items, typically meat, seafood, dairy, and/or nuts. 4) Shop sales and use coupons. 5) Buy less processed foods and do more processing and cooking in your own kitchen, for example buying base ingredients instead of a partially or fully pre-made meal. If you have other variable expenses that come close to your grocery category, such as travel or a certain utility, search up ideas for how to spend less in that category and try them out gradually, making the most effective ones into habits.
  1. Your other variable expenses. The smaller variable expenses tend to be categories like eating out, certain utilities, transportation aside from what I mentioned before, home furnishings, entertainment, clothing and shoes, personal care, etc. Honestly, if you’ve done the work to reduce or try to reduce all of your fixed expenses and your largest variable expenses, you will have transformed your perspective on your expenses and built the skills to adjust your spending in these categories, if you think you need to. Examining your behaviors and creating new habits will be the key. Frankly, though, these expenses by definition don’t make a big difference to your overall spending, so it’s fine to not really consciously address them unless they sum to more than 25% of your after-tax income. If you’ve moved in with roommates, changed your cell phone provider, negotiated all your insurance policies, and become a Costco member, you’ve either created enough room in your budget that you don’t have to worry about your spending in these categories or you’ve so thoroughly changed your mindset about your spending that you will naturally adjust it down in these areas. I do not recommend attempting to reduce your spending by focusing only on this category and neglecting the others, although that is the most common approach.

How do you actually translate decreasing an expense into increasing your savings rate? If you decrease a fixed expense, you can increase your automated savings rate by exactly the amount of the expense reduction or a fraction thereof. For example, if you reduce a fixed-price utility by $25 per month, increase your savings rate by $25 per month. If you are developing a new habit to reduce a variable expense, try it out first to see what the consistent expense reduction is and then increase your savings rate by a conservative reflection of that amount. For example, if with a new frugal habit you have decreased your grocery spending by $10-20 per week, increase your automated savings rate by $40 per month. Another option is to increase your savings rate by a certain amount and challenge yourself to stay within spending limits across a few categories to facilitate that savings rate—basically, stick to a budget. However, if you challenge yourself in this way, do so by choosing a few categories in which you can effect immediate change in your spending like eating out, entertainment, personal care, and shopping. Don’t do this for categories like your utilities for which your actions only affect your next billing cycle.

One final strategy I’ll leave you with, and this applies to increasing your savings rate whether through increasing income or decreasing expenses, is to pay yourself first and last. I emphasized pay yourself first in the first section of this piece. Pay yourself first is great for the savings that you can absolutely for sure commit to on a monthly basis. However, sometimes your month or budgeting cycle goes better than you think it will—you bring in more income or decrease your expenses further than your baseline expectations. This is where pay yourself last comes in. You still pay yourself first with an automated transfer from your checking account to your savings account at the beginning of the month. Then, at the end of the month, when you have a higher balance in your checking account than you expected, you make a second, manual transfer from your checking account to your savings account. You can’t necessarily commit to that higher, combined savings rate, but it definitely helped in that month. This strategy is pretty intense, but if you’re working on an urgent financial goal like saving up the first few thousand dollars in an emergency fund, those extra dollars at the end of the month can really speed your progress. 

Conclusion

Graduate school is too long a period of time to try to skate by without access to cash savings. Unexpected expenses and emergencies will crop up, probably a few times per year, and if you don’t have savings ready to meet those expenses, you’ll quickly find yourself in credit card debt or scrambling to reduce your spending in other ways. This cycle is stressful and will detract from your performance in your coursework, research, and professional development. Instead, intentionally cultivate a savings rate so you will have cash available to you when you need it. To do so, open a savings account and set up an automated transfer for the beginning of the month and then increase that savings rate by deliberately increasing your income or decreasing your expenses.

Listeners, thank you for joining me for this episode!

I have a gift for you! You know that final question I ask of all my guests regarding their best financial advice? My team has collected short summaries of all the answers ever given on the podcast into a document that is updated with each new episode release. You can gain access to it by registering for my mailing list at PFforPhDs.com/advice/.

Would you like to access transcripts or videos of each episode? I link the show notes for each episode from PFforPhDs.com/podcast/.

See you in the next episode, and remember: You don’t have to have a PhD to succeed with personal finance… but it helps!

Nothing you hear on this podcast should be taken as financial, tax, or legal advice for any individual.

The music is “Stages of Awakening” by Podington Bear from the Free Music Archive and is shared under CC by NC.

Podcast editing by me and show notes creation by Dr. Jill Hoffman.

Taxes and Budgeting Workshop Advance Preparation

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Thank you for registering for How to Budget for Taxes and Other Expenses as a First-Year Graduate Student! Please complete the action items below prior to the date of the workshop so that you can receive the full benefits of the workshop.

  1. Bring your 2025 income- and tax-related records to the workshop. Bring your spouse’s records as well if you file a joint tax return. These records include any or all of:
    • Your fellowship offer letter,
    • Your recent fellowship paycheck amount(s) and date(s),
    • Your student account transactions,
    • Your final pay stub from a prior W-2 job, and
    • Your most recent pay stub for an ongoing W-2 job.
  2. Bring your 2024 federal income tax return, if you filed one, to the workshop.
  3. Be prepared to access your student account to view the charges and credits.
  4. Bring all of your current/recent spending data that you have access to. If you track your spending, bring your spreadsheet or plan to access your software. If you don’t track your spending, look up your fixed expenses in advance (e.g., rent, minimum debt payments, utilities, subscriptions) as well as what you’ve spent recently on variable expenses (e.g., food, transportation, entertainment). If you would like, you can use this spreadsheet to organize this data for the recent months (edit according to your spending categories).

During the workshop, we’ll be working with spreadsheets and documents. If the workshop is in person, please bring your laptop or tablet. If the workshop is remote, please set your workspace up so that you can best juggle Zoom alongside the other programs.

I look forward to speaking with you during the workshop!

Dr. Emily Roberts, Personal Finance for PhDs

Which Postdocs Get Health Insurance and Retirement Accounts?

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In this episode, I share what I’ve learned recently about the landscape of postdoc benefits in the US, specifically with respect to health insurance and workplace-based retirement accounts. This discussion of employees and non-employees or fellows may be familiar territory to some of you, but I also know I’m reaching people who have never heard it before. I hope that this episode helps more postdocs access more benefits, but I will not present a single universal solution that can be immediately adopted. Please take what you learn today back to your peers at your institution to converse about what they’re doing for their benefits and what may be possible for all of you.

Links mentioned in the Episode

Which Postdocs Get Health Insurance and Retirement Accounts?

Teaser

Anonymous: “As a postdoc, I mean, yes, your benefits are important, but you’re so, uh, worried about all of the work that you have to get done scientifically. So I think doing all this extra administrative stuff falls by the wayside more often than not.”

Introduction

Emily: Welcome to the Personal Finance for PhDs Podcast: A Higher Education in Personal Finance. This podcast is for PhDs and PhDs-to-be who want to explore the hidden curriculum of finances to learn the best practices for money management, career advancement, and advocacy for yourself and others. I’m your host, Dr. Emily Roberts, a financial educator specializing in early-career PhDs and founder of Personal Finance for PhDs.

Emily: This is Season 21, Episode 3, and today is a mostly solo episode from me plus some short interview segments on what I’ve learned recently about the landscape of postdoc benefits in the US, specifically with respect to health insurance and workplace-based retirement accounts. This discussion of employees vs. non-employees or fellows or trainees may be familiar territory to some of you, but I also know I’m reaching people who have never heard it before with some bright spots. I hope that this episode helps more postdocs access more benefits, but I will not present a single universal solution that can be immediately adopted. Please take what you learn today back to your peers at your institution to converse about what they’re doing for their benefits and what may be possible for all of you together.

Emily: If you’ve been enjoying this podcast, would you please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts? I just caught up on the reviews on Apple Podcasts after a few years, and they really put a smile on my face. Leaving a review also helps other PhDs and PhDs-to-be find this podcast. Thank you very much! You can find the show notes for this episode at PFforPhDs.com/s21e3/. Without further ado, here’s my episode on postdoc benefits.

First Encounters with Postdoc Employee/Non-Employee Differential Benefits

Emily: I’ll start today’s episode with how I first personally encountered this postdoc employee/non-employee differential benefits weirdness. After my husband defended his PhD, he wanted to get a couple more papers published before applying for jobs or other postdocs, so he arranged to stay in his PhD advisor’s lab as a postdoc until he could finish those up. As his graduate appointment was ending, his advisor gave him three choices as to how he could be hired as a postdoc. All three paid the same gross income.

Emily: First, he could be hired as a fellow aka non-employee. That meant he would have to pay for his health insurance premium out of his income and he would not have access to the university 403(b). Second, he could be hired as an employee. That meant his health insurance premium would be paid on his behalf and he had access to the university 403(b). Third, he could be hired as a contractor. That meant he would have to pay for his health insurance premium out of his income and he would not have access to the university 403(b). The tax implications are also different across these three appointments with respect to the employee and employer sides of FICA aka Social Security and Medicare tax, each 7.65% of his income. As a fellow, neither he nor the university would pay FICA tax. As an employee, his employer would pay their half and he would pay his half. As a contractor, he would pay both halves.

Emily: We thought this was such a strange offer! Since the gross income was held steady across all three, it was clear that the employee position was superior due to the cost of the health insurance, and we definitely wanted the 403(b) benefit, even though there was no match. If he had been offered more money for the fellow or contractor positions as compared to the employee position, maybe we really would have had to weigh the choice, but not as it was presented. It was such a stark difference that we wondered if we were missing something—why wouldn’t he choose the employee position, why was this even under discussion?

Emily: Now, when I look back on this offer, what I find remarkable is not the lack of benefits for the non-employee positions or that the same amount of money was offered, it’s that my husband’s advisor gave him a choice at all. Up until recently, I perceived the postdoc position as falling into one of two broad categories. This was based on my examinations of the benefits offered to postdocs at universities that hired me to speak, if the subject matter included a discussion of retirement accounts. Postdocs could be employees with all the attendant benefits such as employer-provided health insurance, access to the workplace-based retirement account, perhaps an employer-provided retirement account contribution, formal vacation and leave policies, etc. These might be the same suite of benefits offered other staff or faculty members or a modified one. Or postdocs could be non-employees who did not have access to the workplace-based retirement account, had to pay for their health insurance premium out of their own pockets—which was not a tax-deductible expense—and probably did not have the protections that a regular employee would. The only monetary upside to being a fellow over an employee is that your income is not subject to FICA tax, meaning that you don’t have to pay 7.65% of your income in that particular payroll tax. However, the flip side is that you don’t get Social Security credit for those quarters either, so that’s really a double-edged sword.

Postdoc Benefits Examples From the Academic Community

Emily: Way back in Season 2 Episode 3, Dr. McDowell, who at that time was the executive director of Future of Research, shared his observation that

Gary M: “Benefits is just a whole minefield with postdocs, even within the same institution. There can be all sorts of different benefits categories for all sorts of different titles of postdocs.”

Emily: I also thought that your funding source completely determined your status—that postdocs who won individual fellowships or were on institutional training grants had to be classified as non-employees. This view was supported as I heard from postdocs who were shifted from one classification to the other within the same institution; for example, postdocs who started out as employees and then were switched to non-employees when they won a fellowship or were put on a training grant.

Emily: Dr. Jamie Lahvic gave us an example of this occurrence during our interview in Season 14 Episode 3:

Jamie L: “And then as a postdoc, I did have a retirement account offered. However, I started out by like not really contributing very much to it at all because I was living in this really high cost-of-living area with not a lot of income. And then I actually found out as I was going through the fellowship application process that I was going to be losing that retirement contribution once I got a fellowship coming in. So then I sort of, at the last minute just before my fellowship came in, I like maxed out all my contributions as best as I could for like the last few months and tried to top it off. But then the fellowship came in and those accounts kind of sat stagnant for the rest of my postdoc. So that was a frustrating thing to see.”

Emily: For this episode, I spoke with an employee of an organization that issues fellowships who prefers to remain anonymous. She confirmed that sometimes

Anonymous: “We do see that once they’re awarded the fellowship. There is this shift from university employee to like a trainee classification, which is seen on a training grant or if you are awarded an f, you know, you, you suddenly lose your employee status. And unfortunately with that. A lot of times things such as contributing to retirement is no longer on the table. Medical and dental can be compromised in some way, shape or form. And even being able to park on university campus. So we’ve really seen a wide array of employee benefits get stripped away.”

Emily: This happens to some awardees, though not all or even most in her observation. However, in recent years, I’ve realized that the postdoc benefits landscape is much more varied than my initial impression. Postdocs care a lot about receiving benefits, and in some cases they and their institutions have found ways to mitigate the issues caused by being classified as a non-employee or even changed the classification altogether. I do want to point out before we start that term employee is a bit tricky and used differently in different contexts, such as tax vs. labor. For myself, I’m tax-focused, so I go by IRS-related classifications. If you are a US citizen, permanent resident, or resident for tax purposes, and your income is reported on a Form W-2 and you have access to a workplace-based retirement account, perhaps after a waiting period, I would call you an employee. For nonresidents, your tax reporting might be on a Form W-2 or a Form 1042-S with income code 19 or 20. If your income as a US citizen or resident is reported in some other way and you don’t have access to the workplace-based retirement account, I would call you a non-employee, at least with respect to that income. For nonresidents, if your tax reporting is on a Form 1042-S with income code 16, I would call you a non-employee. Income tax withholding for US citizens and residents falls similarly: if you’re an employee, your income tax will be withheld on your behalf, and if you’re a non-employee, it might not be withheld on your behalf. If you’re a nonresident, it’s going to be withheld either way.

Emily: I need to define another term here: workplace-based retirement account. I’m using this as a catch-all term for 403(b)s, 457s, and state-sponsored retirement plans, whichever applies at a given institution. An IRA, individual retirement arrangement, is not tied to your workplace. The postdoc benefits situation is considerably different than the grad student benefits situation, even though either might be classified as employees or non-employees. Grad student benefits are more similar across the board, whereas for postdocs there can be a vast difference between being classified as an employee vs. non-employee. I’m painting with a broad brush, but it seems to me that grad students are always offered student health insurance. If they opt in, the health insurance premium is typically paid in full or in large part on their behalf, and it is not included in their taxable income, and that applies whether they are employees or non-employees. For postdoc employees, their employee health insurance premiums are paid at least in part by the employer, and the premiums are not included in their taxable income. For postdoc non-employees, the premium might be paid for from a separate stipend or they might pay for it out of their regular income, but either way the money that pays the premium is supposed to be included in their taxable income. I’ve even come across postdocs who are not offered a reasonably priced health insurance plan by their universities, so they go through the marketplace to purchase insurance.

Emily: Grad students are not typically given access to their university’s retirement account, whether they are employees or non-employees. In certain circumstances, grad student employees are granted access, like Eun Bin Go, whom I interviewed in Season 8 Episode 10, but it’s quite rare that any grad students actually contribute to the plan. I have never come across a full-time grad student who receives a retirement contribution match. Postdoc employees are typically given access to their university’s retirement account, sometimes after a waiting period, and they sometimes receive an automatic or a matching contribution from their employers. Postdoc non-employees are not given access to their university’s retirement account. When it comes to FICA tax, grad students virtually never pay FICA tax, regardless of their classification, whereas postdoc employees pay their half of the tax and postdoc non-employees don’t pay the tax. Grad students may have little awareness of whether they are considered employees or non-employees, because the benefits difference is negligible to non-existent. In fact, if anything, it’s preferable to be a non-employee on fellowship, because that typically translates into a larger stipend. Speaking for myself, I barely registered when my status changed back and forth during grad school because it didn’t impact my pay, benefits, or day-to-day work. However, postdocs absolutely notice these differences in benefits when they are hired or when they switch, and all too often, the pay is held constant between the two classifications.

Commercial

Emily: Emily here for a brief interlude. Would you like to learn directly from me on a personal finance topic, such as taxes, goal-setting, investing, frugality, increasing income, or student loans, each tailored specifically for graduate students and postdocs? I offer seminars and workshops on these topics and more in a variety of formats, and I’m now booking for the 2025-2026 academic year. If you would like to bring my content to your institution, would you please recommend me as a speaker or facilitator to your university, graduate school, graduate student association, medical school, postdoc office, or postdoc association? My workshops are usually slated as professional development or personal wellness. Orientations, postdoc appreciation week, or close to the start of the academic year would be a perfect time for tax education or general personal finance content. Ask the potential host to go to PFforPhDs.com/financial-education/ or simply email me at [email protected] to start the process. I really appreciate these recommendations, which are the best way for me to start a conversation with a potential host. The paid work I do with universities and institutions enables me to keep producing this podcast and all my other free resources. Thank you in advance if you decide to issue a recommendation! Now back to our interview.

How Can Postdocs Who Are Classified as Non-employees Gain Some Employee Benefits?

Emily: First, I’m going to address how postdocs gain benefits at institutions where they are by default classified as non-employees based on their funding source. Second, I’m going to point out that some institutions classify all postdocs as full employees regardless of their funding source. Part 1: How can postdocs who are classified as non-employees gain some employee benefits?

Emily: My curiosity into this question was piqued within the last year when I independently conversed in detail about benefits with two different postdocs at Emory. Both were funded by fellowship/training grant-type funding, so both were primarily classified as non-employees. However, they both accessed a workaround available at Emory, namely being given a very part-time employee appointment so that they could maintain their health insurance benefit and access to Emory’s 403(b). The second postdoc I spoke with, Dr. Celina Jones, asked me if I knew of postdocs on NIH fellowships and training grants who received a retirement contribution match from their institutions, and I offered to ask my mailing list about it. This is the text of the email I sent on January 16, 2025:

“Do you receive a retirement match and if so HOW?

I had a request for information come in from Dr. Celina Jones, who is a postdoc at Emory on an F32.

Celina started off as a postdoc employee at Emory with all the attendant benefits. When she switched onto her F32, she and her PI created a workaround so that she can still access employee health insurance and the 403(b)… but her efforts to retain her retirement match have been stymied.

Celina and I want to know: Do any other postdocs on NIH training grants receive a retirement match from their institutions? She would love to bring some examples back to Emory to advocate for this benefit.

It’s a no-brainer to me that postdocs should not LOSE benefits (read: money) when switching from employee to non-employee status—if anything, they should receive a pay increase or bonus—so I really want to know if solutions are out there!

Please email me back if you have a relevant example!

Emily”

Emily: The responses I received from postdocs underlined that the workaround these Emory postdocs used was not known to everyone. Several respondents confirmed that they had lost their benefits when switching from employee to non-employee status, with no workarounds offered. A couple of grad students replied with outrage and concern that this was an issue their peers were facing and that they might face in the future. Dr. Richard Remigio, a postdoc at NIH, replied “If matching is considerably important, I often hear awardees declining their award so they can remain on their university’s payroll and list the offered award in their CV.” What a sad situation when an award offers prestige but not only no material benefit but actually a material detriment.

Emily: But something else I’ve realized is that not all postdocs are left to workarounds vs. staying as complete non-employees.

Where Are All Postdocs Classified as Employees?

Emily: As I said earlier, I originally thought that the source of a postdoc’s funding determined their employee or non-employee classification, and that receiving funding from an NIH fellowship or institutional training grant meant that you had to be a non-employee. However, two years ago, the NIH made a splash with this innocuously phrased notice. Notice number NOT-OD-23-111 is titled “NIH Policies for NRSA Stipends, Compensation and Other Income” and reads:

“The purpose of this Notice is to remind the extramural community of the policies surrounding stipends, compensation and other income for trainees and fellows supported under Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) grants. 

In accordance with 42 CFR Part 66, NIH provides stipends to NRSA fellows and trainees as a subsistence allowance to help defray living expenses during the research training experience. NIH does not provide stipends as a condition of employment with either the Federal government or the sponsoring institution (See NIH Grants Policy Statement 11.2.9.2 and 11.3.8.2). 

While stipends are not provided as a condition of employment, this policy is not intended to discourage or otherwise prevent recipient institutions from hiring NRSA trainees and fellows as employees or providing them with benefits consistent with what the institution provides others at similar career stages.”

Basically, the NIH was saying, “Hey universities, we never said that you couldn’t hire NRSA fellows and trainees as employees—you totally can if you want to.” Even the end of the notice seems like a nudge to universities to provide benefits to NRSA recipients that are commensurate with those provided to other postdocs. After seeing that notice, I wondered whether any institutions had already been hiring NRSA postdocs as employees or started after the reminder. So at this year’s National Postdoctoral Association Annual Conference and Graduate Career Consortium Annual Meeting, I asked people I met who work in postdoc offices about postdoc benefits and whether all of their postdocs were hired as employees. I actually did meet a few people who confirmed that all of the postdocs at their institutions were hired as employees. For one example, MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX. At the Graduate Career Consortium Annual Meeting, Briana Mohan, the Program Manager of Recruitment & Special Programs in the Office for Postdocs, spoke with me at length about all the postdocs being employees. Dr. Ryan Udan, the Program Director for Academic Operations in the Office for Postdocs described all their benefits. The following audio clip will also appear in a forthcoming podcast episode about on-campus resources.

Ryan U: “In terms of resources that my postdocs can access that would improve their finances, I would simply say it is the benefits at our institution. Our employees and trainees have equal access to these benefits. These benefits include things like free mental health counseling through our MDLive, also counseling through our employee assistance fund. We also have an employee assistance fund that our postdocs can apply to receive extra funds for any kind of specific situations. Other benefits are health related benefits, we have a very amazing fitness facility that they can join for free. They can also join programs through our UT Blue Cross insurance. So they can have a hinge health for free for people that have joint issues. There’s several weight loss programs. We also have child care coverage, that’s through a program called Bright Horizons. It’s actually a backup dependent care system, it’s not supposed to be used on a regular basis but you get at least 100 hours per year for backup dependent care. And I know that there’s a couple extra resources but I can’t think of them right now.”

Emily: Amazing! It’s great to hear that some institutions are looking out for all of their postdocs and trying to give them a really positive workplace experience.

Conclusion

Emily: So now I’ve learned, and perhaps you have as well, that being awarded an NIH NRSA or similar fellowship or grant as a postdoc does not mean that your position will lack the benefits that your postdoc employee peers have. At some institutions, the funding source makes no difference as all postdocs are employees. At others, you can be hired as a part-time employee to get some of the benefits. However, there are apparently still a lot of postdocs who are dealing with being classified as a non-employee and not receiving benefits. If you’re in this situation currently or you’re anticipating taking a postdoc position in the future, what can you do to give yourself a better chance of getting the same or almost the same benefits as the postdoc employees?

Emily: First, if you’re searching or interviewing for postdoc positions, consider targeting institutions where all postdocs are hired as employees or where there is an established workaround. Second, again during the interviewing process or after being hired, try to find the right administrator at the institution who can help you with your classification or a workaround.

Emily: Our anonymous contributor shared that she helps her fellows do this:

Anonymous: “ I think if you can identify the right people to talk to, which is easier said than done, I believe that people want to help the postdocs, I don’t think that they’re out to make their lives harder. It’s just following protocol.”

Emily: However, she observed that this is a bit easier for an outside funder acting as a liaison to do because they have more experience and ongoing relationships, plus

Anonymous: “As a postdoc, yes, your benefits are important, but you’re so worried about all of the work that you have to get done scientifically. So I think doing all this extra administrative stuff falls by the wayside more often than not.”

Emily: Third, if you’re already in a postdoc position as a non-employee, talk with your peers about their funding sources and benefits, such as through the postdoc association or union. You may find that a workaround can be put in place for you and your peers in a similar situation. This becomes more and more likely the more people speak up about this issue and point to solutions at other institutions. Jamie Lahvic from Season 14 Episode 3 also spoke to this approach during our interview:

Jamie L: “Great groups to kind of connect to for that are unions. Within the UC system, we have a strong postdoc union. And I think they had done a lot of pushing, both on how much you get paid, but also a lot of these minute policies about how you get paid. Even outside of a formal union, I’ve seen a lot of success from graduate students and postdocs just banding together and working together on these things. Whether that is kind of peer-to-peer advice and providing resources, or working together as a group to request something from your department, from your university.”

Emily: Fourth, if you can’t be hired as an employee and no workaround is available, you can attempt to negotiate for more money. Calculate the amount of money that you are losing compared to your employee peers with respect to your health insurance premium and its tax payment and the retirement account match. Ask for that much or more to be added to your salary. Honestly, if you’ve won an individual award and are bringing outside money to your institution, you should be paid even more than employees after normalizing for all benefits, and this does happen sometimes, although it may not be typical. Gary McDowell from S2 E3 observed that:

Gary M: “A lot postdocs are negotiating salaries a lot more than I think people know. I think there’s disparity in who’s asking who’s not asking.”

Emily: If all postdocs at your institution are on a set pay schedule and individual negotiations are not permitted, that’s all the more reason to get together with your peers to argue that all postdoc non-employees should receive a pay increase and/or additional benefits. Please let me know your reaction to this episode! Tell me about your workarounds or which institutions hire all postdocs as employees. You can reach me at [email protected].

Outro

Emily: Listeners, thank you for joining me for this episode! I have a gift for you! You know that final question I ask of all my guests regarding their best financial advice? My team has collected short summaries of all the answers ever given on the podcast into a document that is updated with each new episode release. You can gain access to it by registering for my mailing list at PFforPhDs.com/advice/. Would you like to access transcripts or videos of each episode? I link the show notes for each episode from PFforPhDs.com/podcast/. See you in the next episode, and remember: You don’t have to have a PhD to succeed with personal finance… but it helps! Nothing you hear on this podcast should be taken as financial, tax, or legal advice for any individual. The music is “Stages of Awakening” by Podington Bear from the Free Music Archive and is shared under CC by NC. Podcast editing by me and show notes creation by Dr. Jill Hoffman.

Start Graduate School on the Right Financial Foot Workshop Advance Preparation

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Thank you for registering for Start Graduate School on the Right Financial Foot! Please complete the action item below prior to the date of the workshop so that you can receive the full benefits of the workshop.

  • Bring your balance sheet. A balance sheet is a record of all of your current financial assets and liabilities. If you don’t have a balance sheet, please take some time to create one. You can download a template spreadsheet as well as some instructions via this link. Feel free to use a different template if you prefer. You will work with your balance sheet during the workshop.

During the workshop, we’ll be working with spreadsheets and PDFs. If the workshop is in person, please bring your laptop or tablet. If the workshop is remote, please set your workspace up so that you can best juggle Zoom alongside the other programs.

I look forward to speaking with you during the workshop!

Financial Emergency Workshop Advance Preparation

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Thank you for registering for Create Your Financial Emergency Response Plan as a PhD! Please complete the action items below prior to the date of the workshop so that you can receive the full benefits of the workshop.

  1. Bring your balance sheet. A balance sheet is a record of all of your current financial assets and liabilities. If you don’t have a balance sheet, please take some time to create one. You can download a template spreadsheet as well as some instructions via this link. Feel free to use a different template if you prefer. If you use budgeting or net worth tracking software and have all your accounts linked, the software probably has all the information, so no need to replicate it elsewhere. You will work with your balance sheet during the workshop.
  2. Review your budget or cash flow with these questions in mind: What is the total of my current monthly expenses? Am I currently saving money for my short- or long-term future, and if so at what rate(s)?

During the workshop, we’ll be working with spreadsheets and PDFs. If the workshop is in person, please bring your laptop or tablet. If the workshop is remote, please set your workspace up so that you can best juggle Zoom alongside the other programs.

I look forward to speaking with you during the workshop!

Dr. Emily Roberts, Personal Finance for PhDs

What to Do When Facing Financial Uncertainty

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Academic and research institutions are facing federal funding cuts—both realized and potential—due to the Trump administration’s hyper-aggressive and ham-fisted attempts to reduce federal spending. Many of the graduate students, postdocs, faculty members, and researchers at these institutions are experiencing uncertainty about whether their positions will continue and how they will be funded, at least to a degree. In the face of income uncertainty, there are certain steps you can take to shore up your personal finances so that you can better weather any storm that might come.

The following are practical steps you may take to strengthen your personal financial position if you still have an income. There’s no need to take every action on this list. My intention is to help you reduce your stress at this time, not add to it.

Establish or Increase Your Emergency Fund

Evaluate whether you should increase the size of your emergency fund. An emergency fund is a sum of money specifically set aside to be drawn upon when you have a financial emergency, such as income loss or an unexpected but vital expense. This money should be kept in cash equivalents, such as a high-yield savings account, not put at any risk.

While in more stable financial times you might be able to get away with maintaining a smaller fund, right now I suggest an emergency fund size of two months of expenses if you are early in your financial journey (e.g., are holding high-interest debt) or six months of expenses if you are later in your financial journey (e.g., are debt-free aside from student loans or a mortgage and are regularly investing).

If you don’t yet have the smaller size of emergency fund set aside, please make it a top priority to create it quickly, even if it requires an uncomfortable level of sacrifice in the short term. You can free up cash flow for your emergency fund by fasting from discretionary purchases, cancelling discretionary fixed expenses, selling items you no longer use, increasing your income if possible, and attempting to reduce your expenses generally. Ask yourself what you would and would not spend on if you had no income, and spend only on what’s absolutely necessary until you reach your emergency fund goal.

Pay Off Your Credit Card Debt

If you are carrying a balance on your credit card(s), the next step after increasing your emergency fund to two months of expenses is to pay down or off your credit card debt. Like with the emergency fund, please do this as quickly as possible. Credit card debt typically accumulates interest at a very high rate, which is toxic for your finances. I don’t suggest closing any credit accounts in this process unless you are paying an annual fee for them because if worse comes to worst you might have to accumulate a balance again (see next).

Research and Prepare to Take Out (Less Toxic) Debt

Where would you turn if you lost your income and spent down your emergency fund? Especially with a smaller-sized emergency fund, that could happen before you secure another position or funding source. Taking out new debt is a possibility, even though it’s no one’s favorite option. What types of debt are accessible to you that would come with a lower interest rate than your current credit cards?

If you are a student, look into whether you’re eligible for federal or private student loans; consider submitting a Free Application for Federal Student Aid now to open up that possibility without committing yourself to taking out any debt.

If you’re a homeowner with equity in your home, compare home equity line of credit (HELOC) offers from a few lenders and consider opening one. Opening an HELOC doesn’t obligate you to borrow against your home, but once you open it, the credit is available to you. However, there are origination and possibly account fees, so don’t exercise this option without weighing the costs. Some lenders require you to have an income to take out this type of loan.

Shop around for a personal loan at a reasonable interest rate—preferably without an origination fee or a very low fee. If you want to take out this type of debt, you will have to do so while you still have an income.

Consider opening a credit card with a lower-than-average interest rate to turn to if you run out of cash. Some cards offer a 0% interest rate for a fixed period of time.

Diversify Your Income Sources

In general, I suggest the habit of applying for at least one fellowship/grant per year, and right now you should double down on that practice. Take some time this month to identify several potential funding sources; some of them should be from organizations other than the federal government. Loop your advisor/mentor in to help you decide which to apply to, and make it a priority to submit a strong, tailored application at the appropriate time.

Now is also the time to start a side hustle or job if you don’t yet have one—or to add another. You don’t necessarily have to set a goal of earning a lot of money through it right now (unless you’re trying to increase your emergency fund size or pay down credit card debt). The purpose of establishing one or more income sources outside of your primary one is to be able to quickly ramp up your income through them should you lose your primary income. For example, if you freelance and typically take one small job per month, if you needed to, you could try to attract additional clients. It’s easier to go from one client to five than to go from zero clients to one, so establish yourself now, before you need the income.

When you diversify your income sources, think about the upstream source(s) of the money you seek. At this time, it’s best to add income sources from people/companies who do not directly receive federal funding. While I typically advise graduate students and postdocs to focus their side hustle efforts within areas related to their developing expertise that could potentially advance their careers, now is the time to cast a wider net. Yes, offer your data visualization services, but maybe also do a few baby- or pet-sitting jobs to gain references.

Research Resources Available to You

What resources are available to you through your university, city, county, or state if you did lose your funding? You can research this question in advance so that you know where to turn. For example:

  • Would you qualify for unemployment benefits? (Don’t assume you do as a graduate student or fellow! It varies by state.)
  • Does your university offer emergency grants or loans? What is the application process?
  • Where are the local food banks and when are they open? What are their eligibility criteria? (There may be one on your campus.)

If you are a student, the financial aid, basic needs, and/or financial wellness offices can help you with this research.

Prepare for a Career Pivot

While you hopefully will not suddenly lose your income, it may become clear over the coming months that your current career path is not viable or will not meet your expectations. In that case, prepare to pivot. Early steps you can take are to update your CV/resume, reconnect with and expand your network, and utilize the career and professional development resources available to you, such as through your university’s career center.

I hope that taking one or more of these steps will help to calm your nerves in this time of uncertainty. If you are able to, please advocate for the restoration/continuation of vital research funding.