<prompt> Human: hey rpersonalfinance, I just graduated in May and will be starting my first full-time job in a week an a half, which means my first full-time paychecks will start rolling in! Only problem is, Ive never had to deal with countless bills, savings, and most importantly taxes. What Im looking for is just general advice on where my paycheck should go and where I should keep my money all I have is a checking account right now. Im lucky and have no student loans so that makes things a bit easier.Basically I have a paycheck of X, then after rent and other monthly bills, what should I do with my money? How much should I try to save? What do I do about taxes? Im in Virginia so Ill have US and State Income taxes. What kind of accounts should I have? Anything else I should be concerned about? Any general advice beyond start saving early? Thanks!  <response>: Taxes Check the paycheck information. Im pretty sure income tax both US and State is already deducted from your salary. It is in my country and Ive read its the case in many US states. So no need to worry about that expense, its all handled automatically. Make sure though that you fill in your tax papers, because you might even pay too much income tax and will then get some back next year. If it is not, make sure you understand how much youll have to pay, open a separate savings account for this and put money aside immediately after you get your salary. Consider this money as not yours... Savings Open a savings account soon. Criteria: it should give you some interest, plus it should be easy accessible as in you can get money from it within one or two business days. Put money in there from your checking account. This will help you with budgeting and not spending too much. Once you notice that you can actually save a lot of money, it is time to start looking for better ways to save your money so that you get more interest. Investing could be an option, or CDs. But you can start looking into this a couple of months from now, theres no rush. By then you might have a better idea of how much money youll be able to save.Emergency fund Always keep some money in a readily available savings account, because you might suddenly need it in case of emergency. For example a health emergency, or having to travel to see your folks because they have health problems or someones getting married, or getting fired and still needing to cough up rent, things like these. Ive seen here that this should be enough to last you six months. Pension Look into this in the next couple of months. Starting early is a good idea. It might be that your job has a plan for this for example you can contribute and the company then will match your contribution, it might be that they dont and youre on your own. I dont think you have to start with your first salary, so again youll have a few months to find out what you want to do and how to do it. By that time you might also know how much money you can pay towards this and still live comfortably now. Building your credit score Again, this is something you dont need to start doing immediately. So take some time here to understand the system. As I understand the American system, getting a credit card and using it, but paying off before they start charging interest or give you a fee, will be an easy way of starting to build your credit score. You might need a good score in the future to be able to get a mortgage. But as I said, you dont have to start right now, waiting a couple of months until you understand it and until you have found a good credit card for you, is OK.Budget Track your expenses for the next couple of months. I heard that mint.com is good in the US, and safe and easy to use with most banks credit unions. It will help you find out how much you spend and where you might be able to save a buck or two. If you dont want to use mint.com, ask for receipts and save them until the evening or the weekend and then put it in a spreadsheet to save time, use only broad categories, such as food, fun, car or clothes. Analyze this every month to see where your money went and how you perhaps improve that. 