<prompt> Human: Reading the news about Obamas proposed changes to the Pay As You Earn program, along with the fact that I have a six month old daughter who has created more monthly expenses for my husband and I this year, has got me re-assessing my abysmal financial situation. As background, husband and I are both late 20searly 30s attorneys and each earn just under 60,000 a year. Ive been looking at our monthly income and expenses for the last few months and its pretty depressing. Were cutting as many costs as we can, but having bought a house in March 2013, we keep finding more and more unavoidable expenses in connection to that.Heres a rough breakdown of our monthly expenses: 1227 mortgage payment 190 cell phone bill husband insisted we get grandfathered in to our unlimited data plans 57 internet and its awful. TWC 157 car insurance for two cars 690 husbands student loans 670 my student loans 200 utilities electricgas, water, trash removal 975 daycare Ive been paying this out of a savings account that is going to be empty in the next couple of months. Gulp. 560 car payments two cars 400 groceries 200 into savingsThen, of course, theres gas, diapers, clothes, etc.Our combined student loans are somewhere in the neighborhood of 150,000. Im on the extended graduated repayment plan picked it back when I first got a job in 2010 and thought it was better than Income Contingent, and I believe my husband is on the same plan for his. Would we be better off changing to Income Based Repayment and filing our taxes as married filing separately, or staying on our current plans? I have a basic understanding of the IBRs loan forgiveness after 25 years and big ole tax bill resulting from that, and am not particularly thrilled about the idea of paying less per month only to save the extra in order to pay off a tax bill years from now. Are we better off leaving well alone, filing jointly to take advantage of child care credits, etc.?We dont have much in savings as I mentioned, that account is dwindling to nothing since its been paying the daycare costs, and certainly dont save enough towards retirement. Please, reddit, hold me and tell me it will all be alright?Edit: Thanks for all the comments. Obviously its not easy to give advice if you dont have every exact detail of my spending listed, but, like I said, we either have unplanned expenses that the extra goes toward, or the extra sits in our accounts unspent. Its just personally frustrating because I grew up quite poor, am pretty frugal, and feel like Im not getting ahead even though I have a decent job.  <response>: It sounds like what you guys really need is a budget. I would try Mint.com. Its fantastic. Basically you enter in all your accounts, savings, checking, investments, and ccs and it tells you your total net worth and how much assets you have versus how much debt. It also tracks ALL of your spending telling you how much percentage you are spending on food, rent, transportation, entertainment etc. From what others have said here, it seems like you are not accounting for several hundred to a thousand dollars worth of expenses every month. You two need to get that resolved.Also having a baby is expensive. I saw it from my sister when they had their first baby. Expensive high quality food, toys, expensive diapers, expensive everything for their first born. By the time they had their second, it was all discount this, large bulk that, used and second hand stuff everywhere. While you love your baby and want the best for himher, in the end, super expensive diapers are not going to make the baby any happier in the long run. I would consider getting cheapergenericpreowned stuff for your baby if you can so long as it doesnt put your babys heath and welfare in danger. A baby is not going to care if hisher toys are brand new, if its colorful and fun they will play and love it no matter how old it is.Looking at your numbers, they look good. 6.3k take home is pretty good and it gives you about 1000 left each month. From what I see, you had a lot of unexpected expenses lately. Unexpected expenses should come from an unexpected expenses savings account. I call these my OH SHT fund for when in case SHT happens. Generally this should be a 1-2k savings account that you borrow your own money out of. Set it aside and do not touch or add to it unless you have to. Once you use it, refill it like you would a loan. Having an OH SHT fund helps buffer you against having to dip into your savings.Secondly, you should be saving more. Considering your combined salaries are 120k per year, you are only saving 2400 a month, which is 2. This needs to be MUCH higher. Ideally you need to get up to 10 or so. This is for the future, like a college savings fund, etc. Saving can be done by simply picking a percentage and having your savings account deduct that percentage from your checking account every time you get money. If you get paid every 2 weeks, have your savings account transfer over funds 10 or so every 2 weeks in time with your direct deposit. Savings needs to be treated as an expense and it will help you budget better.Most of all you need a budget and stick to it. Does this purchase put us over our monthly budget for this month? Tough luck, were not getting it then. We wait till next month. Do you need a new car or new patio? open a separate savings account and deduct from your own checking account to save for it. Good luck! 