If you are living paycheck to paycheck. You can not afford to lose your job, or not have one while you are looking for another one. This economy should make you immediately do anything and everything in your power to quickly amass at least 3 months of living expenses. This will give you that safety net necessary to be able to find a new gig if the need arises. You will be amazed at how much stress it can take off you and your attitude towards your job.
Agreed. I have probably a couple years of living expenses available now, and I still have some anxiety around work/income/etc. When I lived check to check, it was even worse. There's not no stress now, but far less, knowing I can still eat/live/etc if some engagement is cut short or reduced. Beginning of covid, early lockdown stuff, the company I was working for cut some folks, and reduced me to ... limbo for a few weeks. The project I was on had no clients willing to renew their contracts because... lockdown - they had no idea what was coming in the next few months (who did?). 15 years ago I'd have freaked out about having a project suspended like that. This time, it was... a blip. True, there were bigger things to be concerned about anyway (covid) but short term financial stability wasn't an issue. Longer term - would still like enough to be even 'lean fire', but not quite there yet.
Having slack in your finances may not solve all your problems, but life is much better when you escape from the class of problems surrounding lack of money.
It takes a while, but when you get used to having enough money your time horizon can extend much further, and you can start to make decisions that will be likely to help you in the future.
I say this as someone with household income below the local median, but with thrifty habits and a financially compatible spouse, and who had the good fortune to buy a house before things got so crazy. If housing wasn't a mostly-solved problem for us life would be very different.
