Rocket Finance has this post Does a frugal culture exist in your workplace?

The problem he’s noticing is a financially cultural difference between a former workplace and his current one! If you’re job hunting, it may be a good question to ask during interview process as to what the custom is among the staff for lunch breaks. Rocket explains what he’s dealing with:

Every lunch at this office seems to be a working lunch and there is a lot of pressure to go drop $6 or $8 or $10 on an unhealthy meal that I can’t afford. There have been a couple of situations where my boss has basically ordered me to go to lunch – on my dime. I am still the new guy, and I don’t want to cause too many waves, but going to lunch even one time during a week busts our budget. Mrs. Rocket is pretty consistent about making a lunch for me when I remember to ask the night before, so I took a lunch every day last week and got a way with it – primarily because most of my office was on vacation. I have been playing along and paying the price for the last few months, however, I must cut back. …

Here is the irony: my fellow employees cannot afford to go to lunch either! From what I can tell, they just do it as a part of the job. I suspect that several of them are racking up significant debt in the process. I estimate that they spend $40 a week on lunch, that’s over $2,000 a year!

Luckily, my co-workers are pretty much a frugal lunch bunch. Yes, there are group outings or potlucks throughout the year. Some of us have customer loyalty cards at the downtown coffee shops. And the weekend crew in the newsroom usually will coordinate a take-out order for dinner.

But brown-bagging is quite common place in my office, and nobody thinks twice about my going home for lunch.