4 Ways to Increase Your Income in 2018

Money won’t necessarily buy you happiness but you’ll most likely be able to live a more comfortable life with more money than on less money.

If you have been broke, almost broke, or struggled financially in 2017, the thought of finding ways to increase your income in 2018 won’t be alien to you.

For some folks, finding another job or starting a business might be a great way to increase your income.

This piece provides insight into four simple strategies that you can adopt in order to increase your income next year.

This is the best time to renegotiate a raise

If you want to increase your income in 2018, the best place to start is to ask for a raise at your current job.

Thankfully, December is a great time of the year to ask for a raise because your employer will most likely be in a great mood if the business had recorded a stellar performance this year.

If you are currently employed, and you’ve been dutiful in delivering excellent service on the job, a fair employer will be positively disposed toward renegotiating a raise with you.

If you can justify a raise and they can’t give you a good enough reason not to renegotiate with you; it is still a win-win because you’ll at least know what to expect in the New Year.

if you fail to get a result, try the market and see anyone else is willing to hire you at a better pay.

Consider getting a second job

If you can’t get a raise at work, you may want to consider getting a second job to complement earnings from your current job. Even you can easily earn on the side if you have some free time.

You may want to find job opportunities to get paid for overtime, work at night or on weekends at a second job. If you have other skills, you may want to consider offering freelancing services with your skills.

Platforms such as ELance, Upwork and Guru are a great place to kickstart your freelancing career. You may also want to consider posting classifieds on some of the services that you offer.

Try your hands on Wall Street

If you have a flair for investments, numbers, and business, you should consider trying your hands at some of the opportunities that Wall Street provides to retail investors.

You don’t have to be Wharton educated before you can understand how the financial markets work and trade the markets for profit.

Jason Bridges, an analyst at Wilkins  Finance notes that “the barriers to entry on Wall Street are as low as low can be, anybody committed to spending the time to learn how the market works will eventually understand the rhythms, patterns, and trends of the market.”

Telecommute to reduce expenses

Sometimes, you’ll need to go through the old-fashioned way of reducing your expenses in order to increase your final take-home pay.

If you want to increase your earnings next year, you may want to explore the possibility of telecommuting to work so that you can save cost in terms of transportation and time.

Telecommuting could also add flexibility to your day; thereby making it easy for you to take on a second job or hone your skills at a hobby that could eventually turn into a side gig.

Some of the jobs in which telecommuting could be an option include transcription, writing, designing, programming, data entry, and technical support.