A teacher says she is still struggling to afford her rent with a second job as a server in a now-viral TikTok.
In the video posted by Lexie Firment (@missfirment) on June 15, she shares her “teacher to server second job pipeline story.”
Text overlay on a clip of her dancing reads, “Today two tables didn’t tip me, I have 1600 in rent due in 15 days, and I cried mid shift today. Cant wait to play restaurant and broke teacher tomorrow again.”
The video is captioned, “y’all I just can’t today. My venmo is lexiefirment.”
@missfirment Yall i just cant today. My venmo is lexiefirment #servertok #broketeacher #teachersecondjob #teachersummervlog #teachertok #serverlife ♬ Oh oh oh my gosh – angie❤️
The video has reached over 1.7 million views as of July 13. Comments have been disabled.
Firment’s employment situation is not uncommon among American teachers, as many struggle to keep up with skyrocketing rent prices on an average salary of $41,500 for new teachers.
In a survey of 1,200 teachers conducted by the Teacher Salary Project in 2021, 82% said that they had to take on additional jobs at some point in their careers to support themselves. 53% of respondents said they currently held multiple jobs at the time of the survey.
In a video posted on July 6, Firment says she has started “Instacarting all night” to keep up with expenses. The caption reads, “yes, I’m tired but miss f has rent.”
Text overlay reads, “Going straight from serving to Instacarting all night because I refuse to let myself settle for a lifestyle less than what I want for myself on a teacher salary.”
Before the comments were disabled, other teachers shared what side hustles and part-time jobs they have taken on to make ends meet.
“I have 2 other jobs, besides teaching, including night janitor at my school,” one commenter shared.
“I do Uber alll summer because of this!” another said.
The Daily Dot reached out to Firment via email.
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