Given job uncertainty, I have been trying to save and create a buffer for any troublesome periods in the future. That has had me looking at my expenses, particularly at the recurrent ones that arise every month.
Some of those expenses I took on knowing what their extent would be. Others, like my cell phone and web hosting charges, have been steadily creeping up with time.
It is quite possible that whatever job I end up in long-term will pay dramatically less than my current one, and be less secure to boot. With that in mind, I should remain aware of opportunities to squeeze down these expenses. Moving somewhere cheaper is the obvious option, and almost probably something I will do if moving to Toronto.
Five years later, in a different city and radically different financial circumstances, my rent is well over 50% of my monthly income, with my cell phone bill around 5% and internet access around 3%.
As a University of Toronto PhD student, I got no income from the funding package between the end of the winter term and September each year and was never able to get a summer TA position (though I picked up extra TA positions during the fall and winter terms of several years).
I did do at least some non-U of T work each summer, including some summers where I had a major day job in addition to working on my research.