In partnership with
Quick, hard-hitting business news.
Morning Brew was built on a simple idea: business news doesn’t have to be boring.
Today, it’s the fastest-growing newsletter in the country with over 4.2 million readers—thanks to a format that makes staying informed both easy and enjoyable.
Each morning, Morning Brew delivers the day’s biggest stories—from Wall Street to Silicon Valley and beyond—in bite-sized reads packed with facts, not fluff, and just enough wit to keep things interesting.
Try the newsletter for free and see why busy professionals are ditching jargon-heavy, traditional business media for a smarter, faster way to stay in the loop.
Live: Big Beautiful Bill Passed
Congress just passed Trump's Big Beautiful Bill about as smoothly as you might pass a kidney stone. It was a process.
Here’s what some of the more heavy hitting issues might mean for you:
Tax cuts: Trump's tax cuts from 2017 have been made permanent, though these cuts mainly benefited the top 20% of earners. There are new tax cuts for some tip and overtime pay. If you work in a job with either of those streams of income you may get a wage bump. There are also tax breaks for car loan interest on vehicles built in the US.
Medicaid cuts: Rather than my own description, this is per the Wall Street Journal: "Millions will lose coverage, hospitals’ uncompensated work will increase and insurers will lose big business."
Student aid: There are expanded taxes on university endowments (used to fund financial aid), expansions in Pell Grant qualifications for vocational and technical schools, and a cap on the amount of student loans you can take out for graduate education. Higher ed is set to get more expensive.
Food cuts: There was also $114 billion cut in food programs, primarily to SNAP.
There was a lot in this bill. Plenty more that I did not cover, including "Trump Accounts."
I can't cover it all here, but it's worth looking into. These changes affect you directly.
Learn: How to Budget Using Excel
I don't use Excel to budget, but many do and find it to be their preferred method. So if you like Excel (or sheets... whatever) pucker up!
Gif by jukeboxsaints on Giphy, Excel lovers be like
Here’s a step by step:
Make Columns for:
Income (all sources: job, CDs, side hustle)
Fixed expenses (rent, phone, Netflix, etc.)
Variable expenses (food, gas, fun, “oops” spending)
Though it may take extra time, consider splitting this up into separate columns for needs and wants
Savings
Enter Your Numbers.
Be honest. No one is grading you.
But don't leave stuff out! Even small purchases add up and then your budget will be inaccurate and much less useful.
Use SUM.
=SUM(your range of values) to get totals. Excel does the math so you don’t.
Check: Income – Expenses = ?
Positive? Cool. Negative? Time to cut down on dumplings dude!
Save. Update Weekly.
Treat it like a diary, but for your wallet.
If you want to get fancy...
Add Conditional Formatting: Make negatives red to clearly see when you're "in the red!" It’s judgmental and helpful.
Create a chart that shows your spending visually: You could do a bar graph, pie chart, really whatever you're feeling.
Excel isn’t glam Gabby. It’s practical. And unlike most budgeting apps, it doesn’t try to sell you a premium subscription for your own data. Yay!!!!
Leverage: Excel Templates
You also don’t have to build your own template. You can just steal the work of others! Here are some free templates you can use:
Microsoft’s Free Budget Templates
Pros: Easy to download, customizable, no sketchy sign-up.
Cons: Vanilla.
Google Sheets Monthly Budget Template
Pros: Free, no sketchy sign-up, better if you are a Google Suite user.
Cons: Dreadfully boring
Cele’s Mini Budget
Pros: Beautifully simple and straightforward.
Cons: Maybe a bit boring and difficult to customize.
Reddit Monster Sheet:
Pros: Tracks what your dog spent on its biscuits (Everything!)
Cons: Could be overwhelming/too complex.
If you want more info on how to budget with Excel, let me know!
Also, quick reminder that I am not sponsored by any of the tools I note here. I wish I was!
Launch!
Seriously—use Excel, Google Sheets, Apple Notes, a napkin. Please, something. The habit is what matters.
Your challenge: Write down every expense for the next 7 days.
You’ll be shocked where your money actually goes. (Spoiler: Fido stole your credit card and is eating good)
Budgeting frees you to achieve what you want, not be at the whims of finding out where your money goes at the end of the month.
Measure it, manage it, make it yours. ;)
Hey!
Thank you so much for being a part of this newsletter. I am grateful to write to you weekly and I hope this helps you feel more confident with your finances.
If you found this newsletter helpful, please share it with a friend and invite them to subscribe.
I have a goal of helping people learn personal finance. It works better when more people get my emails.
Thank you for helping me (and your friend) out!
—Ben Brosnahan
