J.D. at Get Rich Slowly recently wrote an interesting article reflecting on his magazine subscriptions and lessons learned. In the post he touches on two golden ideas: (1) the “automatic renewal” strategy that many businesses use is dangerous and can derail attempts to get out of debt, and (2) magazine subscriptions need to be demonstrably valuable in order for one to subscribe from the start or continue with an existing subscription.

For someone with debt, skip the magazine and/or newspaper subscriptions unless a particular one or two are of paramount value to you. Keep in mind that plans with daily delivery are likely going to be the most expensive. Paying to read interesting material these days is a luxury given the free access to web versions of the same topics, if not the same publications and content. Even if full article access is not available through free online browsing, test the limited access for a couple of weeks and see if that content will satisfy you.

If you do choose to subscribe, ask your boss to cover the expense if it’s work-related, enhances your professional skills, or otherwise boosts your performance or the success of your team in the office. Consider discount rate plans to save. In short, do the research and think through a subscription offer carefully since the recurring costs associated with subscribing make it one of the best items to trim from a budget.

Raj Patel writes for DebtGoal.com, a do-it-yourself system for getting out of debt and lowering your interest costs.  DebtGoal.com incorporates all of the techniques discussed in this post and can help users understand and get visibility to and manage their debt finances.