Posted: 3/31/2008 8:33:56 AM EDT
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Hey, unless you're a millionaire, it's an important and often overlooked part of being prepared. And if you're a millionaire, it's important if you want to STAY a millionaire. I was just thinking about an experience that I had while I was stocking up at Walmart on Saturday. There's this lady on line in front of me. Let's be honest here, she's a low rent sort of person. She's got $175-$200 worth of stuff laid out on the conveyor belt, and when the cashier is part of the way through, she stops her. Turns out this lady only has $50 to spend, so the cashier has to go get a cart and clear off the conveyor to return all the unpaid for merchandise. This takes up a lot of MY time that I'll never get back. So while I'm standing there, the cashier and I are chatting and I say "Way to start your shift off, huh?" She tells me that this is nothing, and that it happens ALL time. This and the whole EBT card snafu that I see at Walmart all the time got me thinking... I have a number of accounts that I have to keep track of which I use for a variety of reasons. I monitor them closely. It takes me maybe a few minutes throughout the day and I can check them from anywhere. On any given day I could tell you within +/- $10 how much money I have in each of those accounts. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but why aren't most people able to do this? When I go to buy something, I know how much money I have to spend. If I'm buying something big, I know that I'm going to research it, and that I'll bargain for a better price with the salesperson (and I'll usually get it). The reason I'm posting this is, well, I guess because of the way my brain is wired that I don't understand why people behave like that lady at Walmart on Saturday. Yeah, I know, the entitlement attitude thing, laziness, lack of personal responsibility, stupidity, etc... I suppose more than anything I'm just venting. If you don't have a budget, you need to sit down and figure one out, pronto. Your money is important and you need to know where it is and what it's doing. |
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honestly...probably 95% of Americans have piss poor spending habits. They often buy shit that they want way to often and not always is it what they NEED or SHOULD have. Americans are the biggest consumers, we always want bigger, better, faster, cheaper, newer...ironically in that order most of the time. It's no different than the health care problems here. I can give you a list that is at least 5 people long of my friends who have CONSCIOUSLY chosen to not get medical insurance, instead they went to Cancun for spring break. It is mostly a matter of how peoples priorities are screwed up 3 ways till Sunday. It's part of the reason why I loath the democratic party so much, they assume and give people way to much credit...that and all their "plans" sound great but they don't talk about how they'll be funded. Maybe I'm to cold and cynical for someone my age, but if you can't budget yourself and know your priorities it's your own damn fault and you're the only one to blame. Yeah 20yr olds are wreckless and usually spend money stupidly, but sometimes you need to pull your head out of your ass and see the big picture. My girlfriend bought a $600 camera yesterday, it was a stupid choice but her mistake to make. I'll just give her shit again at the end of the month when she's complaining about not having enough money to pay off her credit card. I give myself $500 to last a semester on while I'm at school, yes I do make some money while I'm down here but it's not that much (around $65 a month x 4.5months). That money covers my food, fun and gas, and at the end of the semester I usually have around $300 or more left over. This semester I'll have around $600 since I didn't spend much money at all. It helps that I live a completely cash based lifestyle, if I don't have the money for it in the bank I don't buy it. I give up some things, but I find other things that cost me absolutely nothing to occupy my time and keep me busy. I live on campus and have already paid for a meal plan so I eat in the caf or student union, yeah the food is shitty so occasionally I go buy food from the grocery store. Living on campus has the benefit of being cheaper in terms of vehicle costs (gas, added mileage, maintenance), time (parking is a PITA here), activities (our school offers lots of free student activities), and food. I considered moving off campus but I figured it would cost me an extra $1000 a semester and that doesn't even factor in the headache of trying to fight for parking every day. |
| I'm the same way. My wife is a typical entitlement minded American, though. She's slowly coming around but it's hard to change people when they were raised a certain way. It's human nature to be greedy and selfish. Some people can control themselves. Some people just don't care and will take every opportunity to get whatever they can get away with. |
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I could write a book on this. We are living on Social Security, which doens't pay much. Fortuantely, we were well on our way to zero debt whe I became disabled and still only have about $3k in Cc debt. That's it, paid off cars, etc. We kept a cash reserve fun equal to nearly 2 years of normal expenses. We've busted that down to 1 year due to emergency spending on vehicle repairs, emergency supplies, etc so now it's down to 1 year. I'm really sweating fuel and food costs and we are conserving as much as we can. Our big problem is local income and school property taxes, which take 15% of our income. How do we do it? We have a budget. We use a shopping list for groceries, and don't deviate from it. We manage a McD's burger about twice a month, and that's it. We'll see a movie about twice a year. We buy reloading supplies and save on ammo for training. We've even reduced live fire training to cut down on expenses further. We're holdng the line, but barely. A steep increase in food, fuel, or taxes will likley swamp us. Anybody want to hire a gimp? Ops |
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SHTF happens to people at different times...the lady is living at the bottom of her personal SHTF. OP in PA is not quite in SHTF financially but he sees the writing on the wall: fixed income vs. rising costs... Now, should the economy go from recession to depression, most of us will be hurt and hurt bad. About the only "ace in the hole" I can think of looking at the prospect of losing the house (5-6 months after losing the job) would be to bug out to "grandmas" house with the extended family and living frugally like interior refugees for a decade while I seek jobs where ever in the hemisphere they can be found to send money home.... It's not pretty and our credit would be ruined for years but it's do-able. As it is, I'm hoping the economy doesnt' tank but in the meanwhile we're maximizing our debt payments to get free of them. |
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It's not about how much you make but how much you spend. Too many people make plenty of money but they spend more. My brother in law makes more than I do but recently he was complaining about not having enough money to replace a broken washer. He didn't have the money and his CCs are maxed out. I don't make a huge amount of money but me and my wife live very comfortably. I had to change the way she thinks because she's terrible at managing money but she's getting better. She complains about not having any money but that's because sometimes I say no to her planned expenditures. I plan out nearly all my purchases and I haven't had a problem managing my money. It's sad to see some people and their complete incompetance at financial management. |
i don't wanna say i relish in peoples stupidity but once people like this bottom out financially you'll see them selling things at yard/garage sales for pennies on the dollar. really good stuff like generators and guns and nice riding mowers, chainsaws and even nice SUV's they can't afford the gas for anymore. even in casual conversation you can ask if and what they may have to sell and you can help them out a little bit . 
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