Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

What If Time Wasn’t An Issue?

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You likely remember questions like this one from your high school classes.  Or your college philosophy classes.  Well, here’s another one.

What if time wasn’t an issue.  What if we knew that we would live to be 200 years old?  Would we still act the way that we do?  Would we still work the same way at the same company doing the same job?  Would we run, run, run until we couldn’t anymore?

Or would we, instead, realize that we had that much longer to achieve our goals and slow down a bit.  Would we pursue more of our passions and less of our profits?

I’m not so sure that anything would change.  I think there would still be people who work 80 hour weeks trying to make as much money as they possibly can so they can have that big McMansion and the Lexus.  And there would still be people who embrace their passions and don’t worry about where the next buck is coming from, only that they are doing the things that they love.

What do you think would change?  How would you handle it differently?

I’ll refrain from assigning an 2000 word essay, but I would like to know what you think.  Leave your thoughts in the comments or write an article of your own in response.

Financial Gluttony

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Gluttony is all around us.  I’m as guilty of it as you likely are.  The most classical example of gluttony is the act of eating much more than you need.  It leads to obesity, which is a rampant problem in this country.  Gluttony is described as the excessive indulgence in food and drink.

But, since this is a personal finance blog, let’s expand that description a bit and talk about financial gluttony. In fact, lets get down right philosophical about it.

The excessive indulgence of money. It may not be an official one of the 7 deadly sins, but it certainly is one of the deadly sins of personal finance.  It’s the rampant consumerism that often runs wild in our society.  Especially around this time of year.  We spend and spend and only stop when our credit runs out.  We give little thought to what the resulting consequences will be of our spending.  Over spending, over extending, gluttonous use of money.

The excessive indulgences of finance.  I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that many of you have probably not thought of this side of the argument.  What I’m talking about is the gluttonous use of financial maxims to save and perform frugal acts.  Moderation is good for all things, even the stuff that is good for us.  You’ll garner no argument from me that saving money and being frugal are good things.  But, it is possible to take it too far.  Making soup by boiling your old belts, not because you can’t afford food, but because it’ll save a buck or two is finance gluttony.  Ok, that’s a pretty extreme example, but you get the point.

What I really want to get at here is that there are extremes for everything.  If we eat too much we get fat.  If we spend too much we get broke.  If we save too much, we fail to appreciate what our money can do for us.  So, the next time you’re doing your budget or even just balancing your checkbook, take the time to think about that.  Are you being financially gluttonous?

Limited Edition

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An advertisement that I received prompted me to think about the term “Limited Edition”.  As consumers we are conditioned to believe that if something is called “limited edition” that it must be more valuable.  After all, it is “limited”, which implies that it is scarce.  It implies that the supply of the item has a limit.  It also implies that you really should buy it now since it won’t be available after all of the current “limited edition” are sold.

However, in truth, it’s most likely not all that “limited”.  It’s just propaganda, folks. A sales tactic designed to make you not only buy the item, but also pay more for it than you should.

If you really, truly, think about it, anything that is being made can be called a “limited edition”. Every model of car that rolls off of the production line is limited.  They only make so many a year.  Get yours now!  This article is a limited edition.  At some point I will stop writing articles.  There won’t be any more.  The supply is limited!  Which is why you should pay me now!  Just kidding.  Kinda.