50 reasons to just be sensible
Filed under: Cost of living, Economics, General Budgeting, Hubby's Views, Jobs & Work, Life in New Zealand
As a follow up to this item, the Dom Post came out yesterday with their ’50 tips to ride out a recession and still have a life’.
Now here, interestingly enough – discussing interest rates with your bank was all the way down at 46 while watching what you spend came in at number 11 – both of which are going to have a bigger impact on cash flow than anything else such as;
Number 8 – Supposedly cheap airfares at grab a seat – just watch for the $310 fare to fly out of Invercargill after you’ve ‘only’ paid $10 to fly there!
Number 10 – About not paying others for what you can do for free. Well bugger that! I can walk for free to work, (it’ll only take me 24 hours if I don’t stop to sleep or eat), or I can pay the train company $11 to drive me there. Cutting back on non-essential spending is the right principle, however not necessarily at the cost of your time or happiness. I’d be bored senseless spending time mowing the lawn, and I’m happy supporting a local businessman by paying him to do it instead.
Which lead to the point that most of the tips have the immediate and direct impact of not spending money on small businesses and other services. Rather than cutting back on spending generally by looking at whether you need the greatest mobile phone plan, or you can buy a less expensive brand of coffee. Just stop spending! – Yeah right – if that worked we’d have all inherited the millions our grandparents could have saved decades ago.
While it’s unlikely Telecom will go out of business if we all start using Skype, or AirNZ because we’re not flying oversea’s anymore and doing house swaps with other Kiwi’s, they do employ your friends and neighbours – less spending means fewer jobs.
Now, I can’t actually believe I’m suggesting we all keep spending to stave off a recession – far from it. Just budget your actual earnings for what you need to spend money on, then what you want to spend some money on, don’t spend more than you earn, and stick to the budget.
This way money keeps going around, you maintain a half way decent lifestyle, and very few people go out of business.
Or you could just quit smoking, saving an average of $5,000 per year – and then blow that saving on a “..brand new TV with all the bells and whistle’s.”
Hmm – yes – that’s really thinking about how to manage the household income sensibly then. Especially when you read suggestion number 41 – where “every cent counts“.
Some balance and sensibility would go a much longer way than spending an hour picking daiseys for 1c each. Or you could have a look at our jobs summit thoughts too for some inspiration.
Ho hum.
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Related posts:
- Why wait for redundancy
- What do you do just in case things do go to hell in a hand basket?
- Taking on more debt is not the way to deal with debt problems.
Comments
One Comment on 50 reasons to just be sensible
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Shayne on
Tue, 16th Jun 2009 10:24 pm
Thanks – this is pretty much what I have been saying – great minds do think alike 
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