How much is enough?- The Malaysian Insider
February 21, 2013 — How many TVs in your house? How many mobile phones? How many shoes? How many shampoos, outfits, bags and accessories? How many cars, how many bikes? And then, how many hours spent playing with a gadget, how many meals eaten alone, how many hours of overtime and how much time spent worrying about expenses versus salary?
Marketing and new product development has long evolved from solving basic problems to focusing on more intangible, smaller wants and emotional rewards through products. Take a watch, for example. Is it sold on its ability to sell the time anymore? Or is it about looks, ability to help you look like a man of substance or a connoisseur? Is one enough? Are bags about how much they store or about how they help your mood? Is one enough? Or shoes, how many colours, for working out or working, for hiking or partying? Is one enough?
Not so long ago, a newly-employed adult was told to plan for the long term. For marriage, children, education and retirement. Work hard now, save as much as you can, stay clear of debt and never waste food. The current generation of young working adults don’t earn enough to move out of their parents’ house, their car downpayments are paid and income topped up for expenses by their parents.
But is their money being spent wisely? How many credit cards do they have, how often are their mobile phones changed for the latest models, how many meals eaten in expensive restaurants, how many sales attended? Indulgences come in every size, every price point today. From a pampering spa experience to a mini break in Phuket, from a Vincci shoe to a Birkin bag, the exhortation to spend is everywhere, accessible to everybody. In the age of instant gratification and last chance sales, it is hard to focus on long-term goals of savings and insurance.
In a gym, it is about crafting the body for maximum effect for the next night out clubbing rather than prolonging life. Ditto for diets. Consequently as they approach their thirties and the age of responsibility, large numbers of them are realising that they are not equipped for the austerity and sacrifices family life with their own children demands. Growing up in a consumerist culture of me first, making marriages work is increasingly hard, taking care of ageing parents too troublesome, doing the chores without the help of a maid simply impossible.
Waiting for an inheritance is not a financial plan. Nor is hoping for massive raises and bonuses two years into a career to help pay for personal loans, credit card debt, car and housing loans. Upgrading your skills at work is, as is matching expenses with income and saving for the future.
The larger issue here might be one of education and parenting. It is naïve to expect the choices out there to evaporate or objects of desire to magically disappear, but is fairly easy to demonstrate at a much younger age the consequences of living beyond your means. It is not in the interests of the marketplace to tell us that, but unequivocally in the interests of the long-term future of our children.
Leading by example, not caving in to every demand made by our children as soon as it is made and laying greater emphasis on values rather than keeping up with the neighbours may sound old fashioned, but still remain the best tools to prevent their future bankruptcies, divorces and eventually dissatisfied and unhappy lives.
Teach them well, for their own sake. And because nobody else will.
Marketing and new product development has long evolved from solving basic problems to focusing on more intangible, smaller wants and emotional rewards through products. Take a watch, for example. Is it sold on its ability to sell the time anymore? Or is it about looks, ability to help you look like a man of substance or a connoisseur? Is one enough? Are bags about how much they store or about how they help your mood? Is one enough? Or shoes, how many colours, for working out or working, for hiking or partying? Is one enough?
Not so long ago, a newly-employed adult was told to plan for the long term. For marriage, children, education and retirement. Work hard now, save as much as you can, stay clear of debt and never waste food. The current generation of young working adults don’t earn enough to move out of their parents’ house, their car downpayments are paid and income topped up for expenses by their parents.
But is their money being spent wisely? How many credit cards do they have, how often are their mobile phones changed for the latest models, how many meals eaten in expensive restaurants, how many sales attended? Indulgences come in every size, every price point today. From a pampering spa experience to a mini break in Phuket, from a Vincci shoe to a Birkin bag, the exhortation to spend is everywhere, accessible to everybody. In the age of instant gratification and last chance sales, it is hard to focus on long-term goals of savings and insurance.
In a gym, it is about crafting the body for maximum effect for the next night out clubbing rather than prolonging life. Ditto for diets. Consequently as they approach their thirties and the age of responsibility, large numbers of them are realising that they are not equipped for the austerity and sacrifices family life with their own children demands. Growing up in a consumerist culture of me first, making marriages work is increasingly hard, taking care of ageing parents too troublesome, doing the chores without the help of a maid simply impossible.
Waiting for an inheritance is not a financial plan. Nor is hoping for massive raises and bonuses two years into a career to help pay for personal loans, credit card debt, car and housing loans. Upgrading your skills at work is, as is matching expenses with income and saving for the future.
The larger issue here might be one of education and parenting. It is naïve to expect the choices out there to evaporate or objects of desire to magically disappear, but is fairly easy to demonstrate at a much younger age the consequences of living beyond your means. It is not in the interests of the marketplace to tell us that, but unequivocally in the interests of the long-term future of our children.
Leading by example, not caving in to every demand made by our children as soon as it is made and laying greater emphasis on values rather than keeping up with the neighbours may sound old fashioned, but still remain the best tools to prevent their future bankruptcies, divorces and eventually dissatisfied and unhappy lives.
Teach them well, for their own sake. And because nobody else will.
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