Understanding Personal Finance and Education

In my younger days I thought economics was something only in books and big business, corporate stuff – banking, finance, college professors, government , etc.

As I grew older and life happened, I had a brilliant idea that economics was something that was practiced each day by the average family everywhere, and could be practiced very well, but without any fancy textbooks or pie charts.

I soon discovered this “idea” was not brilliant or original. Plenty of people look at economics as only for a large business or country when economics plays a part of each and every family.

Stop and look at a family: It is, among other things, an economic unit, just like a corporation. It has income from selling its services, usually the services of the head of the family, the so-called breadwinner(s). It has outgo in the way of expenses, which need not be detailed, for you know them already. It has surplus in the form of accumulated capital – equity in the home, or cash value of life insurance, or some investments. It has a plant, a place of business, the home. It has a budget, sometimes a good one, sometimes a loose, careless one. It has fixed obligation and overhead, plenty of it. It even has inventory.

As for economic planning, the family does it all the time and very intensively – by shopping, by comparing prices, by going ahead and buying, by putting it off until it can be “afforded.” and at times stacking up debt on credit cards. Economic planning enters into the mortgage payments, the selection of the right insurance, the set-aside fund for college. I’d say that all the economic planning done by all the families is greater in quantity and higher in quality than the much advertised planning done by corporations and government, all put together. And the family needs to know “the trends,” just like any business.

Better job, better mortgage, where to invest savings, proper prices to pay, choosing a career, whether to go to college, contributions to the church or community fund, new car, or make the old one do, the vacation, the refrigerator, the kitchen, computer, big screen TV, the doctor bills, the new lawn mower, the summer Timeshare – all these are rooted in personal or family economics, and that’s what we try to share at everlife.com.

Try it and see. Is it useful, down-to-earth, guiding, practical, broadening and worth time for reading? I think it is.