So simple. So important. Yet today it is almost totally ignored. Years ago people made very little money compared to today. Also, sometimes work was very hard to find. Even with this, they still saved. That was very important, because to buy almost anything they had to pay full price, not just make a down payment and so much a month.

As the years went by, it got easier to find work. People made more money. Then a wonderful thing happened. It was possible to buy anything with a small down payment. Then it did not seem important to save anymore. There was no need to wait until we saved enough to buy something. Just buy now pay later.

In life or business the penny you make is easy to work with. You can spend, invest or save. The penny you might make is not so easy to work with. Many have gone from a penny saved to a penny spent, then borrowed and spent again. They want something, and they want it now.

The government spends more than their income. No matter how large the income, they spend more. Companies large and small have learned how to spend. This allows or causes them to make bad business decisions. Citigroup, one of the largste financial businesses, lost over 40 billion dollars in the last few months. It doesn’t seem possible that any company would lose that much and not be aware of it, but that news is just coming out. Earlier they thought the loss would be near 3 or 4 billion dollars. This is from spending and hoping to make it back. General Motors’ loss in the last quarter is over 3 billion dollars, yet they say they are headed in the right direction.

We have a wonderful economy. Our worst is better than the best was 100 years ago. Yet almost everything we hear is how difficult it is. There are lots of jobs for anyone who wants to work. People make lots of money, but it still isn’t enough. We learned how to spend, and we are very good at it; we have just forgotten about saving. When we spend first, almost anything will cost us more by the time it is paid for. When we save then buy, it will cost less as there will be no interest charge. Now it will be ours not ours and the finance company, just ours. When we save money to buy something, by the time the money is saved, we might decide that it is not that important to buy the item. It might just be nice to keep the money we saved. Saving is kind of like spending. It gets to be a habit and lots of fun. To see a bank account grow is more fun than worrying about how to make the next payment.

Remember, make money first then spend only what is needed, and save the rest. Only buy on time what will make its own payments.

Life is so good and easy now if we will just learn how to save again.

Save, then you can Smile and Mean it.