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Cohen
Posts: 7155
Location: Rapture
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 Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 01:02 Post subject: The richest man in the graveyard. |
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I found out something today from my 'distant' grandmother.
We havent spoken in over 4 years. My grandfather died and the circumstances left a bit of a divide in the family, and a never ending argument. You know how it is.. "I wont speak to them unless they apologize!" on both sides..
Well I kept my nose out of it, and moved homes. Several times.
Anyway, I got an email and met up with my gran after all this time for a coffee. It turns out that my gramps had saved some money before he died. But not just a few thousand... she shows me a bank account statement showing almost £300,000.  .. I dont understand that, my gramps saved lots of money for the last 20 years of his life (he was only 60 when he die) .. only to leave it all behind unspent.. and the thing that gets me is, he never told anyone. Its taken 4 years for my gran to find his 'hidden' bank account with all his savings in..
It got me thinking why people just save, and save, and save. Life is too fuckin short, spend that shit and enjoy it. I'm guilty of it myself though.. saving because I feel I "should" and "just in case" you know ? but fuck it, this weekend im gonna treat myself to something big. I think I earned it.
so.. yeah, who saves? who spends?
troll detected by SiN
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TSR69
Banned
Posts: 14962
Location: Republic of the Seven United Provinces
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 01:30 Post subject: |
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i guess you're granddad did that because he wanted his offspring to have a good living
another thing if you are happy with your life why spend more then needed?
Formerly known as iconized
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m82a1
Posts: 25
Location: 127.0.0.1
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 01:57 Post subject: |
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| iconized wrote: | i guess you're granddad did that because he wanted his offspring to have a good living
another thing if you are happy with your life why spend more then needed? |
agreed.
spend how much you need, dont gota over do it. money can change people though
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 02:00 Post subject: |
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Everytime I read the title of this thread, I see "The richest zombie in the graveyard"
Jesus... >_<
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Esel_Gesi
VIP Member
Posts: 3802
Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 02:03 Post subject: |
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I'm definitely a spender but I suspect all that will change if i happen to get married and have some kids. While I'm single and young though, I'll try to travel and enjoy myself as much as I can.
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Invasor
Moderator
Posts: 7638
Location: On the road
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 05:30 Post subject: |
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I believe saving money instead of spending is a strong characteristic of the past generations. Older people nowadays tend to save, but our generation (considering I'm fairly young) probably wont when we get old.
Seems to be a natural development of Capitalism, with more aggressive marketing, social status more strongly related to how much money you seem to have (and that directly connected to the things you own to show to others), less religious morals (and even inside religions there are big changes, like the evangelicanism preaching you can "have it here, no need to suffer or wait for heaven")... More and more we become consumer hedonists.
It's also related to economic cycles (which are inherent to capitalism too) and different cultures (in Japan people tend to save a lot, in the US they spend more).
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Cohen
Posts: 7155
Location: Rapture
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 09:49 Post subject: |
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I'm a spender. Although in fairness I dont really earn enough yet to save. Once bills are paid then maybe i'll start saving. I'm on the verge of a promotion which could see my earnings go up massively. The beauty of sales I suppose.
but yeah, money tends to burn a hole in my pocket.
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 10:02 Post subject: |
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I save because I don't know what to spend it on. I put me and my siblings through college and try to help with my parents mortgage (which is underwater, and considering the house is valued at 1.6 mill, well that's a bit of a bitch). Both my parents got laid off, so the family needed it while they struggled to find a new job. My dad eventually got a job in the same company, in the same position, working with the same team, just at $10k/year less. Go figure. But yeah, even with all those expenses me and my brother still have a tidy sum in our joint bank account.
We keep talking about how we're going to buy an Astin Martin or take a crazy trip to the Bahamas or some other shit like that, but at the end of the day its just talk. I think its the way our mother raised us. She beat it into our heads since an early age that money is the rarest thing in the world, and after you spend a summer working in the garden for $5/hour, well that kind of makes you appreciate how much sweat it takes to eke out a living. Besides my parents peer into my bank account all the time and tsk tsk if they see me buying a video games off of Steam. Annoying, embarrassing  but it kind of makes me rein my spending in.
Outside of appreciation for money and having you parents treat you like a little child, another reason for saving as much could be a sort of "high" people get when counting money:
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1912574,00.html
I haven't read much up on the topic so I don't know if the "high" translates from physical, cold, hard cash to bank account balances, but I imagine a lot of people get a happy feeling when they check their account balance and see a hefty sum sitting there.
And now for an amusing story from my grandfather: Gramps was telling me about a newspaper article he read in Zagreb (Croatia). Apparently there was an old guy sitting on a collection of antique firearms and a WW2 cache that he looted from some SS officer during the Second World War. Nobody knew about it except him. His family appeared to have been an awful lot of fuckwads, and he was disgusted with all of them. So, over the months he quietly sells off the weapons and antiques to Museums, Collectors, Auction houses etc... Then he writes his will, goes to sleep, and doesn't wake up.
The will, it turns out, takes all of the accrued cash (a couple of million marks), and donates it to the Catholic church. He also has the executor of his will send out a letter to each of his grandchildren and assorted relatives with the following message: "You could have had it all, but you fucked it up. Now live with it for the rest of your miserable little lives."
Moral of the story: Be nice to gramps 
Sense Amid Madness, Wit Amidst Folly
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deelix
PDIP Member
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Location: Norway
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Cohen
Posts: 7155
Location: Rapture
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| Posted: Tue, 27th Oct 2009 14:58 Post subject: |
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i would save a fair amount so i can go on trips when i want and the rest is spen on drinking
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| Posted: Wed, 28th Oct 2009 19:11 Post subject: |
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I don't have a lot of money in my bank account but I have alot invested in my home. Hopefully it will be payed off soon. I have a fair amount in RRSP's. I like to have enough so that if something happens I can cover it. My car broke down again, another $2500 in repairs. I was glad I had enough to cover it. That is pretty much where my money goes, fixing things.
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| Posted: Wed, 28th Oct 2009 19:45 Post subject: |
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| Posted: Wed, 28th Oct 2009 21:41 Post subject: |
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if I were you I'd worry more about killing all other inheritants rather than how or why he saved that money
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(You know, OPRAHS WEIGHT LOSS SECRET or HOW JOHNNY MAKES $5000/a week), but that's getting to be a bit too much of a hassle these days. Am now looking to set up some sites/blogs so that we can have a steady income for over a year instead of spending every 2 weeks scrambling to set up a new campaign after our old one tanked. But yeah, SEO takes a lot of patience, so we'll see if I have the willpower to put something up and get it running for a long time 
