With 2015 few days away, I thought of writing the most debated topic & a crucial benchmark, which always get backseat…. What should come first? Expenses or investments?
Let me start with you… which one will you prefer?
- Income minus expenses equals investments
- Or Income minus investments equals expenses
I will not be surprised, if you have selected the 1st option, as most of us including myself (till few years back though) follows the first model, i.e. we take out expenses from our monthly income first & balance is looked at investments later, on what is left.
I started thinking as to why most of us follow this model, even though back of the mind we know it’s wrong.I started comparing societies & countries on how they follow savings & investments. What comes out clearly in the culture & upbringing an individual goes through, where I can draw parallel to the most heated topic of 2014, “women empowerment”.
In our country issue is not with any women or even their empowerment, it’s how our elders talk & behave on gender topics, for instance, girls are not allowed or questioned on night out, but do we have similar treatment for boys? I don’t have to explain this further, but coming back to our topic, do we have similar talk towards investments & expenses by our elders?
Again most likely answer will be “No”.
If you go back in past & see your father investing or talking, I am sure you would have heard mainly LIC money back plan or FD as investments, and no where you would have heard on retirement planning. What does all this lead to, most of us have not thought on retirement planning as of now and key areas on investments still remains same, i.e. LIC money back**** (some of you would have picked private players though) or FD… in short it’s what we saw & our upbringing.
Only difference between our elder & us today is that, we have access to all possible information on our finger tips, due to media & new age communication. We have become pro on Facebook or LinkedIn, but still to understand financial planning or investments or savings… it’s our choice.
Therefore what our elders failed to initiate, we should take the lead now & build same, such that our next generation is guilt free & live a balanced life, not just towards investments or financial planning, but towards gender bias as well.
Even though financial planning or retirement planning will help you, but it will build a foundation, where your next generation will be the key beneficiary.
A very happy & exciting new year 2015!!!
**** read on what’s wrong with insurance?
