A simple quote from The Big Bang Theory, specifically Dr. Sheldon Cooper. Many times the concept of money comes up in this show, especially since the heroine is constantly broke, so the writers of the show put forward many interesting financial theories. If she worked at obtaining more money, she’d be in better shape (financially).
Dr. Cooper breaks down his money needs in detail (as he wants to do) and points out that he only needs about 40% of his income to live on (I am assuming he is talking about his net income). He does not need to work to obtain more money.
Not many people can explain their financial needs down to a percentage in this way. Most folks I know say that they usually don’t have money left over (or worse, they have less than no money (i.e. credit card debt, etc.)).
Michael James and I have a friend (we’ll call him Samuel) who is the epitome of this concept, in that most of his life (from what we can tell), he has lived on about 10% of his monthly income (when he has had income). Last week, we confronted Sammy with this fact (this topic came up in a Bloggers Dinner Club discussion with Preet Banerjee and Mark from My Own Advisor). He claims that he has become a spendthrift, and his “spending line” might be up to almost 20% of his net income (we both laughed very loudly at that one).
As I pointed out in one of my first posts about Dickensian Economics:
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness.
David Copperfield, Charles Dickens, 1849
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery.
Even in the times of Dickens, was that simple rule known? Wow!
What is your net burn rate?
I actually ran the numbers for this earlier this year because post-mortgage we’ve been making huge attempts to save for education and retirement etc. We’re living off about 50% of our after-tax/CPP/EI/LTD income. Which is a good thing because I don’t think our income will stay this high for very long.
The one “take away” I got from “I Will Teach You to be Rich” was that you should save money on things that are not meaningful/important to you and spend it on things that matter to you. Luckily our family wants similar things. So we live like starving students in many ways. (anyone want to borrow our 21″ cathode-tube ray TV?) But we aren’t afraid to spend on the things that we really want. It was a good reminder not to just blindly save, but to also spend when it’s worth it.
This is a tough question. I don’t think we pay any attention to the % spent on lifestyle vs. savings. We have to pay for kids and university and our general lifestyle, everything else goes to savings right? We’d like to have more for long term savings, but to do so would mean either jettisoning the kids or modifying our lifestyle. And I’m reluctant to modify our lifestyle :).
Something to keep in mind? Another interesting calculation to help you understand where you stand?
Sheldon keeps his money hidden in or under different super heros in the apartment. I hope your friend tries a safer interest bearing option.
My take home is $1,300 every 2 weeks and my basic expenses seem to eat most of it but I am trying to live on 50% (40% to debt and 10%) for savings. That will be easy as long as nothing breaks or the dogs don’t get sick and I can remain happy sitting at home watching reruns of Big Bang and don’t want to go out with friends.
Friends? If they were real friends they would applaud your frugality.