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I Hate Being A Walking Advertisement

By Frugaling 35 Comments

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Beats Headphones On-Ear Red

Recently, my laptop pooped out. The four-and-a-half-year-old computer had been through thick and thin. I had traveled the country with it, and even dropped a glass of soy milk into the keyboard. It helped me create graphics, write graduate papers, and start Frugaling.org. The device was essential for my new book, too.

Not having a computer sent me in a tizzy. I needed one for nearly everything I do from work to play to school. My book wasn’t finished either, and I needed a dedicated computer for proofreading and formatting. Immediately, I investigated my options and surprisingly sold my old, broken one for a tidy sum.

My previous computer was an Apple. The laptop was reliable considering what I threw at it. In an effort to be frugal, I looked at Google Chromebooks. Unfortunately, certain academic and work responsibilities would necessitate a real computer – whether Mac or Windows.

Considering resale values, reliability, build quality, and my own knowledge base, I decided to get another Apple. Because it was “Back to School” season, the company had a special sale. Buy a computer, get an education discount, and receive a free pair of Beats headphones.

Regularly $200, the headphones would be shipped with the purchase. When I agreed to the payment options and clicked order, I planned to sell the headphones. They would ultimately lower the real purchase price of the computer.

I ravenously opened the boxes. Despite everything I preach about immaterialism and anti-consumption, my computer was a necessity. There wasn’t another way for me to write, publish, comment, and work on Frugaling. And I was lusting over the product.

Then, in another box, were the Beats headphones. I left the box sealed – brand new and ready for auction on eBay or sale on Craigslist. As the days ticked by, that unopened box stuck out like a sore thumb. It begged to be open.

So, I did.

As I ripped the shrink wrap and took the shiny headphones out, I felt this guilt. If I’m supposed to be frugal, am I allowed to own Beats headphones? Furthermore, can I truly afford them if my budgets are still so tight? The frugal friend on my shoulder said, “you can’t afford this.” The baller on a budget said, “maybe you can.”

When I put the headphones on my head, I looked in the mirror and saw Lebron James suiting up for his next basketball game. I was a walking, listening ad for Beats.

With their iconic lowercase “b” logo on either ear and a red cord dangling down, I was embarrassed. The look, fit, finish, and advertisement-like design bothered me. I felt like a hypocrite. How could I spout frugally inspired words and wear these?

The next day I took the headphones to school. Everywhere I went, people asked about them. In fact, someone in the Iowa City community who struggles with homelessness that I’ve interacted with regularly approached me.

He grabbed ahold and said, “Wow, nice headphones!”

When I heard that, I felt shame. How can I walk around with these bulky Beats that flash status in the face of those with less? How can I reconcile the decision to keep/accept flaunting $200 sitting on my head, while he struggles to find shelter?

In these moments, I think many people ignore this dissonance. They rationalize their ownership by stating that those with less get what they deserve. This is our capitalistic society working as it should.

For me, I balk at symbols of excessive wealth. These are unnecessary reminders of classism that pin rich against poor – privileged against disenfranchised. I don’t need to look like Lebron James walking to game time. Likewise, I don’t need to look like I’m better than anyone else – because I’m not.

But is there ever room for something like this in a frugal lifestyle?

What would you do? Would you keep the brand-assailing Beats headphones or sell them off?

Filed Under: Save Money Tagged With: Apple, Beats, Class, classism, Computer, Headphones, homeless, Homelessness, Income, Materialism, money, Privilege, Technology

Who’s Responsible For Poverty?

By Frugaling 12 Comments

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Banksy I Hate Mondays Art
Art: Banksy

Picture this: a dirtied, scraped up, penniless homeless man holds up a cardboard sign pleading for pocket change. Perhaps he wrote well wishes and a message of gratitude for giving what you can. Most people who pass him don’t know where he’s from, his name, or how he came to be homeless.

As humans, we tend to fill in the blanks. Unless you’re chauffeured from a gated community to a private jet, and refuse to look out the window in daily travels, it’s nearly impossible to miss these questions of responsibility. We tend to explain the inexplicable with simplifications. People deserve what they deserve.

These mental shortcuts enable us to quickly pass through our day and “understand” the world around us. It’s complicated out there, and we have limited brain power. We can’t worry about everything, can we? Dwelling on uncertain ideas of responsibility might result in something scary: feeling lost, stupid, or flirting with pointlessness.

When we think of the causes of poverty, it can be natural to blame individuals. For instance, that the person asking for change on the street corner is too lazy to work, wants to feed their alcohol addiction, and/or doesn’t care to shape up. If only they would take responsibility for their actions, then they wouldn’t be homeless, right?

That’s the simple conclusion — and it’s possible — but today I want to encourage us to take a step back. Let’s think about some alternative conclusions. Those alternative conclusions harbor a truth that’s larger than one simplistic answer. It encapsulates the range of possibilities and diversity of lives.

Capitalism tends to encourage individual responsibility for actions. We have a penal system that punishes individuals’ actions as if they are divorced from difficult upbringings and environments — separate and isolated incidents. We have enormous financial markets, which encourage individual college students to major in business, computer science, and engineering. We congratulate and honor people for “their” work and individual contributions to science, politics, and bravery. When we seek answers for homelessness, poverty, and even wealth, the scripts have been built for us. As I’m a visual person, I’ve created a pie chart to explain responsibility in capitalism.

Pie chart 1

In this first chart, capitalist ideals suggest that individuals bear the responsibility. Pretty simple, right? When I was younger, I enjoyed the efficiency of more libertarian — individual responsibility — principles. If you work harder, you’re rewarded. The world is yours, if you earn it.

Those capitalism-infused libertarian values of responsibility eventually shifted. The best explanation was an active decision to expose myself to diverse reading material and cultures. Suddenly, the responsibility for homelessness, poverty, and wealth became complicated ideas. I needed to wrap my head around the chicken or the egg — what came first — of finance. Did the poverty cause lethargy or did laziness cause poverty?

Pie chart 2

Obviously, these pie charts aren’t scientifically exact. They’re meant to be illustrations of my thought process, as I consider where to assign blame and responsibility when I see poverty and wealth. The more I thought about what might influence and shape an individual, the more complicated it became. Certainly, it would save me time to write off the impoverished and say they are welfare grubbing lifesucks, but I choose to represent a different point of view. We are each born into this world with different characteristics — monetary, racial, SES, etc.

Pie chart 3

If we reexamine the aforementioned homeless man, responsibility becomes murkier with new variables. Suddenly, we see the man beyond the exterior and our previous assumptions. Perhaps the reality is that he was born to a single-parent household in a disenfranchised neighborhood. Perhaps he was a Vietnam War veteran who suffered from the losses of fellow soldiers and improperly/untreated posttraumatic stress disorder.

Or, perhaps we are all incredibly complex, diverse beings. We’re born with unique genes, environmental upbringings, educational opportunities, and parents. Heck, those listed here are but a small fraction of all the variables we could include.

If we quickly judge that someone bears the responsibility for being destitute, we are the lazy ones. We are the ones we often hate, despise, and discount. Carefully examining responsibility is challenging and not without errors, but we avoid incorrectly concluding that someone failed and deserves the punishment of poverty.

Filed Under: Social Justice Tagged With: blame, Class, Finance, impoverished, Income, poverty, responsibility, ses, status, Wealth

Buying The Ticket And Taking The Ride

By Frugaling 15 Comments

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Buy the ticket, take the ride

In The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Ben Stiller’s character races across the globe in search for an adventurer, played by Sean Penn. The ensuing travels take Walter on a psychological rush. Suddenly, his life is full of excitement and uncertainty. But before he jumps — takes that chance — Walter is stuck at the office. He’s afraid to leave. His life is a boring repetition of the same cycle of work.

Recently, I’ve noticed a similar dissension within me. While I enjoy my work immensely and have deep passion for helping others, this delayed gratification of graduate school prevents me from engaging in a fundamental, eye-opening experience: international travel.

Seeing another culture has been shown to aid in the development of empathy. Intuitively, that finding makes sense, as we often live blindly to those in difficult life circumstances. Immersive cultural experiences such as travel and reading help people become rounded.

Sign me up for the discomfort of having to negotiate a car rental without speaking the language. I’ll find a way. Sign me up to confront class differences between cultures and peoples. I’ll question my assumptions. Sign me up to try the exotic foods and push my boundaries. I’ll open my stomach and heart.

With these values and ideas in mind, I’ve been fantasizing like Walter Mitty. Days go by in work and writing, but I secretly imagine a getaway — daydreaming my way to Denmark, Egypt, France, Israel, and Russia. Sometimes I picture dropping everything and running; after all, we only have these moments. Each time I dream big, I slowly regain composure and repeat simple mantras: “must save, later will travel” or “must work, employer needs me” or “once I get my PhD, then I’ll travel.”

But moments of lust for flight keep hitting. Nowadays, the fantasy occurs every time I’m in an airport. If the flight is delayed, cancelled, or I’m flying standby, I look at Kayak.com for the cheapest flights to… anywhere. From hundreds to thousands of dollars, I wonder if I could just go — without fear or restriction.

One of my greatest regrets has been my failure to develop fluency in a second language. Travel could’ve aided in language acquisition. As a frugal person, I can’t quite afford it yet. I’m stuck on saving a little egg that can protect me and someday empower me to travel. I find that terribly frustrating.

My guess is many people are like me. We’re busy working away during the week and the money is helping us get by. If you’re more frugal, you can sock away a little more, too. We’re hardly rolling in the dough, though.

If we could cheaply travel, we would. And yes, there are ways to travel more affordably. You can get a credit card with a signup bonus, buy tickets well in advance, look for student/senior discounts when possible, stay at hostels, and travel light. But at the end of the day, travel requires time off work and savings. It necessitates a certain safety net, unless you’re willing to risk homelessness because of the desire to travel. And there are classes and cultures right here at home that cannot and will not travel — ever — despite whatever desire they have internally.

When my head and heart race, I slow down by remembering my consistent goals. I want to be able to provide for others, give healthily to charity, avoid nasty loans, save for retirement, and be prepared for an emergency. Travel will come, and as much as the daily drools of quotidian life will never appeal to me, I do recognize what I’m building here. Frugality is a philosophical aspiration where I realize that life can be grand with less. Eventually, I’ll buy the ticket and take the ride.

Filed Under: Save Money Tagged With: Class, cultural, cultures, empathy, fly, flying, international, ticket, Travel

Frugal Articles of the Week

By Frugaling 1 Comment

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Reading Nook Photo

Every week I like to feature a few frugal articles that caught my eyes. Curl up in your favorite reading nook and enjoy. Hopefully these encourage you to live frugal lives!

Household Finances Still Fragile Six Years After the Recession by Gillian White
The Great Recession still lingers on. Many households are resisting purchases because of inconsistent and variable incomes. Paychecks that vary each time make it difficult to predict safe spending. It’s leading the most affected to hold back more than ever.

This Is What Sweden’s Most Statistically Sought-After Home Looks Like by Kristin Hohenadel
This brilliant design firm has constructed the “perfect” house. Based on surveys and data from Swedish residents, this minimal, utilitarian home is what most would like. The floorplans are open, with lots of natural light. But the best part is the effective use of space.

How to live a middle-class life in New York City on less than $5,000 a year by Pauline Marie Bock
This semi-anonymous, French freegan is living in New York City on an insane, impressively frugal budget: $5,000 a year. She hustles to find the shops and spots where good food is being wasted — thrown away unnecessarily. From bagels to beans to fruits, “Marie” has found countless free meals.

This Season’s Must-Haves by Brooke McAlary
From beautiful new colors to shapes, clothing changes every season. For many, it’s a clarion call to action: shop to you drop. Brooke has an amazing twist on this season’s must-haves. You must read this one!

Filed Under: Save Money Tagged With: articles, Class, Clothing, Frugal, housing, Minimalism, Recession, Sweden, week

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