Save More Money or Make More Money?

good point

Being frugal is necessary no matter how much you make. But, you do have to live, so striving to make more money than you are now is a worthy goal.

I think a combination of both saving more and making more is the way to go. It seems that saving is not as important as it used to be. It seems that most of my peers just spend all that they make and they think that if they make more money they will save more, but they don't know how to save anyway. I only work 25 hours a week, so I need to make more and save more.

As a doctor friend of mine has said, "It's not what you make that determines weath, but rather what you can keep." My earnings, I guess are modest, but we contribute to work retirement accounts, and recently, we've gotten 2 years of our Roth IRAs fully funded. The amounts invested have also grown as the stocks have increased in value. We are pretty aggressive in trying to pay down credit card debt.

I believe in both. When Hubby got his last raise we decided that once bills are caught up (he was off work for a while) than the rest goes in savings. We are not spending any more than we were before his raise.

i am very frugal person..shop at discount stores and goodwill. i agree with u that saving should be a priority, also it helps when u can control ur urges to buy the latest and the hottest thing in the market.

We have NO credit cards. If we can not pay for it with cash, we will wait until we can afford it. That may mean we miss out we do, occasionally it may mean we get bargins by waiting.

I shop for all clothing and all home items on sale.

I use coupons and look in sales flyers when I go to the grocery store. making my list in advance before I go shopping. If I see a good buy I'll stock up.

We take our lunches to work 4 days a week. I also include snack items & bottle of water, a can of soda or bottle of iced tea. So that nothing needs to be purchased in cafeteria's or vending machines.

One day a week we treat ourselves to lunch out. Some weeks we even skip that, as leftovers and items I purchased for lunches are better than fast food or cafeteria food.

I have a food saver so we buy in bulk now and portion the food.

I cook extra portions when I cook. I'll make extra taco filling, a extra casserole, extra stews, all extra meals are food saved & I freeze them. (using the food saver I can freeze the food without freezer burn.) Plus having a meal already cooked that just needs heated, means less take out food if I work late! I just pop a prepared meal in microwave, add a salad & veggie and we're ready to eat.

I also cook baked boneless chicken breasts -great cut up in salads or in a wrap sandwich, and has less sodium & cheaper than the packaged precooked chicken. I do this once a week and bag them when cool and seal in food saver bags, if my husband wants a wrap sandwich he just takes a individual serving out & reseals it.

I wash only full loads of clothing, and use cold water only.

I run the dishwasher when only completely full, since there is only two of us that's once a week sometimes.

I have unplugged my coffee maker, toaster, toaster oven, can opener and plug this in when I use it.

We replaced every light bulb in the house with low-wattage energy saving bulbs. We turn off-lights when we leave a room. I also have motion activated lights on stairs and in halls that go on & off automatically saving us even more money, a bit expensive at first but pays off in the long run.

We turn off celing fans if we are not in the room, and we raise air-conditioner to 79-80 degrees when not home. The house stays very cool even in summer and I live in Florida.

We have dark window tinting as we face west and in the Florida sun it gets hot, this keeps the house a bit cooler, we leave all blinds closed during the summer months (actually we are doing this now as it has been hot).

We use the Scunci steam cleaner, as both of us have allergies to household cleaners, so I save by not buying them.

I have a investment savings account at work. And we also save by taking a sum each pay period auto-deducted and that goes to savings. My hubby has his state pension, who knows what that will be like when he retires.

Elaine seems to have it down. Now if only I could remember to do all those things. I would love to have a food saver so I can start buying in bulk and not wasting. :) Thanks for all the great ideas Elaine.

Thanks for the website too.

Both and good info Elaine

I definitely agree. The tax free savings really are amazing. Probably between S.S., state taxes and federal taxes a $100 savings would mean I would have to make about $135 and $150 to net that same $100--not even figuring in the other costs of working a second job or whatever to "earn" it the conventional way.

nice