Luxury, part three
We finally have reached the conclusion of this massive rambling on cash money. I’m assuming you’ve read the previous two posts on this topic, but if you haven’t, here’s a quick summary:
- God wants us to both have luxuries as well as share the incredible financial resources we have with those in horrible circumstances. The struggle is in how you balance such things.
- When I say luxuries, I mean things either: 1. excessively beyond what we need, or 2. things we don’t need that provide no benefit to our friends, family, community, etc.
- We talk about our personal finances less than we talk about sex, or, put another way, greed is approved by way of the fact that we never discuss it openly.
- I’m seeking to find some balance to this in my own life, and one of the main parts of that is talking it through on my blog here, with friends, and with my wife.
All that said, it’s time to take all this practical. Talk is cheap and whatnot.
As a rough guideline (and because the math is easy), I find that a split of 50%/50% between giving and luxury to be a radical departure from the “if I have the money to buy something, and I want it, it must be right for me to have it!” approach of life. It also seems alittle more responsible, given the huge gap of comfort levels around the world.
How exactly would this work? Well, I was discussing all of this on gmail chat the other day, and came up with this: Whenever buying something I would define as a luxury, pretend it costs twice as much as the price listed. If its still worth buying to you, go ahead and buy it, and give away the excess money that wasn’t actually spent on the the item.
Seem kind of odd? I agree. But let’s consider what this will do:
1. It will make you actually stop and think twice about purchases that are luxuries, instead of impulse buying. This is a strong plus for me. It seperates things you want from things you really want. In effect, it teaches you to truely value the money your earned.
2. It allows you to still have the good things in this world that you want but aren’t necessities. I’m not suggesting we live in grass huts and eat bread and water. Go out to eat at the nicest resturant in town. Buy that new CD. Put those cool rims on the wheels of your car that spin when you stop (you know, “spinnaz”). The struggle is keeping that purchase in line with the responsibility you have to the downtrodden and oppressed peoples of the world. This approach does so, in my opinion.
3. It allows for freedom in the Spirit in your purchasing decisions, on a day to day basis. – As I consider this more, giving a flat percentage based on income earned would really be easier. But it also can become a very calculated, heartless act. Consider auto-drafting from your checking account toward your church’s offering, a service widely offered. They pull a set amount of money out every month, and never think about it but once a month, if that.
4. It automatically scales up and down based on how financially blessed a given person is. I really like this part of it. If you don’t make much, and therefore don’t spend much on luxuries, then it would seem quite possible that perhaps God is calling you to give in some other way than in money. If you have an incredible amount of money, that you earned with your own hard work, you can enjoy that money, and at the same time, give faithfully and sacrificially.
I would love to hear what you think about all this. It’s still developing in my brain, and I need other viewpoints and perspectives on this. Feel free to comment.
FL: QuikMaps – using google maps, you can make your own map, and drag items on to it to mark stuff. Leet.
as an addition to the giving/luxury struggle, I believe that we also need to consider our debt. in fact, at this point in almost everyone’s life, we have some sort of debt (mortgage, car loan, student loan, credit card). this is not something we can, or should, ignore. I actually proposed, just the other day, that we triple the price of any luxury that we buy, so that we are also paying off our debt equally. I don’t know about you, but most of the things I want are not worth triple the retail cost. Most of them are already overpriced enough that I question buying them. My trouble comes in with the really little things… buying some Reese’s in the checkout line at the grocery store… buying oreo’s… I think I just realized that most of my justifications/struggles come with food, because food is a necessity… hmmm… this becomes a problem because it’s only a couple of dollars at a time, not a 17″ monitor, or a $20 book. It makes it really easy to forget, since they are all little and insignificant in the long run. but we all know those little things add up.
well, I guess those are my thoughts for the time being.
I agree with your philosophy, Eric, but I’m not sure it can be practically lived out. I still have multiple bills to pay, so shouldn’t I pay those first, and then with my excess, use your 50/50 system? I can’t realistically pay rent, car pmts, plus give that amount away. Did I miss that in your blog posts?
very interesting and well thought out. I haven’t really heard anything like, it and its a very proactive and generous approach to giving
@wife: Yay for the wife.
I think the whole point of this, at the root, is to re-align how we value $1.00, one dollar. By doubling the perceived price of some items [luxuries], it makes an attempt at showing us where our excess money, or “disposable income” (whatever that means) could go to if we saw the value of it rightly.
While a $200 monitor can wreck any chance at having a chance to give sacrificially, the 69 cent candy bar, the 1.49 gatorade, the 1.19 mini-cookies can do far more financial damage over a lifetime. The real battle isn’t “do I get the 39,000$ accord or the 49,000 lexus”, it’s, do I drink tap water or buy a bottle of coke?
@emmuh: You got it right, emmuh, unless I’m not reading your comment right. Basically, after you pay all your bills for necessities: car, shelter, reasonable food needs, no doubt there’s some left over. It may not be alot, but it’s some.
From this some would come your split between luxuries and giving, by doubling prices of luxury items. I know alot of financial commitments aren’t easily changed, with loans, cell phone 2 year plans, etc, etc. But for most of all of us, I’m sure there’s plenty of wiggle room in all the things that aren’t fixed each month. I know there’s a huge amount for Heather and I.
In this way, the more financial blessed among us are called to give more, as a financial blessing is the gift God has given them/called them to. Others of us have less demanding jobs, and therefore less salaries, but this also opens up more of our time and talents to serve as a gift.
The struggle is in balancing what your luxuries are, and what to give your money/time toward.
That is an interesting approach for sure. I don’t know that I have ever heard of that. The only thing I would worry about, for me, is that I would just end up buying nothing and not giving anything to avoid having to think about it. Or, I would buy my “luxuries” and forget to give the other amount away. But I guess no way is perfect for everyone. I definitely don’t claim to have the perfect way, either. And I will readily admit that we need to do a better job at giving.
abschicken.
[...] Eric on luxuries (part one, part two, part three) [...]
well . . . well. what a nice intro into the “serious posting world”. even your funny links can’t get rid of the deep thinking that i’m seeing.
really good thoughts eric. sorry i never gave you feedback on it when you asked for it. the idea of luxuries is a really good way of framing the conversation.
when thought of like that, it forces me to run all of my things through that grid, which i think is and will be quite helpful.
also, i think the idea of changing the way we live should play some sort of role into the idea of money. its true we can barely be getting by but may be doing so at a very high level. i’m not saying we need to live like 3rd world countries, but i think their situation at least causes us to consider ours.