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Always broke?: Steps to better money management

by L G Hoel

Created on: April 24, 2008   Last Updated: February 21, 2011

Better money management has never been more important than it is today. The first step to better money management might be to stop using your credit cards unless you pay off the balance each month. You will soon start having your money to manage instead of letting your creditors control it.

The American family needs all the help it can get today when it comes to better money management. Many are in financial trouble through no fault of their own because of costly medical bills. Some have made poor decisions when it comes to borrowing and spending. Each person has to decide on what lifestyle to live. If you make the decision to live in a real world, responsible for your debt, that will help guide your money management.

Better money management is something that the big banks should have been studying. Their past loan requirements seem to have been only that the borrower had a pulse. If you are a big investor in today’s economy, you next best plan might be to start a crash course in ulcer management. All of the old rules regarding sound money management have been rewritten.

A family money management plan has to start first with a planned budget and then starting to realize that you really don't have to buy all the things that you or the kids want. Your spending has to start with buying what you need to live on and after that buy some of the things you want, if it fits into the budget. This sounds like a hard thing to do but it can be a way of life that will put you in charge. Starting to repay past built up debt seems impossible but it has to be planned into your budget if you want to be a free person.

The banks have been making billions of dollars on interest and late payment fees on everything from credit card debt to home mortgages. The credit card companies consider you a deadbeat today if you pay off your balances every month. They make no money off of you in interest payments, late charges or any of the other new charges that have been invented.

In Proverbs 22:7 the bible says, "the rich rule over the poor, and the borrower becomes the lender’s slave." Today it is apparent that the rich truly wish to rule over the poor. The best way the lenders have found to control the poor is by lending them more money than they can ever repay.

Credit cards at one time could only be obtained by people who could show they had the ability to pay for what they charged. Evidently the credit card companies were not making enough profits so they started to lower the standards to qualify for a credit card. The big banks soon found out they could really grow their fortunes by putting credit cards in the hands of everybody.

Madison Avenue advertising has been the glue holding the whole credit binge together. We are constantly bombarded with ads telling us, we have got to have all of this stuff that we see. It is no wonder our country has ended up in the debt mess that we now find ourselves in. It has all been preplanned with the knowledge that human greed is very easy to manipulate. The modern day lender shows very little concern for the future of families or the country.

You have to save yourself and your future through starting better money management.


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