Also have similar spending patterns as the two of you, and played video games when I was younger. Yes, I had similar spending patterns in RPGs and particularly

Also have similar spending patterns as the two of you, and played video games when I was younger. Yes, I had similar spending patterns in RPGs and particularly RTS games. I'd hoard resources to make sure I always had some when I needed them. The thing is - in both video games and life, this is not always a good thing. In Starcraft, if you've banked over 1K minerals you are doing something seriously wrong; if you look at pro games, they rarely have more than a couple hundred minerals stored up, because they have a strategy that they're continuously executing and it involves burning minerals to convert into more minerals. Similarly, if I'd been willing to run with zero cash cushion, spending everything I made and locking myself into the corporate treadmill, I'd be a homeowner and have a net worth about 50% higher than I currently do. Optionality & security have a price; you trade efficiency for it, and it comes out of the standard of living you can maintain. I think people just have a certain set point for the amount of risk they're willing to run, and it's probably partially genetic and partially from watching how your parents react to risk and internalizing that.