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Money skills for survival and money skills for wealth accruement are completely and utterly different skill sets. If you grow up with money and half decent par
by OkayPhysicist 6y ago
Money skills for survival and money skills for wealth accruement are completely and utterly different skill sets.
If you grow up with money and half decent parents, you learn the latter. Slowly, perhaps even imperceptively so: it probably starts young, opening a bank account, learning how to navigate the basics of the financial world. If you're middle class, you learn about investing and dealing with brokerage accounts. If you're rich, you learn how to deal with the people that handle that for you.
On the other hand, if you grow up without money, you don't learn those things. If your household is living paycheck to paycheck, you probably experience the basics of banking, but your exposure to the world of capital is greatly limited. If your family's struggling to put food on the table, then there's a solid chance you don't even get that. 22% of households in the US are unbanked. There's a reason why check-cashing services exist.
Beyond the simple knowledge gap, there's habits and thought-processes that get ingrained. It all culminates into a system that very effectively stifles class mobility.
- EarthLaunch 6y agoThat's completely accurate at that macro scale. At a smaller scale of paying bills and product selection, I know trust fund adults who can save thousands using tricks poor people know; don't spend money / pay bills until it's necessary, use credit cards to defer interest, avoid pushy extras/upgrades/insurance, buy during sales, buy resellable brands, sell your phone instead of trading it in, check for new deals annually, etc. Because of the macro skills you mentioned, they don't need to do those things. But they also don't know how to.