I've seen the same thing and I've experienced your frustration. However, I also want to offer a counter-point to your argument. You keep coming back to the ma

I've seen the same thing and I've experienced your frustration. However, I also want to offer a counter-point to your argument. You keep coming back to the marshmallow test and how he can't make a sacrifice today for a greater benefit tomorrow. My question is whether he would send a $5,000 banking fee to a Nigerian prince today for a million dollar money transfer next month? Would you? Delayed gratification is only effective if you believe that you will be rewarded for it. I'm betting that you've never sacrificed a calf to Zeus. That's not because you lack self control, but because you don't believe that you would receive any benefit, not to mention one that would out weigh the cost of the calf. In the same way, your friend is "rationally" choosing to spend $250 a month on a bonding experience with his son instead of spending $125 a month on a failed degree that won't land him a better job. Either way, he's going to get fired, lose his house, and be forced to move to Detroit, but the first lets him move to Detroit with some happy family memories while the other has him moving to Detroit with a worthless piece of paper. Now, we know that he can prevent his constant economic crises. We've done it for ourselves. Your friend, though, knows that correlation is not causation and the relationship between our self-sacrifice and our economic well being is as tenuous as the relationship between uncle Ernie's lucky Elvis shirt and that time hit the jackpot on the penny slots. As long as financial disaster is "unavoidable", he'll continue to make the only "smart" choice and immediately spend the little money that he does have before he loses that, too.