How to train yourself to save money: the advice of psychologists

About half of Americans cannot pay $ 400 for unexpected expenses without selling or borrowing money. Moreover, half of Americans after 55 years have no savings for their retirement period, except for social insurance.

Фото: Depositphotos

The problem with savings concerns not only low-income Americans, but also the middle class. Scientists have found that the reason that people can not save, are psychological barriers, writes Time.

One reason is that people prioritize their short-term desires over long-term goals and plans. This leads to spending on designer clothes, new devices or dinner at a luxury restaurant - instead of saving some money for the future.

Another problem is that people get caught up in their daily lives and are unable to make decisions on issues that do not require their immediate attention, such as preparing for retirement in the distant future.

According to research, people are fairly accurate in estimating their big monthly expenses (rent, taxes, etc.), but most underestimate so-called special expenses. Therefore, various holidays or simply dinners in luxurious places are perceived by us as a “rare occasion,” but these occasions are not as rare as they seem.

Fortunately, knowing human psychology, you can find several ways to make savings despite the psychological barriers.

For example, if we cannot postpone consciously, we can do it automatically with the help of employers. Studies show that if an employer automatically deducts 2-6% of the salaries of its employees to separate savings accounts, then their savings for retirement will increase significantly.

Research also shows that if employees are offered savings by default when this option is already configured automatically, and additional actions need to be taken to cancel it, most will leave the option active.

Nevertheless, such programs with the involvement of the employer as the initiator of additional savings in US law have some obstacles. Moreover, not everyone can get lucky with an employer who is concerned about the long-term savings of their employees.

Therefore, we offer you a number of tips on how to learn to save on your own:

• Banks may, by default, send a portion of their clients' income to a savings account in case of an emergency.
• The bank may designate these savings as “emergency savings.” This can solve the problem when people use the saved money for some short-term desire, because without a proven emergency the bank simply will not issue it.
• For customers who do not want to start a savings account now, the bank may postpone the down payment. People are more willing to accept difficult but correct behavior if its start date is in the future.
• Savings should start from the beginning of a new week, month or year, when we are psychologically feeling more motivated to start something new and correct.
• You can also use the option of moving the loan to savings. For example, when you repaid the loan, continue to deposit the same amount into a separate account every month, but now it will go not to pay the loan, but to a savings account.

Many of the financial decisions that we make daily are not based on a sober assessment of the situation, but on desires and emotions, so an understanding of psychology can help us in forming a financial reserve for an emergency or long-term savings for the retirement period.

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