Backwards Economic Thinking May Also Be Rooted In Knowing Only How To Spend But Not How To Save And Invest Money

I remembered one of the biggest problems I wrote about is how a lack of basic knowledge leads towards backwards thinking. After that, I made a comparison between Hilario Davide Jr. and John Gokongwei where one only knows how to spend money while the other is the founder of the Robinson's Empire and S & R chain of groceries. You can see who's more qualified to talk about economic reform. Sadly, while Davide Jr. had a good track record in office but that can't be said about his knowledge in economics.

Now I remembered the time I had a conversation with someone about the need to open up the economy to foreign investors, how the 60/40 is not working and what did he reply? He replied the typical lie that, "Why do you want them to come and invest here? They would only the one who would be rich!" Said person only knows how to spend money but not how to invest money. He had a lavish lifestyle and very expensive taste. He doesn't even know anything about investing money in the bank like time deposits, bonds and where to get the best insurance for life (such as AXA and its current stock insurance). All he knew what to do was to spend, spend and spend more money -- which would make it no surprise he doesn't understand basic economics at all!

I remembered a survey last 2015 where CNN revealed that 69% of Filipinos don't even have a bad account. That's really a tragedy considering how bank accounts is part of keeping the economy spinning because it funds business expenditures such as corporate spending and dividends are funded by various investments such as bonds and time deposits. That's why there's an interest paid to the banks because corporations use your money and they must pay you interest for the time it was used. I would also believe that one good reason why 69% (or possibly more) Filipinos don't even have a bank account may also be linked to not keeping up with the minimum of PHP 10,000.00. The bank penalizes account holders who won't keep up with the minimum. It's a problem where people would spend the money as long as there is money -- it's spending for the sake of spending or consumerism!

The principle of economics is that it also talks about savings and budgeting aside from spending. For example, why do you call home economics as home economics? It because it teaches you how to budget for the home like teaching you how to make stuff on your own than buy them or how to have good budgeting habits. If you don't have people learning how to save then how can they have money to spend? Spending always requires a source. You can't just say that it's "self-funding" because you have to account for the source. In Mathematics, you need to solve for the correct answer for the missing values and if X is wrong then your answer is wrong. In real life application -- it requires you to account for the source one way or another.

Besides, there's also the problem of sticking to what you are used to having or the "nakasayanan" fallacy -- where you'd rather stick to what you know rather than knowing something new or better because you are used to what you are currently in. It's like saying that you'd just stick to what people knew for hundreds of years never mind that before a hundred years are accomplished -- it must always start with having no experience at all! I guess it's also because many Filipinos have been too used to overspending that they refuse to dissociate it from their being Filipino. Since when did overspending make a Filipino "more Filipino" and learning to invest and save make a Filipino well "less Filipino"? None! It's just a poor excuse to enjoy the idiocy of overspending!