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robocat

I see this in many retired people I know. Still saving, not spending wisely.

Using 2 hours of precious time to save $2.

Investments with a time frame that is longer than their expected remaining life.

Driving across town to get a couple of percent off a tank of gas - actually wasting petrol and time.

Hoarding stuff that they will never use - often stuff that would be useful to their kids or friends.

Then again I see the opposite in some people: drawing down a reverse mortgage like they'll be dead in 5 years and ruining their finances. Smoking and boozing and otherwise ruining their health because they "haven't got long to live".

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It's hard to break old habits or misconceptions.

Can't enjoy a meal because it is overpriced. Or similarly, won't pay $3 for a cold drink in the sun at the beach, since it is $1 in town.

In a completely different direction...

I played skyrim and noticed that I had lots of upgrades, and great equipment and was kind of overpowered.

So, I would go back and play the game naked. (not a new game, just start with the character I had built up)

I would start out with no equipment and just make do with whatever I found. Use the first sword or pants I found and go from there. Kind of fun.

> It's hard to break old habits or misconceptions.

It's especially necessary when one's circumstances change a lot. It's true for pretty much everyone that the opportunity cost of not using your assets increases as you age - but increasing financial security also changes the calculus in a way which is difficult to unlearn.

> It's hard to break old habits

Yes, you've hit the nail on the head. I've noticed how people hate paying £9 for what ought to be a £7 lunch. Doesn't seem to matter much if they're fresh out of university, or half way through a high-income career.

I suppose it shifts from being an immediate financial concern, to an old habit, or perhaps a matter of principle.

I think we fear the implicit judgement that we feel is being made about us. Imagine that everyone knows that the fair price is £7. The restaurant sells it at £9 - what does the make that purchaser? A fool for overpaying - even if they can afford it, even if they actually want to support the restaurant financially, the purchaser will feel judged as a fool. As is often the case with shame, nobody else might even have noticed, let alone actually be judging, but that doesn't negate the feeling!

My theory is that a large amount of 'luxury' commerce is simply giving the customer an excuse not to feel shame, because no longer do they feel a fool, but now they are a special customer with discerning tastes.

I've fallen for that fallacy many times. Only in very few cases does luxury imply higher quality; usually the illusion is formed by the addition of almost worthless decoration (such as folded napkins in a posh restaurant, bought wholesale for literally two a penny).

> Can't enjoy a meal because it is overpriced.

This is my problem precisely with food

I’ve come to conclusion that it’s quite deep character trait. You can change your attitude to spending but it will be hard work. It won’t happen automatically when your life situation changes but you actually need to make a conscious decision one day and then retrain all your automatic reflexes and try to stay vigilant. Like getting fit or anger management or similar things where you try to control your behaviour with will power. Extremely hard.

Yup. My parents will drive 10 minutes one way to save $0.10 on gas. Assuming a 20 gallon tank size and filling from empty, that's a savings of $2.00. At 20 minutes for $2.00 savings, the expected value of that action is $6/hr, ignoring the additional gas and wear/tear which would lower number that even further. They are not poor people.

Are they retired? Their time is worth nothing, at least apparently not to them. And the thrill of saving that $2 is worth something, as is the resulting mild brag they can tell their friends.

I love the second point, that the act of saving itself has added value. I often hack together my own tools instead of buying available commercial ones (stuff like notes apps, cloud sync, ...)

The act of not buying another subscription just feels good, monetary value is negligible.

Being retired def changes your relationship to time. It stretches as needed or desired. Sometimes your perceptions of things and activities expand to fill the time available.

The part that baffles me is the cognitive dissonance between wasting time in this manner and subsequently complaining about not having enough time to do things.

Not only that, it also goes the other way. If you're retired, you can't easily pick up another shift or do some overtime if you need to balance the budget, so the most available option for trading time for money is in finding savings.

And people always forget to account for taxes. Purchase prices are in after-tax dollars and hourly wages aren't. Between sales tax, state and federal income tax and government benefits phase outs from earning more money, the wage-equivalent value of saving a buck can be around double the nominal hourly wage.

And taxes strongly discourage trading time with others: I can't trade an hour of work with somebody else because my hour gets taxed and their hour gets taxed.

In New Zealand the marginal tax rate for the median earner takes more than 1/3rd of your wages. The top marginal rate is 39%. It isn't motivating!

All else equal, even if it takes you twice as long to do something (compared to employing someone), you are often better off doing it yourself.

Some retired people I know are bored. Driving across town gets them out of the house and gives them something to do.

One thing people often miss is how valuable to society this is.

Many don't have time to price shop. However any pressure such as this, rewards competitive pricing, and damages gougers.

It does matter.

Sometimes my mind is blown away with how some people come up with these kind of saving ideas

Meanwhile, gas station operators want you to buy their expensive fuel. $6/hr is not bad if it makes the greedy not any richer.

Folks who grew up in an environment where they were lacking necessities tend to keep the fridge full and lots of supplies "in case something happens". They compensate due to uncertainties that they had growing up.

Folks who grew up always having plenty don't usually worry much about keeping food reserves or waste.

It's clear why this happens: circumstances change but people don't often stop and re-think attitudes which they've incorporated.

If they're smoking and boozing that hard, doesn't it seem kind of likely that they'll be dead in 5 years?

That would be an extreme case.

At the risk of stating the obvious, the reasoning for that sort of self-destructive lifestyle doesn't make sense on 2 fronts. First, living an extremely unhealthy lifestyle will of course shorten your life, exacerbating the tragedy that life is short / YOLO. Second, it will significantly degrade your quality of life during that time.

It takes a surprising amount of effort to kill a human body through these drugs. It's how their abuse got so popular in the first place, since their damage only becomes really apparent over decades of excess.

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