Rewind. My grandmother grew-up during the Great Depression and lived during the ensuing ups and downs of the U.S. economy. She’s no noob when it comes to financial hardship either. Born and raised in Indiana, she grew-up on a farm, married a farmer, and even produced a few farmers herself. Growing up, she was accustomed to a humble life laden with sharing, stretching and saving nearly everything. So even though the width of her pocketbook has thickened a bit over the last twenty years, she continues to practice the principles she absorbed as a child on the farm.

Fast forward. Aisle 15: Sauces and Condiments. As we rounded the corner I motioned for a jar of organic blackberry jam. It looked delicious and I thought it would accompany the croissants my grandmother had already tossed into the cart. As I went to toss the jar into our cart, my grandma asked me “Oh, that’s on sale is it?” It hadn’t crossed my mind to even consider the notion so I spun around and looked for an “on sale” sign near the mirage of jams to my left. Nothing. And to make the situation worse, because it was organic, it was also expensive.

“Well I suppose we can splurge”, she shrugged. Then it hit me. My grandmother had been selecting items based on whether or not they were on sale. That explains the car full of mismatched items from random brands, different levels of quality and price. So I asked her, “You on a budget this month Grandma?” She turned around and said, “Sweety, I’ve been a budget my whole life”. Coming from a women who could afford to buy the supermarket she was shopping in, that sure meant a lot.

At some point during the ensuing conversation she exclaimed, “I never buy anything that’s not on sale!”. While it may seem a bit extreme, my granny must be on to something. Having survived the Great Depression and then some, I’d say her financial methodology is worth at least a hoot. So there you have it, wisdom from the wise. It may not keep you from overspending (click here for that), but it can sure help you save money on the things you’re already buying.

Payoff.com partly exists because we believe many Americans have bought into a lie. The lie is, that spending money can buy you happiness. Now, you may be thinking, “oh great, not another rant about how money can’t buy you happiness”. Hold your horses Turbo, we may surprise you. The truth is, if you sit down and truthfully consider the things you buy day in and day out, a great percentage of them are directed at making us happier. Whether it’s that extra Franklin we pay to stay in a nice apartment, the weekly lunch date with our best buddy, the pack of peanuts at the gas station, the irresistible stuffed animal for our two-year-old, or the small fortunes we spend on things like shoes, clothes, video games, toys, or food, we spend money both directly and indirectly on things that increase our happiness every single day.

For the record, this isn’t exactly bad or even financially unhealthily. We actually have a word for someone who is precisely the opposite: a miser. And trust me, you don’t want to be known as a miser. Just ask Scrooge. Like anything else however, a healthy balance is usually recommended. But here in lies the problem. Many of us have grown accustomed to pleasing ourselves constantly. Heck, we can’t turn down even the smallest urge for something like a stick of gum. It’s as though we’ve handcuffed ourselves to the consumer-marry-go-round-of-never-ending-debt and can’t seem to sober-up long enough to take the key out from our front pocket, unlock ourselves and step off.

While many popular news outlets, studies, and articles tend to frame American’s as ruthless consumers, out to purchase anything and everything, I’d like to offer an alternative characterization. What if the core issue is the simple fact that we fill our lives up with simple pleasures. That is to say, the problem of overspending in America may be a result of a nation full of snacks. Yea that’s right, snacks. Take this analogy for an example: people that want to lose a few pounds typically blame their extra weight on what? Snacks. So what’s the solution? Cut the snacks.

In a similar fashion, we financially “overweight” Americans have filled our lives with financial “snacks” we like to have before and after every purchase. The result is, a financially bloated America plagued with a culture of financial snackers that can’t quite figure out why they’re overweight. Now do you see where I’m going with this? Like a chubby adolescent who simultaneously cracks open a bottle of cheese-wiz and exclaims “I can’t figure out why I’m overweight”, we sit around at coffee shops around the country asking one-another why we are in so much debt. Hmm. Look down perhaps. No, not at your new shoes, at your steaming latte. Got the hint?

I firmly believe that a slew of money can be trimmed from our monthly expenditures if we simply keep an eye on the constant nibbling we do nearly everywhere we go. It’s the little things that add-up each month, year after year. So give it a try, I dare you. If anything, maybe you’ll avoid the local philosopher who frequents your coffee shop and who insists on explaining the Big Bang Theory every time you see him [insert smirk here].

You see, back a few years ago Rick was an ordinary father looking to help his son improve his batting skills for Saturday morning little league games. In the backyard one day, he suddenly thought of something that just may help improve player’s swing-timing and accuracy. Like the typical American father, Rick grabbed a roll of duct tape to begin. Yes, duct tape.

Before he knew it, Rick had evolved his sticky solution into a plastic bat collar with steel beads that make a sharp hissing sound when you swing the bat properly. Not only does it sound cool, it actually works. But like any other average father looking to help his son improve on the field, Rick didn’t exactly have professional advertising assistance or a million dollar marketing campaign backing him up. So he kept on swinging until one day an unlikely character drove by.

His name is Bobby Witt, a retired pitcher for the Texas Rangers. As he drove by Rick’s house he noticed Rick’s son practicing with some sort of odd contraption attached to his bat. He couldn’t help but stop and have a few hacks with it. It turns out, he was so impressed, he promised to tell his former teammate Rusty Greer about it. Rusty, a career .305 hitter, had sons that were playing baseball and happened to be interested in youth training devices. Trust me, it only gets better.

Before he knew it, Rick was on his way to a restaurant parking lot where he met Rusty and gave him a demonstration of his now prototype. Not a half an hour later, the two baseball dads had shaken hands and verbally agreed to an endorsement deal. This unlikely string of events led to what today is called the “RBI Pro Swing“. Today it is used by baseball players from age five to fifty all over the country. Whether it’s club baseball at the YMCA or that one team in New York that rhymes with “blankies”, the RBI Pro Swing has been a real hit.

Now. While the story has been painted a bit rosy, the truth is that Rick pursued his hunch with fervor. Even after the Yankee’s batting coach Kevin Long told him that he had seen hundred of supposed swing enhancers that had all turned out to be scams, Rick pressed forward. While his idea is worth a shout, his execution is worth a parade. It is precisely a result of his motivation however, that he successfully brought his idea to fruition.

I suppose the reason I began this post the way I did, was to remind us of the many small or seemingly insignificant ideas we have all had. Whether it be a simple change fix to an existing problem, a small device that makes our lives easier, or a basic service that just doesn’t exist, we’ve all thought of some sort of solution to some sort of problem. An idea however, no matter how great, remains an idea if one is unwilling to pursue it.

So today we take this opportunity to commission our readers, to encourage you to pursue your ideas and your dreams. Remember, the worst thing that can happen isn’t failure, it’s seeing your idea on a shelf with a name you wouldn’t have dared to give it.

From a creative producer to a flier-hander-outer, the whole experience was no doubt humbling. Though in the midst of utter discouragement, Catherine decided that it was time for a change. She had always dabbled with the idea of filming a documentary, but never really had the time, money, or a suitable topic. As she struggled through one of the toughest economies in the last hundred years, that suitable topic suddenly dawned on her: Re:Invention, a story about the creative ways people were surviving the economic recession.

Armed with an idea and a slew of extra time, Cathy traveled cross-country with friends and produced the short film (below). To her delight, she won a small grant at a local film festival just months later, helping her to fund a longer version which she hopes to complete in the near future. As with most grants, they tend to run themselves out quicker than expected, leaving a slew of unexpected costs to be accounted for. This didn’t stop Cathy however, she supplements her income with odd jobs and freelance projects, totaling just twenty-five percent of what she had earned as a creative producer. “My quality of life has not changed at all,” she says. “I think it’s improved because I’m exploring what I want to do. When I see postings for full-time jobs, something inside me says, ‘No, don’t do it.’ I want to make sure I am making the right choice.”

Now that is precisely the kind of freedom Payoff endorses. I find it astounding that one could live on 75% less and make a statement as genuine as the one above. And not only that, but she’s discovered an avenue by which to pursue her passion as a filmmaker. While it hasn’t been easy, Cathy is living proof that cutting-back may turn-out to be a blessing in disguise. Along the way, and no doubt a result of speaking to people affected by the recession, she’s captured a few golden nuggets of advice for those trying to cope with the recession:

Let go of your identify. Don’t beat yourself up for losing a job or being laid off. Having too high of expectations for yourself will not only drive you mad but will keep you from discovering alternative options or future possibilities you never would have considered.

Get out of the house. Home alone is no cure for the unemployed. Whatever you do, don’t lock yourself in your house and send applications all day. Fresh air and friends will serve you well. Plus, you never know who you will meet jogging through the park.

Re-adjust expectations. When money is tight, be sure to double-check your expectations. You just may have to change your purchasing, food consumption, and extracurricular habits. By changing your expectations, you can find a happy medium, free from past-life spending sprees.

Don’t point fingers. Blaming your boss, neighbor, spouse, friend, or dog will only put you further in the doghouse. Pull yourself up from your bootstraps and take your future into your own hands. Playing the blame game will only put you deeper into misery.

With a slew of good advice from our very own economic warrior, I call your attention to the following: the idea that what many people fear could in fact be the very catalyst to change in a persons life. For some it’s marriage, others college, for some it may be unemployment. What I can say, is that for Cathy, her worst nightmare turned out to have a silver lining.

You see, we Americans can’t seem to pass-up a good deal. But the most unfortunate thing is, retailers know so. The effect is, we tend to overindulge when presented with any sort of promotion, sale, or special offer. It works like this: you’ve fought the urge to purchase those new shoes for months, primarily because they are $250. But one day, you walk past the store and what do you see? That sweet four-letter word in bold red letters: SALE. You see the shoes, are now only $165, nearly a one-hundred dollar discount. Your knees buckle and the next thing you know, your $165 dollars poorer.

What happened? The sale simply got the best of you. But of course we love to justify ourselves by whispering, “what a deal, you saved $85″. The problem of course, isn’t the $85 you “saved”, it’s the $165 you spent. This is where one of America’s greatest pastimes turns its back on us, where a lace laden “sale” becomes a broken budget. While it seems so obvious and easy to spot, we are constantly making poor financial due to the anchor effect.

But that’s why your reading this post. We at Payoff pride ourselves in uncovering the many pitfalls of personal finance and how to avoid them. So in light of our pride, we’d like to point-out a few “sales” that are selling your pocketbook short.

Brand Crazy. It’s extremely difficult to pass-up a name brand article of clothing or accessory when it’s on sale. It’s something about that shiny logo, or the emotional attachment you may have to the brand. The truth however, is that many people purchase stuff just for the label, only to realize it was three seasons old, didn’t fit correctly, or was something they didn’t even like to begin with.

For a Limited Time Only. This phrase gives my nightmares. But for some crazy reason, it installs in us a sense of urgency, a sense that we must take action in order to take advantage of such an amazing offer. The truth is, it’s a wonderful marketing strategy. There are even virtual shopping hubs that utilize this form of near “hysteria”. When your up against the clock, be sure to take a few minutes to really consider your purchase and the reasons for it.

Bandwagon Bummer. The internet has opened the door to a slew of websites offering “group buys”, or discounts for items you purchase along with five-hundred other people. The result, is similar to that of the first two examples, you end-up purchasing things you had always been comfortable living without. To beat the bandwagon, steer clear from online peer pressure.

So the next time you find a “sale” trying to swindle you into purchasing something in the moment, check yourself, don’t wreck yourself.

While miscommunication in all facets of life is typically negative, a recent study conducted by Echo Research for American Express found that miscommunication in the home regarding financial topics is especially prevalent. Here’s one for you: the study found that nine out of ten parents of 18 – 22 year olds say they’ve discussed financial responsibility with their kids. The gap: only seven out of 10 18 – 22 year-olds say their parents have had the same talk.

While at first glance the results may not look so catastrophic, here is a real tooth-grabber: eight out of ten parents and seven out of ten kids age 13 — 22 believe the best way for their kids to learn to manage money is to have a budget to work with. Only four out of 10 kids have a budget to work with (fewer, by the way, than have a curfew or rules regarding dating). Eh hem. This is a very large gap, like Grand Canyon large.

The gap was so impressionable in fact, that Jean Chatzky from NBC’s Today’s Show decided it was time to fill it. The result? National Money Night Talks, basically a time where parents and kids alike can sit down together, whether over the phone, in-person, or even on Skype, and have a talk about the financial topics that are most important to them. This might include things like college, allowance, summer jobs, or budgeting.

It’s not always easy however to simply sit down and start spilling your financial concerns, questions, and interests. Chatzky (NBC) had a slight hunch that this was precisely the case and one significant reason for the significant gap between the financial understanding of children and their parents. As a result, she has created three free tool kits, one for middle school children, one for those with high school kids, and one for those whose kids are in college. In each kit, you’ll find an exercise about setting financial goals, a discussion guide to family bills and a section on allowances.

These wonderful resources can all be found here. While every family is different, these resources may be the catalyst to healthy financial conversation in your home. At the very least, take note of the canyon that often exists between children and their parents. And as they say across the Atlantic, “mind the gap”.

His book is entitled, “What Should I Do with the Rest of My Life?” and is a collection of true stores from thirteen individuals who made the life altering decision to make their careers their personal missions in life. He chronicles the curious way in which each of them toyed with the idea of pursuing a second, third, or even fourth career, ultimately deciding to embrace a new sense of possibility with almost unimaginable success, passion, and purpose. Oh and one more thing: all thirteen people were over the age of sixty.

Eh hem. While I’ll skip the part about how we young folk should be even more inclined to pursue our dreams, giving the passion within each of us a chance to blossom. Instead I’ll simply skip forward to how we young folk should be even more inclined to pursue our dreams, giving the passion within each of us a chance to blossom. Frankel’s book is all about “living with spark throughout all our days”. If I’ve even the slightest clue, I’d venture to say that some of you lack that “spark” Frankel is referring to. Heck, some of you lack the lighter.

For many, the element of possibility is lacking. We love to tell ourselves what we cannot accomplish, as opposed to encouraging ourselves toward the many things we can. If a pep-talk from a friend, a mental cleansing, or any other method hasn’t supplied the encouragement you need, perhaps the stories of thirteen people who have found the “fountain of pursuit” could offer you a small push.

Life isn’t about living, it’s about giving. Each of us has a gift and a talent that can be molded into our profession. I’d go as far as to say that if your not pursuing your passion, your selling yourself short. Life has a way of convincing us that “getting by” is enough. Well it’s not. Switching careers is never too late and never a bad idea, especially when in pursuit of your passion. With a touch of planning and a load of passion, the chances are you’ll find your niche among the crowd.

As I’m sure you’re all aware, this recession, dubbed the “Great Recession“, is the most profound financial crisis the United States has seen since the Great Depression. Now, not many of us were around to witness the Depression of the 1930’s but the photo above just about sums it up. It wasn’t a mere blip on the economic radar, it was a catastrophe. While our current economic crisis isn’t quite the nightmare the Great Depression was, we too are in the midst of a unique recession.

Our current recession is one in which our unusually high unemployment rate (about 10%) is predicted to remain such over the foreseeable future and one in which a broken housing market makes both selling and purchasing a house extremely difficult (making relocation for purposes of employment extremely daunting). Unfortunately, it seems the current recession will not simply be weathered as quickly as the previous blips on the economic radar. A bleek economic future, similar to the one in which we live now, would render education a shoddy solution to the current economic climate.

To make even more difficult for those seeking to shelter the storm in the classroom, both public and private college tuition has increased dramatically over the past five years, making the leap a bit more financially challenging for back-to-schoolers.

All in all, the slew of individuals heading back to school in recent years have contributed greatly to a startling statistic recently released by the Federal Reserve: the fact that as a nation, we owe more for education than we do on our credit cards. Americans owed $826.5 billion on their credit cards in June and $829.8 billion in student loan debt, a great portion of which ($300 billion) has been accrued in the last four years. It seems as though a bit of a torment may be brewing.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that a poor ole’ student looking to avoid a bad economy may wind-up with a load of debt and in the same poor economic conditions he started out in. Now for a disclosure: the purpose of this entry isn’t to scare your socks off or make you feel like you made a horrible decision by going back to school. The purpose is to educate students as to the current economic climate so that they can properly plan for a healthily financial future. We would be sincerely grieved to see a generation of students graduate only to realize the pot of gold they perceived at the end of tunnel was only an illusion.

If your looking to go back to school, take some time to examine your financial plan. While taking out loans to go to school may be a bit more respectable than maxing out your credit cards on video games and soda, it’s still debt that must be repaid. Take out loans with caution and think twice before banking on that dream job that pays six-figures. It’s always better to be over-prepared than under-prepared.

While only a prototype, players roll the dice, advance around the board, assemble a crew, buy cannons and ships, collect gold, and fight scary monsters like Poseidon. Now that’s my style board game! The focus however is to manage the assets you accrue along the way, including the gold you can either deposit into treasure chests (which earns compounding interest) or risk loosing in the case that Moby Dick attacks. The winner is he/she who manages to collect twenty gold coins first.

What’s most intriguing to me about the game, that’s yet to be named, is the fact that a group of students designed it, likely no older than twenty-five years old. That’s a signal as to how pathetic of a job the nation’s game designers have done at providing a useful solution to the gap shown in the photo above. It’s wonderful to see a group of Parsoners jumping head-first into an ultra-dull space, looking to spice it up a bit. We are excited to see the game develop and hope to see it on shelves soon.

You see, there is a major problem with the budgets we set: we control them. A budget is only worth something if the person who designed it actually follows it. As it turns out, we humans aren’t so talented at sticking to our budgets. Because of our natural desire for stuff and the fantastic job that advertising companies do to convince us that we need it, we either ignore our budgets all together or blow by them because we simply don’t have a solid grip on how much we’ve spent that month. What we need is a a bark-collar, one that shocks us to Neverland if we try and purchase one more latte than our budget permits.

While the shocker has been omitted, MasterCard has developed a system intended to protect consumers not only from thieves but from themselves. It’s called inControl and has already been piloted and adopted by Barclay’s Bank in Britain. inControl works like this: the cardholder may control a handful of financial parameters such as where, when, or for what charges can be made. Taken one step further, the cardholder may choose to receive alerts whenever these parameters are breeched.

For an example, if your bank adopts the service, you can tell it to reject purchases on your debit or credit card at any restaurant after you’ve spent x-amount in the “restaurant” category. If your anything like me, you spend way too much eating-out every month. This nifty tool would serve-up an embarrassing reminder as I tried to charge one-too-many meals at Ruth’s Chris for the month. Other useful tools include the ability to prohibit charges originating in certain countries, the option to simply have your card shut-off once you’ve reached a certain spending limit, the ability to limit card usage on particular days of the week, and the option to receive alerts sent by email or phone when a purchase it made in a particular geographical area or in a particular store.

At this point you may be wondering why this service wasn’t made available to consumers five or even ten years ago. Well, it seems it’s been introduced in the context of today’s economic environment for a reason. Citi Bank is the lucky guinea pig that will be launching the service in partnership with MasterCard in the very near future. In addition to increasing their competitive edge, Citi is likely employing the more “consumer friendly” service to win back its reputation and patch-up its image. Reputation aside, the service will no doubt help consumers control spending and stay true to their budgets.

We’re glad to see credit card companies adopting policies and inventing services that actually may help consumers. I’m sure that if Citi launches the service, competitors will have no choice but to adopt it as well. For better or for worse, we really do need someone to “save you from yourself”, to keep an eye on us because it seems as though we may not be able to.