UNITED STATES—How do you go about saving money for a rainy day? Are you one that stashes it in your savings account? Do you have that checking account no one knows about? Perhaps a safe in the home or some other strategy you use to save money? Well for me, it is storing left over change I have in a cannister. This is slightly old school because my parents do it, my grandparents did it and their parents also did it.
Look, things have gotten a bit better. How so? Back in the day you would have to roll-up those coins and take them back to the banks to cash in. Now, you have those Coinstar machines at certain establishments, where you cash in your coins, but you pay a fee to do so. Yeah, you lose like eight to nine percent on every dollar that you cash in, but it saves you time. Yes, you have to pay for the convenience, but it is sometimes worth it.
This is not so much about what you do with the money you save it’s about how you save. I know some people who hate coins. Like it beyond baffles me, and as a result they just toss them and I’m not referring solely to pennies, this also involves silver America. People don’t like pennies, but news flash America, pennies are MONEY! It takes 100 pennies to equal a dollar, a dollar isn’t just a dollar and money is money which you can spend pennies too and I do it often. If I’m trying to get rid of coins I will utilize those loose pennies that I have in my pocket.
At the same time, you are always breaking a $1, $5, or as I call it the dreaded $20 bill. I hate, and I mean immensely hate a $20 bill. I feel like I spend money so much faster when I have a $20 bill versus let’s say a $50 bill or $100 bill. You’re more conscious of things. However, at the end of the day, whenever I have left over change in my pocket, I store it in this little candy canister that I have. It holds quite the amount of silver and copper people, so I recently looked into the cannister and man was I floored with the amount of change I had accumulated in a matter of months.
It was actually over $150 in change. Yes, you have quarters, dimes and nickels and pennies. Guess what that was groceries for the week, gas in the vehicle, money towards a utility bill or the cell phone bill for the month. That means the money that comes from my paycheck from work doesn’t have to cover a bill or an expense that is always transpiring each month.
We are able to save as Americans, if we choose to and not look at it as someone forcing us to do something, but us doing something that helps us in the long run. Don’t think about saving money as a chore, look at it as a way of having a security blanket. You never know when something is going to happen in life and trust me life always and I mean it always happens. When it does, you find yourself in a situation where you are able to dip into something as you need it, and not living the paycheck to paycheck mantra.
Written By Jason Jones
