Reply to Why aren't you able to live within your means?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]When DH and I were dating he had no concept of budget. He spent a lot when he got paid and couldn’t make it last until the next paycheck. No one ever told him about saving. He had been deprived of a lot growing up and REALLY liked to buy things. Lots of reasons. He’s a saver now but if I hadn’t intervened and brought some financial literacy into his life, he’d probably be in a ton of debt and made years of bad financial decisions. [/quote]

Usually when people grow up poor, they prefer to save money so that they always have some when they really need it.[/quote]

One of his siblings did (almost to an unhealthy degree). The others inherited their parents feast-or-famine mentality. They can’t save because they spend as they get it. [/quote]

Yes, I think it’s complicated and may play out either way. When you grow up poor and made to feel embarrassed there is a tendency to want to save to not have the life you had in childhood. But, also a tendency to not ever again want to look or feel poor. When you work hard to get out of poverty you want to give your family what you did not have — I guess the opposite of all the trust fund posters who rave about really old cars, sweaters with holes, etc.

So one might save responsibly for retirement, college, etc. not overspend egregiously, but certainly could be more frugal. It’s a balance.[/quote]

It is definately a balance.  We can spend on whatever we want and be fine, we are at that level.  However, our years of being fiscally smart make us still consider researching and deciding what we will pay for and what we wont.   If moving our flights by a day or two on either side (we are retired in our early 50s) can save us $$$, we do that.  Similarly, I"m searching for the best deal on a great or luxury hotel.  But we have limits.  While I might spend $1000+ for a luxury beach vacation hotel per night, I'm not inclined to spend that much while in a major city in Europe, where I'm hardly at the hotel.  So I'm searching for the best deal that meets our minimum standards.  Sure I can afford the $1K room, but why if I'm not at the hotel to enjoy the room or the amenities of the hotel (luxury beach vacation I'm purchasing the location/restaurants/pool/beachaccess/etc for that hotel along with the room---in Paris, I'm purchasing location and quality for the $$$). 
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You are a humble braggart.  And btw, you have significantly more options when both you and spouse retired such as moving your flight back or forth. [/quote]

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