The concept of spending money is a foreign thing to me, most of the time whenever I use money I try to find the most efficient way to spend it.

Anyway, I can't really understand the whole consumerism holiday going on right now, I went around to local tech stores (I was thinking about buying an sd card for my phone for reasons that are obvious), lo and behold I found a bunch of stuff sold out on the weekly sale.

My question was, why? I look at prices quite often and I did not see anything to get excited about and yet, people are buying spoon. I mean, the "sale" prices have been like that for months and for SOME REASON it's the time to buy spoon? Does anyone know where their money goes? I always feel like people are being treated like sheep with all this consumerist programming, *shudder* the thought of some guy analyzing me like some rat is a rather bothersome thought.

Same thing with my current laptop (from which I'm writing from atm), I usually see a lot of people in my university with expensive donkey macbooks for what reason? Well the exact same reason I'm using this sucker, writing a blog post or doing some remedial programming/web browsing.

Well why am I so special? That's because my laptop cost me 300$ and not my arm.

Where is all the resource management? The expectations of a bad day? Do people think about optimizing their time and effort so that they get the most out of it? Are people just buying things because they can? Or because someone told them to? Doesn't this bother anyone? I dunno, maybe I'm just as crazy as I always have been.

VIDEO GAMES ARE GOOD USE OF MONEY!

/rant

---

Oh yeah, speaking of money and such, I was able to land a job as a co-op software developer. I'm not going to go too much into the details of the job, but I'm totally excited to actually be able to make my own money. Ok well that and the fact that there's a lot of spoon that goes into commercial products than I thought, I've already found out about 20+ frameworks that businesses use to power their products. All in all I hope I don't get my spoon slapped and I learn a lot from the experience, finally being able to pay for my own food and housing for once.

(This post was last modified: 23/11/2012 02:10 PM by Tetris999.)

I'm sure there are people who just go out buying looking for specials and decide they need a memory card, so just pick one up along the way.
Or you could reason that it's unlikely that stuff on Black Friday will be more expensive than it is otherwise - useful if you can't be bothered following prices.

Consumerism is a big part of Western culture and economies - most people spend the large majority of their expendable income on consumption goods (as opposed to savings).
Do people know where their money is going?  Some yes, some no - probably explains why one of the most common financial advice (for those struggling, obviously) is budgeting.  I suppose devices like credit cards, lay-by loan schemes etc encourage this more.

On the other hand, money is there to provide you utility.  People will, thus, have different perceptions of what things are worth and be willing to spend different amounts on things.
Being an unemployed student, chances are your expendable income is close to 0, so you'll naturally be more conservative.  But if you're working and earning a decent income, it may make sense to splash out somewhat more extravagantly.

Personally, I'm rather difficult to impress and have a somewhat conservative personality, so I don't really feel the need to buy much.

(23/11/2012 01:48 PM)Tetris999 Wrote:  The expectations of a bad day?

In a relatively stable environment, not much.  In a less certain environment, one may be more willing to save.

(23/11/2012 01:48 PM)Tetris999 Wrote:  Do people think about optimizing their time and effort so that they get the most out of it?

A bit of a different question, but if I'm understanding you, it's usually difficult to do.

(23/11/2012 01:48 PM)Tetris999 Wrote:  Are people just buying things because they can? Or because someone told them to?

I don't think you can sum up all the reasons people buy things in such a simple statement, but I'd say those are certainly components.
I'd say people generally buy things because they ultimately provide (or hope to provide) utility in some form.

Congrats on the job!

(This post was last modified: 23/11/2012 09:24 PM by Cirehpsa.)

(This post was last modified: 24/11/2012 12:08 AM by Slushba132.)

(This post was last modified: 24/11/2012 12:25 AM by Jem.)

(24/11/2012 09:07 PM)TatsuyaXD Wrote:  Vita at $199? I'm sold (if I do have the money and the Black Friday).

Was at $180 on Amazon (and that included a game + 4GB card): http://camelcamelcamel.com/Assassins-Cre...B002I0JZOC

You still watch TV?