“Consumers Aren’t Spending Even In a Booming Job Market”

[SheilaT]

35. While I'm outside the job market, having retired almost a year ago,

and even though my income is the same as it was, I'm still living very frugally. By choice, I might add. While my yearly income is below the national median, I live alone, my expenses are manageable, and I am able to attend the science fiction and writing conferences that are very important to me.

All of my adult life I've been amazed at what most other people spend on presents at Christmas time. Perhaps because I grew up quite poor, in a somewhat large family (six kids), that even though Christmas was wonderful in so many ways, there weren't a lot of presents. I carried that into my adult life, and in recent years I'm more likely to make someone something than buy. I embroider and crochet, so it's not that hard for me. I'm already at work on this year's presents.

I also feel that growing up poor, and not having very much at the beginning of my independent adult life, also shaped me, and shaped me not to spend too much.

Here's another very important thing. I've gone without TV three different times in my life. The current no-TV has lasted almost seven years, and the longer I go without, the less I miss it. For one thing, I can watch a lot on the internet. But more importantly, not seeing the advertizing makes it very easy not to spend money. I'm not bombarded with ads telling me I basically can't live without something, or that I'd be beautiful if only I bought that. TV advertizing makes it very easy to feel deprived because you can't afford all of what the ads tell you you MUST have. I constantly encourage people to turn off their TVs, although I haven't won any converts yet.