Should I spend it or save it?

I put a good many sayings about thrift into the mouth of Poor Richard, and later gathered them into a little speech by an old man called Father Abraham. People still repeat them. A penny saved is two pence clear. Beware of little expenses, for a small leak will sink a great ship. They sound like a shopkeeper's wisdom, and they are, but there is more in them than counting coins.nnWhat I valued above all was independence. A man in debt is not free. He must flatter his creditors, take work he does not want, and lie awake at night. A man with savings can say no. He can leave a bad master, take a chance on a new venture, help a friend, speak his mind. I started with nothing in Philadelphia, and it was saving, not luck, that let me buy my own press and later step away from business altogether to do the things I cared about.nnSo my advice is to save before you spend, not after. Put aside a fixed part of every sum as it comes in, before you can think of uses for it. Then spend the rest freely and without guilt, on things that are truly worth it to you.nnI will add one caution. I never meant thrift to be miserliness. Money hoarded for its own sake is as foolish as money wasted. Save for a purpose, know what it is, and when you reach it, enjoy what you saved for.

I grew up poor in Algiers, in a flat with no electricity and a mother who could not read. We had almost nothing, and yet I have rarely been as rich as I was then, on the beaches, in the sun, among friends. I learned early that the most valuable things are not bought and cannot be put aside for later.nnI am not against saving. A roof, food, security for the people who depend on you: these are the conditions of a decent life, and only a fool or a rich man despises them. But I have watched many people turn prudence into a religion. They defer every pleasure to a future that keeps receding, to the house, to the pension, to the day when they will finally live. Then the day does not come, or it comes too late.nnI once wrote that real generosity towards the future lies in giving everything to the present. I meant it as a political idea, but it is true of a single life as well. The present is the only place you can actually be. A meal shared now, a journey taken while you can still walk, a gift to someone who needs it today, these are not wasted because they leave nothing in the bank.nnSo ask yourself honestly what the saving is for. If it is a real need, keep it. If it has become a way of avoiding life, spend some of it, on something that makes you glad to be alive.

Wealth is plainly not the good we are seeking in life. It is useful, and useful for the sake of something else. Once you see that clearly, both extremes of your question look a little foolish.nnThere is a virtue concerned with money, which I call liberality, and like the other virtues it lies in a mean between two vices. On one side is the spendthrift, who gives and spends too much, on the wrong things, at the wrong times, and soon has nothing left to give at all. On the other is the mean person, who takes too eagerly and gives too little, who counts every coin and cannot bear to part with any. Of the two, I think meanness is the worse and harder to cure. The spendthrift can be taught. The miser usually grows worse with age.nnThe liberal person uses wealth well. They spend on the right things, in the right amounts, at the right times, and they do it with pleasure rather than pain. They look after their property, not because they love money, but because they want to be able to help others and to live well.nnSo the question is not spend or save in general. It is what this particular sum is for. Keep enough to secure your household and your future, since a person without means cannot act well. Beyond that, ask what use of the money would be fine, generous and fitting to who you want to be, and spend it on that gladly.