One of the reasons why our country has staved of any recessional crisis and remains unshackled is we have good reserve of bullion – 558 tons. Burying past shame of 1991, when India had to pledge 67 tons of Gold to Bank of England and Union Bank of Switzerland to supplement a poor Foreign Exchange Reserve of $1.2 billion, India recently purchased 200 tons of gold from IMF at a price of $6.8 billion, to augur its present foreign exchange reserve of $285 billion.
If you look at our country as a whole, I would say that our people have many habits but only one passion – SAVING. It has become a cult as well. Other people save too. But none like the Indians. We save as the Americans spend money based on their future income; as the Chinese cycle on streets; as the English queue up; as the Japanese work and as the Spaniards watch bull-fight. It is simply a passion.
The dream of an average Indian is to long for a lifestyle that’s unaffordable and then when they have the affordability, to starve. Not to be able to buy a car or build a nice home is frustrating. But to be able to afford it and yet save the money instead seems to be every Indian’s summit of ambition and climax of earthly pleasure.
Notional (mind you... it's not NATIONAL) enjoyment is the pinnacle of happiness. “You know what… I can buy an apartment costing Rs 75 lakhs and still afford an Audi car.” Being able to afford is as enjoyable as owning. Not only saving is a thrilling and exciting pastime, but also the ultimate goal in life. Indians would sooner forego their means to live than their means to save. An Indian looks forward to a retirement with huge savings as the final aim of his working life. He works in order to be able to stop working. He works hard throughout his life time to die with a huge bank balance.
And women out beat men in this game of saving. I and my wife agreed a couple of decades back that out of the family’s total earnings we will save 25%. Now with our earnings having increased some twenty fold (from a meager Rs 5,000/- pm to Rs 1,00,000/- pm), she magnanimously says, “we were earlier spending Rs 3,750/- pm, and now with inflation of last 20 years taken into account let us spend Rs 25,000/.” Indirectly she has increased our savings to 75% and decreased spending to 25%. If I question her prudence in foregoing little pleasures of life like travelling abroad, buying the latest gadgets for home or frequenting exotic restaurants for gourmet cuisine, the reply would be “...and now we're down to our last Rs Thirty Seven Lakh Forty Thousand Three Hundred Twenty One. We can't afford” (Ok... Ok... It's not rupees, it's paisa... I don't want my blog readers looking for a loan from me!)
As Andreas Capellanus said, “Even if the whole earth and sea were turned to gold, they could hardly satisfy the avarice of a woman... You can more easily scratch a diamond with your fingernail than you can by any human ingenuity get a woman to consent to giving any of her savings.”
For me I take the cue from P. J. O'Rourke who said “It is better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money.” I also like what Colonel Sanders said… “There's no reason to be the richest man in the cemetery. You can't do any business from there.”
If you look at our country as a whole, I would say that our people have many habits but only one passion – SAVING. It has become a cult as well. Other people save too. But none like the Indians. We save as the Americans spend money based on their future income; as the Chinese cycle on streets; as the English queue up; as the Japanese work and as the Spaniards watch bull-fight. It is simply a passion.
The dream of an average Indian is to long for a lifestyle that’s unaffordable and then when they have the affordability, to starve. Not to be able to buy a car or build a nice home is frustrating. But to be able to afford it and yet save the money instead seems to be every Indian’s summit of ambition and climax of earthly pleasure.
Notional (mind you... it's not NATIONAL) enjoyment is the pinnacle of happiness. “You know what… I can buy an apartment costing Rs 75 lakhs and still afford an Audi car.” Being able to afford is as enjoyable as owning. Not only saving is a thrilling and exciting pastime, but also the ultimate goal in life. Indians would sooner forego their means to live than their means to save. An Indian looks forward to a retirement with huge savings as the final aim of his working life. He works in order to be able to stop working. He works hard throughout his life time to die with a huge bank balance.
And women out beat men in this game of saving. I and my wife agreed a couple of decades back that out of the family’s total earnings we will save 25%. Now with our earnings having increased some twenty fold (from a meager Rs 5,000/- pm to Rs 1,00,000/- pm), she magnanimously says, “we were earlier spending Rs 3,750/- pm, and now with inflation of last 20 years taken into account let us spend Rs 25,000/.” Indirectly she has increased our savings to 75% and decreased spending to 25%. If I question her prudence in foregoing little pleasures of life like travelling abroad, buying the latest gadgets for home or frequenting exotic restaurants for gourmet cuisine, the reply would be “...and now we're down to our last Rs Thirty Seven Lakh Forty Thousand Three Hundred Twenty One. We can't afford” (Ok... Ok... It's not rupees, it's paisa... I don't want my blog readers looking for a loan from me!)
As Andreas Capellanus said, “Even if the whole earth and sea were turned to gold, they could hardly satisfy the avarice of a woman... You can more easily scratch a diamond with your fingernail than you can by any human ingenuity get a woman to consent to giving any of her savings.”
For me I take the cue from P. J. O'Rourke who said “It is better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money.” I also like what Colonel Sanders said… “There's no reason to be the richest man in the cemetery. You can't do any business from there.”
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