Today here in BC there was a lot of news about the minimum wage increase where it went from $10.45 an hour to the new rate of $10.85. I suppose with that number if you worked full time then that could mean an extra $50 or so a month. What fascinated me the most is how people were already describing ways they would spend this extra money. The most common example was that since many people felt it was so little that they could at least buy like an extra cup of coffee from like Starbucks each day now.
It made me think how for myself whenever I am presented with a situation like this where I get some kind of small raise or bonus I tend to just live the way I always have been as opposed to suddenly introducing a new monthly expense. The only difference is that with that extra money it gives me more flexibility to potentially make better purchases or investments on things that I was potentially going to spend money on anyways.
For example, it’s like saying if you were thinking of investing one hundred dollars to earn like interest on then this gives me the option to invest an extra $60 to earn more. Or if originally my budget was to purchase a smaller tour trip then now I may consider getting the higher one. Essentially, I am not changing my whole lifestyle in a sense for this small financial gain but rather trying to use it in a way to make stuff better.
I personally find if you always permanently change your everyday lifestyle spending in these ways then you are kind of keeping yourself in the same situation you have always been in. This is the very common scenario of like people who make six figures a year yet it seems like they still struggle financially as if they make like $20,000 a year. To me personally anyways you need a bigger windfall financial gain to consider completely changing what currently works for yourself.