So I found out thereโs a term for what we were talking about the other day on treating your money differently depending on how you get it!
Itโs called โmental accountingโ and apparently is a pretty popular thing, based on work by Nobel Prize recipient, Richard Thaler :) Hereโs a description of it from Investopedia:
Mental accounting refers to the tendency people have to separate their money into different accounts based on miscellaneous subjective criteria, including the source of the money and the intended use for each account.
That about sums it up! Hahaโฆ Although not sure about the 2nd part of the explanation:
The theory of mental accounting suggests that individuals are likely to assign different functions to each asset group in this case, the result of which can be an irrational and detrimental set of behaviors.
I will admit to the irrational part of treating your โextraโ money differently since money is still money no matter where it comes from!, however is it really that detrimental to your financial well being?! I donโt think so, at least in my particular caseโฆ I think you get into much more trouble when youโre playing around with your โcoreโ income than your side pots. But who am I to postulate โ Iโm no Nobel Prize winner ;)
Still โ pretty neat thereโs a TERM for it! Thanks to everyone who let me know about it, particularly Shannon who then sent over this fantastic article on all the ways mental accounting can affect us:
Four things Richard Thaler taught us about irrational behaviour
The first two weโve already covered (#1. was a breakdown of what โmental accountingโ is โ i.e. the way we process money differently, and #2. was around โhouse moneyโ โ when you tend to be more risky with winnings because it feels more like someone elseโs money), but here are examples #3 and #4 which I found equally as fascinating (and guilty of as well!):
#3. The โendowment effectโ โ The idea that we tend to overvalue what we own simply because we have it! โThaler demonstrated the effect in action in a classic experiment in the 1980s while working at Cornell University in the US. He randomly handed out free coffee mugs to students and asked those who had received mugs how much they would sell them for, and those who hadnโt how much they would pay for them. The typical recipient of the mug demanded $4.75 but the typical buyer offered $2.25. The mere possession of the mugโwhich in this case was accidentalโcaused people to value it highly.โ
I catch myself doing this alllll the time with new coins I add to my collection, hahaโฆ As soon as itโs in my possession it feels as if theyโre 10x as valuable! Especially the *longer* itโs in my possession for :) I always thought it was maybe due to me being able to appreciate them more as you have more time to look at them/research them, but I suppose that doesnโt hold the same weight for non collectible things like mugs, etcโฆ
Same goes for anything *sentimental* too. I always perceive the items that have attached memories to be much more valuable than the actual items themselves, which of course is nonsense and why so many of us canโt ever get rid of our stuff! (Or price them too high when we try โ hah!)
#4. The โnudge theoryโ โ This is one of my favorites, and something I wish became more mandatory across our country. โThalerโs nudge theory is especially relevant to retirement planning. Research shows that when employees are automatically enrolled (given a โnudgeโ) into a retirement plan (with the option to withdraw), far more people sign up than would have if they had to enroll themselves.โ
YES!!! Because people are lazy!!! Even with things that they say are important to them! So you always have to find ways to use this to your advantage, and โforcingโ them to automatically enroll in things is exactly the key to ramp up savingsโฆ (though of course the same trick works in opposite ways too, like signing up to subscription services that youโre then too lazy to cancel later!)
Thaler also co-designed something called the โSave More Tomorrowโ plan (SMT), in which people commit to saving more later, but actually opt into the plan *now*.
As Thaler explains, โself-control is easier to accept if delayed rather than immediate.โ And, as planned increases are linked to pay raises, it is meant to diminish the effect of loss aversion โ the tendency to feel losses larger than gains.
So basically people signed up for this โSave More Tomorrowโ plan early on, and then later when they got their raises a portion of it was automatically siphoned away into savings and they didnโt even notice it. Because they didnโt even have a *chance* to notice it! Hahaโฆ The first go at it was so successful โ quadrupling employeesโ savings rates from 3.5% to 13.6%!! โ that it got disseminated around and is now apparently used by millions of people. I guess internationally, since we sure donโt have this here?!
Anyways, all this to prove yet again that emotions are very much a part of our finances, and can be used to help AMP them or DESTROY them depending on how theyโre harnessed :)
Personally I try using my energy to AMP it, but Lord knows there are times where I might as well have just lit my cash on fire! Hahaโฆ But we live and we learn! And the more we continue learning about *ourselves* in particular, the better weโll recognize when this โmental accountingโ is in play.
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I belive they also studied the โnudge theoryโ internationally related to organ donation selection on a driving license (or something similar). People may opt out, but are less likely to do so.
My 401k plan has the default set to a 1% increase in contribution annually automatically. I opted out because Iโm closer to maxing out (plus side hustle solo 401k), so I need to make sure things donโt go over. I donโt think Iโve heard anyone else at work mention it, so Iโm guessing it works.
Thanks for sharing the new information you got!
Thanks for sharing yours on the organ donating! I wonder how many other areas of life you could actually apply this too?
The nudge theory โ email subscribers to Budgetsaresexy.com :)
Hahaโฆ I like the way you think ;)
My old job allowed for people to enroll in an automatic 1% increase of their 401(K) once a year but capped out at 15%. Since I was already investing greater than 15% it didnโt do me any good. And our contacts werenโt able to explain to me why it got capped there when, for most of us, that would be nowhere close to maxing out so yay for trying and boo for not making it very effective?
that is strange? maybe itโs to protect people from โgoing too much overโ, which of course would actually be a good thing? ;) At least give yโall the option to โopt intoโ higher levels!
I think I selected a plan that gradually increases my contribution to my retirement planโฆsee, this proves the theory. I canโt even remember!
Hahaโฆ you should log into it one day and see how much youโve accumulated over all these years of forgetting :)
Ugh! Iโm really feeling the endowment effect right now. Weโre trying to sell our old condo and itโs taking longer than Iโd like. We might have to lower the price. :(
That blows, Iโm sorry :(
Maybe you can lower it enough where you might get a couple of people fighting over it?? Some of the homes Iโm looking at for our move are being sold within HOURS with multiple offers coming in โ and are all priced either dead on or lower to drum up the excitementโฆ (except for the buyers who then have to compete!)
Iโve been doing the โsave more tomorrowโ thing with my husband and Iโs raises for years. Now I have a name for it! It works really well, since you canโt miss something you never had. I learned about it from a neighbor years ago, who always said she planned on retiring at age 40, and just a few months ago, she did just that :-)
First comment after lurking for about a year. Love this blog!
HEYYY COOL!!!
On both your neighborโs retirement and you finally stopping by to say hi to me :)
Hello! *Waves*
Thatโs really interesting because my employer just put auto enrollment in our 401(k) at the top matching percentage this year. To not be auto enrolled you need to go to a website and decline. Iโm curious how many people will bother to do that. I have a feeling participation in our 401k is going to go way up this year!
YES IT WILL!!!
Thatโs awesome theyโre doing that!! :)
I agree that โmental accountingโ can be irrational and detrimental (sometimes). For example, I had a friend who had budgeted year after year and gotten around $3000 into a savings fund for emergencies. Then something happened to their car and it would need over $1000 in repairs. My friend was freaking out because she was only thinking of their monthly income and the balance in their checking account. She was nearly in tears before someone reminded her about her emergency fund and since this car repair is an emergency, that should be exactly what it is for. She still struggled with it because she doesnโt want her emergency fund to get too low but it just goes to show how different it might have been if the money was just sitting in her checking account.
On the other hand, I think itโs helpful to โseparate my money in my mind.โ Otherwise, I would probably have zero saved for emergencies because the total in my checking account would seem like itโs enough for a purchase here and another purchase there, until itโs gone, haha!
That emergency fund thing is totally real!!!
Even us $$ bloggers have a hard time spending it because it just looks so nice and pretty sitting there finally after years of building it up!! Who wants to spend any of it and have to re-fill again?? ;)
As someone familiar with Chicago (at least from some pics on your site), youโll appreciate the great example of the nudge effect on Lake Shore Drive and Oak Street, where the lines on the curve (designed to get you to slow down) are not evenly spaced but instead are put at increasingly closer distances as you approach the curve to give you the illusion of going faster (so you thus slow down even more):
https://nudges.wordpress.com/tag/traffic/
I also will absolutely recommend Thaler/Sussteinโs book Nudge, if youโre into this sort of stuffโฆ.great insight into easy ways to improve our world by turning human inertia/laziness/misperceptions to a socially optimal advantage.
Woww that is cool! Love seeing all the applications with it!
And yes to that book too โ been on my list for a while and then keep forgetting about itโฆ I think its time to finally scoop it up from the library :)
Oh! I love this guy! I heard him on the Freakonomics podcast and could never remember the expression โmental accountingโ to read more about it. Thanks!
Here is the podcast:
http://freakonomics.com/podcast/richard-thaler/
People Arenโt Dumb. The World Is Hard. (Ep. 340)
Oooooh thank you!!! That sounds like a fantastic listen!