Being kind to yourself > Listening to Money Gurus
There’s an unending trend of advice on how to be frugal, how to save up money, and how to make money. But they always seem to be short of any form of kindness. People seem so easy to pass judgement on the low wage-earning person purchasing a cup of Starbucks (or an alternative expensive cuppa).
Here, what people seem to miss is that this low-wage person or someone in a difficult situation may be having his or her cup of expensive coffee as the only form of luxury or enjoyment. We don’t know (and we will never know) what these people are going through. And for some people on low wages, it may actually be almost impossible for them to become well off or even to escape from the current misery.
This problem is even called perverse in developed countries than in developing countries. Because in a developing country (aka a poor country), the majority of people are poor, and therefore, being a poor person in a poor country, you are in pain, but you are the majority and it’s actually very, importantly well visible.
And I will give some examples, a poor person in a rural household may have less need for an expensive branded coffee because there’s actually no expensive coffee chain in that rural place and the whole village is of more or less equal in terms of their purchasing power, etc.
Going next up, even in a poor country like Myanmar, if you go to large cities such as Yangon(Rangoon) or Mandalay, then the wealth divide becomes more visible. Here you will see young people who may spend up to their whole day wage on a cup of ice bubble tea as a treat or as a luxury or as a way to belong in the progressing urban life.
When we move to a more developed country such as Malaysia, and of course, there is Starbucks and more expensive bubble tea chains, and there’s a greater pressure to spend more, plus in a more developed country even Malaysia, with a mature financial market, people can actually get into debt, including credit card debt, which can actually add to greater mental problems by extra stress, etc. of debt.
Finally, when you move to even more developed cities such as Sydney or London, and then, of course, you can make the deduction that it will make worse for people from the bottom of the pyramid (the bottom of the pyramid is a term used by international development professionals when conducting projects in undeveloped countries, which is actually very relevant to impoverished parts of many of these donor countries, such as the UK or US (example, Chicago).
Sucks to be poor, there’s something worse — Sucks to be poor in a rich country.
So yeah, next time before you judge someone for splurging on latte grande — do remember that it may be a ticket of temporary salvation….Even better withhold judgement.
With metta
