My pet peeve: people who confuse frugality with cheapness. Here’s how I see it:
- Frugal people think long-term.
- Cheap people think short-term.
- Frugal people like delayed gratification.
- Cheap people like immediate gratification.
- Frugal people believe less is more.
- Cheap people believe more is best.
- Frugal people select quality goods.
- Cheap people hoard cheap goods.
- Frugal people repurpose, reuse, repair things.
- Cheap people throw things out.
Does that clear it up just a little bit? I hope so🙂.
But it’s an ongoing challenge to constantly remind my two teens about the difference between frugality and cheap. It pains me when they think that my husband, Steve, and I are cheap when we are just making a choice on how to best spend our money and time. They may feel deprived because they don’t have iPhones like the rest of their friends…but they do have cell phones and iPods! No one is going without in our home. And, we try explaining to them that even millionaires are frugal, but that they are hardly cheap! Frugal millionaires are just more thoughtful than the rest of society about where and when they choose to spend their valuable time and money. That’s the absolute key to wealth, in my humble opinion.
~Marilyn, TFF
Two Frugal Fairfielders 