Some of you still remember the time when people got wages every week. There was a lot of playing in pubs afterwards, somewhere even until the Sunday morning. Everything changed later. People of every social status and every profession were forced to the system of salaries paid after the whole month and advances paid between salaries. Although parts of this system are still alive, many things have changed with the use of debit cards. Direct debit services have done away with the concern about common payments and so the focus of personal finance changed to saving, borrowing and pocket money, i.e. money we have for everyday use. It is usually less than we would consider appropriate.

People lost sight of how to spread all money – not just money for everyday use and irregular expenses, but also the money saved as an appropriate reserve for unexpected occasions. This happens especially if they make the mistake of comparing their consumption with the consumption of other people.
There are two cultural traditions formed a very long time ago. One of them leads to the formal habit of saving which can be described as thrift. The other one distinguishes between the time when we need to keep the behaviour of everyday low consumption and the time when we should not be too thrifty, which is especially on holidays and social events. It depends very much on the environment we live in and on personal preferences, but it is always important to keep an overall long-term balance and to know that every coin has two sides. The opposite of this balance is irresponsibility, which is connected with a high risk and low social potential of the person for long-term relations.