The Trouble with Dollars

It's a moment familiar to every good Trekist, and a surprising number of non-fans as well: they've just unlocked the overhead hatch leading to the grain storage compartment, and Captain Kirk has been buried to the waist with tribbles, when Dr. McCoy runs in and tells them he's figured out the solution to the trouble: don't feed the tribbles, and they'll stop reproducing. Kirk looks up from the huge mass of furry little creatures which have been gorging themselves for days, and mutters "Now he tells me." It's one of the best moments of one of the best episodes of one of the best television programs ever made, and like so many other parts of that production, it's surprising how often the same principle comes up in other contexts...

Take the headline in USA Today this week: "The Key to Saving Money: Just Don't Spend It!" Great; now they tell us. It's kind of like telling someone who has gone bankrupt that they need more money, or someone who's drowning that they need less water. It's not wrong, exactly, but it's no help, either. Most people have no idea how to stop spending money, or what they should do with it instead; just telling them to stop isn't going to do any good. The simple fact is that a stronger credit rating, a comfortable retirement or even a higher bank balance are all abstractions, whereas whatever it is you feel like buying at the moment is both concrete and immediate gratification into the bargain. You might as well tell people not to feed the tribbles...

Back when we were kids, my parents introduced me and my sister to the idea of saving money through one of the simplest methods possible: a matching program. Any money that we wanted to deposit in our savings accounts they'd match one-for-one. Of course, when you're 6 years old, that doesn't amount to much -- I think my allowance at the time was a quarter. But back in 1970, 25 cents would buy me two candy bars and five pieces of penny candy, or an ice cream cone at Baskin-Robbins, and the idea of not only earning interest on my money but also getting my parents to double it had a very strong appeal. They discontinued the program when I was a pre-teen and started earning money outside the home, but by then I had the kernel of the savings account I would eventually use to buy the house I'm sitting in...

Now, I'm not suggesting that this by itself would be enough to alleviate the savings crisis in this country; those habits are learned in childhood, and most of the people overspending, running up huge credit card bills, and never saving a dime are already adults. But the concept of matching accounts has been used with considerable success in adult populations; the donor- and grant-supported Individual Development Account (IDA) programs being a perfect example. In an IDA program members of an at-risk or in-need group (orphans aging out of the foster care system, for example) are given bank accounts that can only be accessed under agreed-upon conditions (for living expenses once they turn 18, in the above example). All deposits made to those accounts are matched by donors, businesses, government agencies, the bank holding the deposits, or whoever is backing the IDA program...

Massive social change -- like converting Americans from a nation of debtors into a nation of savers -- does not happen overnight. If we want to make that kind of change, then we need to start now, with small-scale savings programs for school children, IDA programs for people in need and at risk, and support for people trying to afford college tuition, retirement programs and house payments. As a wise man once said, we have to become the change we want to see in the world, or at least promote that change in our spending habits. Or else, we can probably count on seeing a lot more tribbles...