13. Making a personal budget.

When you live on your own you understand that something should be done with your unlimited wants and limited resources. You should use your income as effectively as possible. Choices must be made concerning spending and saving. You never know whether you can afford another афсшдшешуы. Then you come to the conclusion that you must develop a useful personal budget. And if you want to do it you should keep track of your actual income and expenses for a month, and, of course, at first you have to clear out what should be recorded.

Sources of income you can rely on include allowance, part-time jobs and interest on savings, if you have a bank account. You should record only take-home pay, including all deductions.

Then you should record different kinds of expenses. Fixed expenses are set in advance and must be paid regularly . They are rent payments, tuition for example. Flexible expenses are necessary but change with circumstances (food, clothing, college supplies). Optional expenses are not always necessary (entertainment, personal care). Better to make expense chart. Obviously, income should be higher than expenses.

Budget should be flexible. It will change from month to month and should be reviewed every month.

14. The Value of a college education.

An understanding of opportunity costs and tradeoffs is important personally to high school students. Sooner or later they must make choices about what to do after graduation. And most of students ask themselves about the relationship between education and individual’s earning. Definitely, further education is worth the time and money involved, it provides the great variety of courses.

The opportunity costs of going to college involve a loss of income and a loss of practical job experience while attending college.

The trade-offs involved in going to college include using time and money now to gain greater advantages in the future. Nobody will give you a job if you haven’t got education and knowledge.

Also it’s better to use a chart which shows lifetime earnings estimates based on the level of education. According to it, a person who graduates can expect to earn much more than a person who doesn’t graduate.

15. Comparing prices.

Learning to make informed decisions about buying food will result in economic skills that last a lifetime.

To understand how buying decisions are made better to make a shopping list of 10 basic food items, then go to several shops and find out the range of unit cost for each item. To begin with decide what kind of a commodity to buy as there are many brands. After consumers generally consider the price. The next step is the evaluating the quality, which may be different.

A wide variety of prices, brands, sizes and advertising gimmicks influence you when you enter a store. Some stores indicate the unit price for the items on the shelves. Although quality or kind of a product contributes to the price, generally the larger the quantity, the less per unit cost. Buying in quantity can often help us spend less.

At the same time there is one more very important factor influencing buyer’s decision – advertising. You can trust brands that have been around for a long time but maybe you want to try a newcomer. Also the consumer’s decision is a matter of personal taste.

In conclusion I’d like to say that many factors influence buying decisions, and choices are not simple for consumers. Smart buyers must obtain product information and then compare and evaluate that information.