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Earning and Saving Money

Here are the best tips to becoming a better earner and saver.

By Carlos FoxPublished 5 years ago 3 min read
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Making money isn’t easy, and neither is saving it. But you’ll need to do both if you’re going to provide for yourself and your loved ones, get the most out of the things that you enjoy, and save up for a comfortable retirement.

With that in mind, it’s good to know a few tips for building a steady income, increasing your earning power, and keeping sneaky costs from eating into your careful savings. There’s no magic bullet or secret recipe here, but hopefully you’ll find something that helps you become a better earner and saver.

Building a steady income and growing your earning power

There are two important things to consider, when it comes to earning your money. The first, of course, is how much you earn. The second is how steady and reliable your income is.

Here’s an extreme example to illustrate the point: let’s say that you’re an NFL running back. You’re earning good money, because the minimum salary in the National Football League is nearly half a million dollars per year.

But your job security is less than ideal. An injury could end your career, and even “long” careers for running backs are much shorter than most careers. So you’ll need to be extra careful and build up a big emergency fund.

You do have some control, of course, over what sort of career you have and what kind of job security you can expect. You could seek out specialized skills to increase your earning power and protect your job.

Take court reporters, for instance. To be a court reporter, you need very specialized skills, according to experts who employ court reporters in Fort Lauderdale. You’d use a special device called a stenotype to take down every word said in court proceedings. You’d have to work through thick and thin, no matter how fast the lawyers talk or how serious the crime being detailed is.

But great court reporters are irreplaceable, because their skills are so specialized and because no computer program can yet come close to the precision and real-time judgment of a court reporter. Unlike the running back, the court reporter will never be locked out of their job market.

Increasing your earning power within your career is something that you can do by gaining new skills, or new degrees and certificates that prove you have those skills. Going back to school costs money, but it could help you further your career and increase both your earning power and your job security in the long run.

Or perhaps you’ll find that you can gain skills while on the job, which will help you move up the ranks. The key is to never stop improving and specializing.

Save, save, save

Earning money is only half of the equation here. The other half is saving money. Going back to job security and emergency funds: the less sure that you are of your next paycheck or your next year on the job, the bigger your emergency fund should be.

Beyond that, you should cultivate savings in bank accounts (where you can quickly access them when you need them). As soon as you can afford to, you should invest. It’s investing that will give you the interest you need in order to grow your wealth and beat inflation.

But where are all of these savings coming from? They’re coming from the money that you don’t spend on nonsense. What you need to do is create a personal budget (or a household budget, or a family budget, depending on your situation) and start carefully tracking where your money is going. Keeping a spending diary can be a great way to do this.

And look out for waste. What kind of waste? How about trendy smartphones? This isn’t to say you should go without a smartphone, because it’s hard to get by without one these days. But you don’t need to upgrade too often.

An iPhone 7 screen replacement is a much more affordable way to stay in the smartphone game than turning around and buying a brand-new iPhone XS. And choosing local repair shops can save you even more.

You’re sure to spot your own wasteful habits if you look carefully enough. Maybe you spend too much on trendy clothes that will be out of style next year, or maybe you eat too much take-out. Police your habits and start saving what you’ve worked so hard to earn!

personal finance
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