People who are able to build wealth and accomplish the goals they set for themselves continuously think about the world differently than people who are complacent and find themselves stagnant instead of accelerating toward the life they want.

Differences in ways of thinking, such as feeling like you have control of your life vs. letting life “happen” to you, having the courage to embrace change instead of letting it hold you back, and being humble enough to constantly learn new things; are examples of mindset differences between those who will eventually have and those who will continue to have not.

I thought JD meant “irrational” in a more technical sense, not the looney tunes sense.

BTW, my neighbourhood thrift stores don’t put out ripped or stained clothes. Perhaps others are different.

Nah, you really weren’t far off when you said $20

I get the whole “kids grow out of it in a minute” argument, and it’s great that you are passing your clothes on to the nth child since it’s still got life in it. That isn’t my complaint at all.

Actually I think my point is humans NEVER behave rationally, we always behave emotionally. There are always value judgements in play. We delude ourselves if we think otherwise.

But, I will not let it go — he’s not excused for his rational comment. You may or may not be able to find brand new things at a thrift store. If you do, more power to you and sure then it’s the “rational” choice. If you are buying it USED at a thrift store, there is no way you can claim “maximal quality” as your criteria for feeling you’ve made a rational choice. It’s a ridiculous assertion.

That is my point. Shop thrift stores all you want. Stop feeling superior over it. You aren’t. You aren’t inherently more virtuous because you go to Goodwill instead of retail. (You also aren’t more inherently virtuous because you shop retail instead of Goodwill.) At Goodwill you’re there with the intent of buying USED stuff for cheaper than NEW, unless it’s your lucky day and you find new stuff at Goodwill. But you can’t count on finding the new stuff.

Just be honest about it.

JD gave you a reasonable explanation. Let it go. Nobody is judging you as irrational. He did not mean it.

It amounts to being a trade off.
Buy at thrift store = function of (opportunity cost, wear n tear, …)*SAVINGS*MINDSET.

Mindset is part of the Math !!!

$20 for a onesie? Seriously, they grow out of them in like 4 minutes. We’ve always outfitted our kids in used clothes, believe me – no one suffered. Besides, leave the Baby Gap and Gymboree stuff for relatives to buy.

We sold a bunch of kids clothes at a garage sale last month. Some of those will be on their 4th or 5th kid, and there is plenty of life left in those.

Ummm, if you ever shopped in a Goodwill you would find there are many items that still have their pricetags on them. Most people don’t shop for used onesies anyway. I guess you have to enjoy the hunt to enjoy shopping at thrift stores. My MIL once bought a brand new pair of shoes (suggested retail $150) for $5 and our dining room table was found at one for a measly 10 bucks. Personally, I think anyone who pays $20 for one onesie is insane. You can get a whole pack at Target for under $15. Babies just stain them anyway.

The problem with shopping at thrift stores now is that so many more people are doing it because of the economy and more people are holding onto their stuff there is less to choose from. When all my debt is gone I will still shop at thrift stores.

One thing you would have to convince me of, is that Goodwill is actually delivering “maximal quality” at “minimal price” as opposed to Baby Gap. I would contend that it does not, and cannot ever. Simply because by default, something that is used is going to have already had it’s “maximal quality” diminished relative to something brand new.

Let me state it this way. You buy a onesie at Baby Gap for $20. You go to Goodwill and find the same exact onesie for $1. You are saying it is rational to buy the Goodwill one.

I contend it is not. It’s still an emotional decision. Because the Goodwill one is used. It’s had some of its utilitarian value diminished already because it’s used. Maybe it’s stained. Maybe seams or hems are a little frayed. Maybe there is nothing visibly flawed about it, but it still has been used and therefore it still does not have comparable value to when it was sitting brand new in the Baby Gap store.

When you shop at Goodwill, you are still employing a set of emotional and psychological criteria to your purchase.

Now, if you leave Baby Gap, go into JC Penney, and find the same onsie selling brand new for $15 — THEN you have the opportunity to make the rational choice. Because the “maximal quality” there is comparable to what’s at Baby Gap.

Many of us are super-frugal in all aspects of life except our kids. I’m willing to spend all kinds of money on things that will give my child an opportunity in life (music lessons, language lessons, etc.), but I clamp down on spending on stuff.

My greatest frugal kid coup: my neighbor loves to shop for her daughter who is one year older than mine. Twice a year, when she cleans out the closets, I willingly pay her $50 for all the hand-me-downs I want. Often there are more than I could possibly use. I get to pay $100 for an entire years worth of clothes. Nice.

also, some how i stupidly gave the lasik company my personal email. i plan on getting lasik some day. when we’re out of debt and i can pay cash. but when that email showed up for one split second i fantasized about having it done now. i had to immediately delete that email.

If you asked Dave, he would likely agree with you – “once someone makes a strong commitment to pay off debt, it doesn’t really matter how they do it”. He teaches the Debt Snowball because it is the most effective method from a standpoint of actually completing it.

In The Total Money Makeover he likens debt reduction to weight loss. If your first weight loss goal is to lose 30 lbs, then you are not very likely to succeed, even if you have the weight to lose. It’s just too lofty of a goal. Now if your first goal is to lose 3 lbs, then 5 more, then 5 more, then 10…. psychologically these goals are more attainable and after some quick wins, you’ll gain confidence and will be more likely to continue the plan. The Debt Snowball is no different.

You raise a valid point. And, it’s one that I’ve wondered about. I think that once someone makes a strong commitment to pay off debt, it doesn’t really matter how they do it. Dave Ramsey says that the snowball method is better than paying the highest debt first. But how does he back up his claim. In reality, he doesn’t have to back it up. He just has to sell that concept to others. And he has done so quite successfully.

Advertising is an amazing thing. I’ve studied consumer behavior and applied those principles in various situations and found them successful. Conversely, when we only allowed our daughter to watch commercial-free TV (PBS Kids, Noggin), this amazing thing happened. Errr, didn’t happen – she didn’t beg for toys and cereal and all the other junk they push on kids.

An advancement in years doesn’t change the affect of advertising on people.

Amy Daczyzyn explores that in the Tightwad Gazette.

The time value of money argument is misleading. It suggests that a person making $35 per hour would use work time (without pay) to shop at Goodwill, whereas in reality most people would shop around the working hours, when they are earning nothing.

“Time is money” is really only valid when the time spent results in a net loss of money. Outside of working hours, the opportunity cost generally doesn’t represent a dollar value, it represents a “I could be doing something else” value.

It’s fine if other people want to shop in other places. I just will not patronize Walmart, Target or a plethora of other large companies, but that’s just me.
I like that I can support the local economy, contribute to work training programs for the educably mentally disabled and recycle at the same time.

However, I do not run my life from a strictly mathematical point of view. I will pay extra for food from local farmers who I know farm in a way I approve of. It’s all about what is important to you…not what is mathematically sound.