By Sandra Aamodt and Sam Wang

DECLINING house prices, rising job layoffs, skyrocketing oil costs and a major credit crunch have brought consumer confidence to its lowest point in five years. With a relatively long recession looking increasingly likely, many American families may be planning to tighten their belts.

Interestingly, restraining our consumer spending, in the short term, may cause us to actually loosen the belts around our waists. What’s the connection? The brain has a limited capacity for self-regulation, so exerting willpower in one area often leads to backsliding in others. The good news, however, is that practice increases willpower capacity, so that in the long run, buying less now may improve our ability to achieve future goals — like losing those 10 pounds we gained when we weren’t out shopping.

The brain’s store of willpower is depleted when people control their thoughts, feelings or impulses, or when they modify their behavior in pursuit of goals. Psychologist Roy Baumeister and others have found that people who successfully accomplish one task requiring self-control are less persistent on a second, seemingly unrelated task.

In one pioneering study, some people were asked to eat radishes while others received freshly baked chocolate chip cookies before trying to solve an impossible puzzle. The radish-eaters abandoned the puzzle in eight minutes on average, working less than half as long as people who got cookies or those who were excused from eating radishes. Similarly, people who were asked to circle every “e” on a page of text then showed less persistence in watching a video of an unchanging table and wall.

Other activities that deplete willpower include resisting food or drink, suppressing emotional responses, restraining aggressive or sexual impulses, taking exams and trying to impress someone. Task persistence is also reduced when people are stressed or tired from exertion or lack of sleep.

What limits willpower? Some have suggested that it is blood sugar, which brain cells use as their main energy source and cannot do without for even a few minutes. Most cognitive functions are unaffected by minor blood sugar fluctuations over the course of a day, but planning and self-control are sensitive to such small changes. Exerting self-control lowers blood sugar, which reduces the capacity for further self-control. People who drink a glass of lemonade between completing one task requiring self-control and beginning a second one perform equally well on both tasks, while people who drink sugarless diet lemonade make more errors on the second task than on the first. Foods that persistently elevate blood sugar, like those containing protein or complex carbohydrates, might enhance willpower for longer periods.

In the short term, you should spend your limited willpower budget wisely. For example, if you do not want to drink too much at a party, then on the way to the festivities, you should not deplete your willpower by window shopping for items you cannot afford. Taking an alternative route to avoid passing the store would be a better strategy.

On the other hand, if you need to study for a big exam, it might be smart to let the housecleaning slide to conserve your willpower for the more important job. Similarly, it can be counterproductive to work toward multiple goals at the same time if your willpower cannot cover all the efforts that are required. Concentrating your effort on one or at most a few goals at a time increases the odds of success.

Focusing on success is important because willpower can grow in the long term. Like a muscle, willpower seems to become stronger with use. The idea of exercising willpower is seen in military boot camp, where recruits are trained to overcome one challenge after another.

In psychological studies, even something as simple as using your non-dominant hand to brush your teeth for two weeks can increase willpower capacity. People who stick to an exercise program for two months report reducing their impulsive spending, junk food intake, alcohol use and smoking. They also study more, watch less television and do more housework. Other forms of willpower training, like money-management classes, work as well.

No one knows why willpower can grow with practice but it must reflect some biological change in the brain. Perhaps neurons in the frontal cortex, which is responsible for planning behavior, or in the anterior cingulate cortex, which is associated with cognitive control, use blood sugar more efficiently after repeated challenges. Or maybe one of the chemical messengers that neurons use to communicate with one another is produced in larger quantities after it has been used up repeatedly, thereby improving the brain’s willpower capacity.

Whatever the explanation, consistently doing any activity that requires self-control seems to increase willpower — and the ability to resist impulses and delay gratification is highly associated with success in life.

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There’s been some talk on Twitter about food prices. Normally I avoid thinking about how much I spend on food, ’cause it’s a lot. But today I faced the ugly truth.

How does this compare to prices where you are?

For reference, that’s a 5lb (2.27kg) bag of potatoes, about 1.5lb (700g) of cherries, and 10 medium figs per box. Obscene-looking root is horseradish.

Green – organic, orange – conventional.

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New York Times

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I want to thank the people who make our life easier. I really like our mailman, my hairdresser and the butcher. Our building manager is pretty nice and helpful, too.

Tough to decide what to give: don’t want to seem like a total cheapskate but still want to show “we appreciate you”. And you never know what they’re allergic or morally opposed to.

We gave chocolate truffles to a client once. When he called to thank us, he said “Even though I have diabetes, my granddaughter enjoyed them very much”. And yet candy seems like a safe choice. In worst case, they can just re-gift it.

• The Mailman got a special edition holiday Toblerone ($8.50). Everyone loves Toblerones, right? He didn’t seem very moved but said that he’s in our area for awhile, hopefully he’ll be here next year as well (his words). So I’m thinking he wasn’t too offended. I thought about giving money but it’s against the law.
• I tipped the Hairdresser 100%. I did well here, she was happy, everyone loves cash.
• The Building Manager will either get a box of cookies or a Tim Horton’s gift card. He’s always carrying a Tim’s cup.
• The Butcher is tricky. We shop at the Whole Foods, so would a WF gift card be appropriate? A steak? cash? I’m open to ideas. He is a very friendly young guy. I don’t want him to misinterpret it though.

Holiday tipping guide from CNN
The article suggests that cash is the best choice, average recommended tip is $20 or so, with some going a lot higher.

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Sobeys is the most expensive grocery store in the entire Toronto. We shop for the bulk of our food at the Whole Foods store and the local market, but Sobeys is the closest, so sometimes we go there for convenience. Even the Whole Foods, known for its ‘not very low prices’ beat Sobeys, by a wide margin, on organic and regular products.

Sobeys prices are outrageous as it is, and 2 out of 3 times we go there, we end up getting stiffed! They overcharge on their already ridiculous sticker prices by 20 to 50 cents. So I buy 4 items, and 2 of them scan wrong, and I end up “gifting” $0.50-$1 Sobeys? Not so fast.

I’m very tired of having to dispute the prices, then wait for the cashier take the time to slowly check if I’m lying. Then, she looks down on me like I’m such a loser for not overpaying. I especially “enjoy” this attitude from a bright-pink-haired girl with about 8 piercings in her face. She probably thinks “Even I can afford to overpay to this wonderful corporation”.

I understand that they assume I want the item for free, but I always insist that I just want to pay the correct price. (In Ontario there’s a law that says if an item’s scanned price is higher than the posted shelf price, you get the item for free, up to $10.)

It’s not that I can’t afford an extra 20 to 50 cents (let me remind you – on the already highly inflated prices). It’s a matter of the principle.

Since it’s happened about 50 times since spring – no exaggeration! – I’m confident it’s their corporate policy. I have noticed that Canadians are generally very shy, and even if they do dispute something at the cash, they blush and apologize to everyone in the line. It must not happen very often and worth an occasional free item. Just think how much more they pull in by scalping off a few cents here and there.

I just feel mad, not embarrassed, when this happens.

Also, briefly, they’re definitely not “fresh obsessed” (I know it’s the Dominion’s slogan, just saying that Sobeys is not like that – at all). Stuff is allowed to go bad right on the shelves.

I avoid going to the Sobeys stores unless I absolutely have to. Oh, and Sobeys – you suck.

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Finding total happiness is the ultimate goal for many people — but should it be? New research suggests that if wealth and success are also at the top of your list, the two goals may be somewhat incompatible.

Diener and his colleagues used data from the World Values Survey, which measures the happiness of respondents on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 the happiest). They found that income did indeed increase along with happiness but not at the very top. The 10s earned significantly less than the 8s and the 9s. The latter were also more likely to have gone to college, have engaged in the political process and have saved money.

Why is it better to be happy but not euphoric? Diener’s take is that happy – but not too happy – people are strivers. They’re interested in making the sorts of changes necessary to get ahead in life, including engaging in competition (not always a happy pursuit), obtaining more education and changing their behavior when what they’re doing now isn’t working. The 10s, on the other hand, are too complacent to adjust enough…

Extreme optimists (those who overestimated their own life spans by 20 years or more), additional research shows, also behaved in other ways that weren’t good for their future. They accumulated debt and didn’t save. Moderate optimists, recognizing that their luck could run out, saved more than the extreme optimists did.

Source: CNN

In other words, happiness makes you complacent and lazy.

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The economic benefit of paying as little as possible to save money is lost if you have to pay the second time to fix the result.

A couple of anecdotes:

• Last year I dyed my hair at home, and had to pay the hair dresser to have the color fixed. Color corrections cost more than a simple dye job. Have I learned the lesson? You bet.
• We bought a fairly expensive item ($1,300) last year from a small store. The owner gave us a discount, but his return policy is “no returns”. The item turned out to be not what we wanted and we ended up having to re-sell it on Ebay, taking a monetary hit, of course. In the end we lost more than we saved, not to mention all the time and worry of selling on Ebay.

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This post was prompted by a late run to the grocery store.

P.S. How about that snow! Lovin’ it.

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Overall I’m pretty bored with money right now:

- stocks are not moving. Suppose I should be grateful they’re not down more than they are. I keep dreaming about numbers and charts and crazy breakouts, *must*take*a*break. It’s like computer games all over again (overplayed them at one time, started dreaming in Tetris and Super Mario. Yeah a long time ago.)

- it’s warm outside and makes me want to spend money, not save it. But in winter it’s so miserable I want to spend it, too. It’s a year-long affliction.

- I’ve only sent 4 invoices this month (typically it’s 8-12). One client keeps begging for an invoice – time to get worried about my lazy invoicing habits?!

- Again – warm out, too lazy to make graphs. Those are usually amusing when the weather is ugly.

Hope y’all are enjoying the summer!

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In March (first contract month) they added on $17.10 activation fee, so our total bill came to $44.56, about $5 less than before. It was supposed to have been around $30-35. This was most likely a computer error – they assumed since we signed a new contract, we must be a new customer (not so!), so they or it charged us an activation fee.

Of course I called them the minute I noticed it on the credit card statement, and they graciously removed the charge, but I spent yet another 15 minutes straightening this out. Really hoping next month it’ll go as planned.

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