Budget Diagnosis What is the thing that drives each of us? Survival. No matter where you are or where you work, survival is the very livelihood that drives people to want to succeed. People want to take a look at how they can be successful and move up in the world. Now while promotions and an increased income are key to building one’s personal wealth, another factor that can derail a successful person is how they handle their finances. If you are unable to control what you are spending and weigh yourself down in debt, it becomes impossible to begin to build personal wealth. Reflecting on my own budget, the diagnosis of income versus expenses identified some key areas where improvement can occur and serves as an example for others to …show more content…
While month to month may vary, I took a look at my previous month expenses and identified some warning signs that I can focus on improving. The first thing, is while I am putting about $400 in retirement and investment accounts, and while that builds over time, that is not as much as I want to be putting away. Due to the fluctuating market those retirement accounts will build over time but I need to continue to push a bigger percentage of my income into those accounts. As discussed, “Saving 15 percent or more is something to aspire to…The key is being proactive and staying the course when markets get chaotic.” (Woolley, 2015). I identified two areas of concern that I can cut back on that should increase these amounts I am able to put into the retirement accounts. These areas are dining out costs and phone costs. I see reasonable cost cutting avenues in these two areas which should allot another $400 towards investment and retirement accounts. Following through with these actions would net an estimated $4,800 per year towards these accounts. While these avenues are geared more towards the long-term future another area to address is a savings …show more content…
While I have identified some ways to add to my retirement and investment accounts my first realistic step should to be solidify my savings to a point that would set me up for success. While I do have savings, my emergency fund does not have a realistic impact to handle an actual emergency. While it sits around the $5,000 range a real emergency, a loss of a job for example, would require, at a minimum, ten times the amount I currently have. As emergencies tend to have a lingering effect and last a few months, I plan to increase my safety net over time to reach a point where if I were out of work for three to nine months, I would still be financially stable for basic necessities. This action, along with an increase of what I put in savings monthly, is a building block for success in case disaster strikes. While I have a decent amount set aside I intend to increase that amount to ensure future success. This can be done through setting aside a certain amount per month and not deviating from that amount. While all savings are critical, implementing these actions is the key to it
The goal of this course is to get you thinking about personal finance issues at a point in your life when you still have time to benefit from the power of time in generating wealth to accomplish your other life goals. The financial decisions you make early in life with determine in great extent the quality of life you will enjoy later, especially given the turbulent and uncertain economic conditions. Money isn’t everything, but a lack of it will impact almost every aspect of your life and those who surround you.
There are four long-term challenges facing the US today that must be addressed by the next President and Congress. These are serious challenges, and are not small tasks to accomplish. By any means the challenges the next President and Congress faces will be discussed in fully on how they impact the economy and what steps should be taken to fix them. Before I deliberate the four topics in detail - I am going to give a brief description of each topic; The first topic that most importantly needs to be discussed is the national debt, When someone mentions $17 trillion dollars what do you think? What comes to most minds is that is an excessive amount of money. Truth be told that is sadly the amount of debt the United States has incurred, and that number is growing at an extensive rate each day. When I have concluded the ending of my discussion the debt will have already increased significantly. That deficit will need to be reduced through a combination of spending cuts and/or revenue increases that will yield a net savings of $1.345 trillion dollars by 2030.
Analyze the challenges that organizations face in the effective transition between selling products using the traditional brick and mortar marketing channel and selling products online. Synthesize the strategies that organizations like Zara and Wal-Mart- two companies that are having difficulty developing eCommerce capability can implement to increase the effortless movement of customers between the traditional and online channels.
As you can see from the pie chart you biggest sources of cash outflows are taxes and living expenses. While I think your family is doing well financially you could benefit greatly from reducing your everyday living expenses. Your family spends a significant amount of money on recreations, vacations, and other personal expenses. By cutting down on these expenses you would be able to invest more money into your children’s education expenses or your own retirements. Currently you are only investing 9% of your income into educational expenses and 6 percent of your income towards retirement.
There were many different financial tools I can make use of that would greatly benefit me in the future, as well as right now in present day. Some financial tools that I can use to make better decision financially are budgets. There are many different types of budgeting systems that can be utilized. Budgeting will help me have a clear goal of what is safe to spend and what needs to be utilized for spending on appropriate items for daily living. With defined goals. It is easier to monitor, track and trend spending. One can better plan for items such as vacations, or for retirement. Using a budget allows one to be conservative with their spending. I can also use a more defined and complete budgeting system such as a comprehensive budget. (Rachel Siegal and Carol Yacht, Personal Finance, Published December 2009). This will allows all facets of my life financially to be monitored and tracked. To show recurring income and expenses deriving from daily life, an operating budget can be utilized. (Accounting Tools, What Are the Types of Budget Models;
Overcoming financial difficulties is not easy, but understanding where money comes from and where it goes would help ease budgeting in that the importance of financial security would prove itself to make life less chaotic in the long-run. Writing things down, organizing money appropriately, adapting to life’s changes, following things through, and actively seeking information is necessary for a “rich” life. For example, goals, as indicated in the book, are vital in determining one’s ability of spending, saving, or sharing. Without goals, the destination one reaches could potentially be financially devastating. Having goals would lay the foundation down for developing new skills in saving money. Saving money is heavily encouraged for good reasons; it gives people a peace of mind, emergency cushion, retirement, down payment on big-ticket items, and an increase in luxurious opportunities or items. Although, most the benefits that stem from saving are not shown immediately, their future-self would sincerely thank themselves for their financial
Personal Finance has always been an emotional topic in the United States. Today, many Americans are generating unlimited wealth and living exceptional lives, while others are struggling to make ends meet. Evidently, people’s actions and beliefs are the deciding factors in their achievement of wealth. So, this huge gap in wealth between rich and poor people has a special connection with the philosophy and attitude of each individual toward personal finance.
Another expense results with budget expectations is capital purchases. Capital purchases are those that cost an organization more than $5,000. Such purchases include radiology equipment, lab equipment, computer systems. Unexpected expenses occur when equipment failure occurs and a need for new or repaired equipment arises or when unexpected volumes of patients require additional capital purchases of equipment to be made. “Working capital management is the role of the manager, in ensuring that there is adequate cash on hand to meet the organization’s needs and minimizing the cost of those resources” (Finkler et al., 2007, p. 360). Variances occur when multiple unexpected costs arise and that reserved cash is expended and needs to assume short-term loans or take away from other departments is necessary. This type of unexpected spending may be categorized as an unfavorable variance. Unfavorable variances are “variances in which more is spent than the budgeted amount” (Finkler et al., 2007, p. 501).
In order to achieve anything in life, the person needs to set goals and clear planning that allow him to reach it.in this case , Alice sat goals for herself that she aims to achieve ,which are : pay off student loan ,buy a house and save for children’s education, accumulate assets, retire ,travel around the world in a sailboat. In order to do the right steps and choices she Assessed her current situation that showed different and important aspects of her financial life including assets, debts, incomes, and expenses. her assets and debts shows her annual incomes and expenses shows how possible her goals are and whether she is making progress toward them.
4. Temporarily stop funding your retirement accounts. Use this money to help fund your emergency fund and eventually use to help pay off debt. Once the debt is paid off then start fully funding your retirement accounts again.
Each employee whose principle function includes medical billing or medical coding shall have a portion of such employee's billing-related work reviewed. For new hires, a significant portion of their work shall be audited initially to ensure accuracy and the percentage will be reduced as time in the position increases and scores improve.
Every company relies on accurate budget estimates in order to provide the correct amount of allocated dollars in a budget plan that the company develops. Most companies develop budgets that look at least two years into the future. Each company is different, however typically most expect their projected budgets to be within 10% less or 25% more of the projected budget (Schwalbe 281). In order to do this, managers must allocate project costs to individual work items over the lifetime of the project. Project managers will create a cost baseline (time-phased budget) in order to measure and monitor the performance of their projects over the projects duration. Any changes or updates that are needed should be changed and reflected in a newly updated budget. Real time budget updates are vital in order to avoid financial problems. Ultimately, budgeting provides a prediction of the projects funding requirements. This article will go into detail about the best practices of determining a budget, and how they can be innovated for a better approach in the future.
I know that some of you are thinking to yourselves "Savings? What? That’s not an expense!" Well, I'm here to tell you that savings should indeed be thought of as an expense. Each month one should personally budget for a certain amount of their money to be saved. This should not be an "if I have money left over" situation. It should be definite and as automatic as writing that check for your mortgage every
Although, when one reflects on the day’s thoughts of finances his or her mind is easily eased because one can simply just create a course of budget. In order to keep track of spending and to stay out of debt, it is important that one writes down how much that he or she is willing to spend each month and does not go over that budget. Subsequently, by budgeting not only is one managing his or her finances but one is also making his life easier. According to Harry (2015), “A most important essential for achieving personal success is having money…having money gives you more choices and freedom to explore an open world of possibilities” (p. 413). Therefore, not only does budgeting give one a new outlook on his or her finances, but it also gives one an opportunity to explore a whole new world of
In today’s society, it is common for people to drive their aspirations solely in the pursuit of wealth, believing external possessions will bring them happiness. Individuals tend to be consumed by their desire to acquire capital. Some do this to the point of exhaustion, working 50 or 60 hours a week to make more money than they would ever truly require. Hence, to live a lifestyle tied to material belongings ultimately halts people from experiencing a meaningful life.