THE MANAGEMENT OF MONEY

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1612, 21 January 1903, Page 50

THE MANAGEMENT OF MONEY

“Who rights a land’s finances shall be excused for touching copper, though Jaer hands be white.” If the close and personal partnership of the matrimonial state is to be a successful one and bring prosperity as the years pass over tho household, it can only be managed when both heads are agreed as to the management of their mutual income, and both are equally reliable in its administration. Financial difficulties are at the root of more than, half the frictions which mar the happiness of homes. To start with an absolute frank understanding ako*ut the family income, its extent, whence and how i’t. is derived, what it must cover, what it must allow for as and how it should be spent, is good, but it is not quite all. To carry out all this requires equal capacity of administration from both parties, or else the yoke will free one shoulder while •it drags on the other. - But there is a strong temptation amongst women —especially if they pride themselves on being womanly women —to leave the conduct of the business part of the matrimonial alliance to their men, caring nothing so long as they have a sufficiency of ready cash supplied to them for current wants. And if by mischance the masculine help fails them, if through misfortune he comes to grief, or they are left as widows, they are almost as helpless and defenceless as the children they have to guard. Or, without coming into such extremity as this, they always fail of being true helpmeets because they never understand the real value of money, what it ought to do, and how to make it do. If they are called upon to deal with money that is placed unprofitably, or with bonds and mortgages, with deeds and documents relating to property, they can do nothing without “advice”—costly advice, too—and have no judgment of their own to use. A cheque even, to some women, presents incomprehensible mysteries. The education of girls ought not to be considered complete runtil they have learnt a good deal more about the management of money and of documents relating to money. There is, indeed, very little relating to real finance . that would not be all the*better for knowing, because that side of Stock Exchange business which consists in speculating on the movements of stock, in buying and selling what is never held, cannot be truly called finance. It is gambling, pure and simple. And if it is wrong for women to gamble, it is equally wrong for men to do the same, therefore our consideration of what we call finance puts this kind of dealing altogether outside the pale for both sexes.

The wise women of old knew how to consider a field and buy it; that is, she understood the values of real estate as an investment for her money. Prooably there was no other kind of investment possible for her in those days. Still, the fact that she knew how to “consider” or judge is eminently worth noting. In spite of the freedom conferred upon them by the Marrieu Women’s Property Act, not many women of the present day are as wise as this.

To leam how to manage their own money is a great lesson to teach girls. If they can manage their own incomes well, all through life, they will be very lilkely to manage their husbands’ incomes providently. We would strongly advocate the plan of giving girls a proper and sufficient allowance of money for all their expenses* not included in actual board and lodging -'directly they have left school. Let the sum, whatever it may be, be lodged in a bank in their own name, and give them a cheque book and require them to examine their pass book regularly. Give them the whole responsibility of dealing with that sum. and if sure that it can shffiee for all their wants, demand that it shall be made,.,to do so, As a girl gains in steadiness and reliability, she might be encouraged to invest a little on her own account, and. to this end she should be encouraged to study the investment market intelligently, and to understand the seeming intricacies of the money article. An invaluable amount of mental stamina and selfprotection will be given girls by Assisting them to become self-dependent in this way. Of course, it is of the fortunate ones whoso lives are protected within the walls of home of whom we are now thinking; not so much ot those whose dot it is to learn selfdependence in "the school of practical experience; yet even these, w r ith their often tiny and' hardly earned incomes, feel greatly iii need at times of a better understand”! 2 1 of how r to deal wi + n money, especially ‘‘paper” money. Something they learn through having the care of other people’s money or books, but that does not help them to the planting of acorns for themselves—acorns which might some day grow into oak trees. One of our best modern financiers has lately written: “Any man or woman may become wealthy if he or she begins aright. Begin by always saving

some portion, then be on the alert for some investment. When investment is wisely made money soon begins to accumulate, and in a few years to double and treble. . . . Keep a bank ac-

count, but don’t be content with merely having your money there. When you have twenty-five, fifty or a hundred pounds, look abo»nt for a good investment. Don’t take up anything at a venture, but examine every one carefully ; if it repays scrutiny, and you see your way clear, put your money into it. Real estate is generally a good investment. More money has been made in real estate than you could estimate in a day. In nine cases out of ten a first mortgage is safe. But take advice before you invest, and also when you put :yc»nr money into stocks or shares of railways. If your first investment prospers, by careful management and by being always on the alert, you. can increase your fortune by reinvesting your profits. But keep out of the way of the plausible speculator. Do not despise the planting cf acorns. Bee that you start aright; save money with regularity, and by so doing you will not only save money, you will make it.”

So much for the opportunities of the unmarried woman ; those of the wife are perhaps fewer, and certainly less easy to define. But the wife’s share cf the mutual income ought to be hers to deal with in perfect independence if she wishes to have it so. It ought not not to be doled out to her in driblets, or an account of its expenditure required of her. If her education has taught her to reason, and her mental and moral capacities, are worth anything at all, they will be manifested in the use she makes of moneys put into her charge. Her capacities, at least, will not be stunted under a regime of jurisdiction and surveillance.

A man is sometimes heard to say, “I give my wife whatever she asks for, as far as my means allow; she knows she has bat to speak if she wants anything from me.” But she ought not to have to speak! A business partnership between two men on such terms would be intolerable, and a wife is too great a factor in a husband’s life for 'her to be his financial dependent! It is because she is put in this unnatural and false position of a dependent that there is so often friction in households and not through any lack of love or loyalty. Women in these days realise their individuality too clearly to be content under such conditions. Every wife who is “worth her salt,” to use the expressive phrase of the working man, knows perfectly well that she earns, and is capable of earning, her full share of the miutual income. And m every other partnership both assets and liabilities are fully understood by every member of the firm, and the rights of each are clearly defined. Sayings and investments are more satisfactorily made when both agree together, and estimates regarding tbe family budget, as also the administration of the family exchequer, call for genius from both heads of a 'household. If this frank understanding existed those pitfalls of so many feet, the systems of payment by instalment and Credit accounts, would lose their fascinations, and fewer helpless ignorant ones w'ould be entrapped into them. —Lucy H. Yates, in the “Queen.”