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Economic decisions without sufficient knowledge can lead to serious errors. Instead, make decisions based on financial knowledge gives us a better alternative economic life. Understand the field of finance is a task that must start from young. Learning to know and understand the language of money from kids will increase the ability to generate and multiply on the basis of appropriate financial strategies. Also young people can start a healthy economic life from an early age, which is important when the base of economic development of any individual is based on savings. sometimes given little thought to the financial or economic culture, but it is unquestionable importance of money in our lives.

We need to give their proper perspective and consider it as a cornerstone in the development of human beings. For this reason we must consider financial education as a fundamental part of the knowledge that we must instill in young people and anyone who wants to improve their financial situation. Some actions that we can implement as a society for the development of financial literacy in our family and society :

At school: It is desirable that educational institutions, from the basic level, initiating a financial literacy training for children, guiding their consumption habits by teaching them the value of money, inculcating savings culture, values ??and knowledge that prepare them for the future.

At home: Financial education both at home and at school should be a discipline of early learning. Teaching methods through which they can develop their own skills parents should teach their children how to save and when to invest. Read the rest of this entry »

Previously mentioned on life insurance, but today I want to delve a little deeper and emphasize its importance as an essential tool in good financial planning.

Consider the situation: Raul delivers a small amount each month to an insurance company in the hope that if he died, the insurer will return to his family a much larger amount.

Life insurance is one of the greatest miracles in family security, tranquility offered simply having one is priceless. There are many ways that people can make so much for so little, but beyond insurance to protect the family income, are all an expression of love to the loved ones. Ordinary life insurance are the representation of parents concerned about the future of their children, aware that life is bought and need to protect their families if they did not arrive to find, because the only protection we can continue to provide after death is the financial support.

Looking for alternatives …

If Raul investigate other methods that provide financial support to his family, discovered that ordinary life insurance is your best choice: He could spend all your money in stocks and get fat profits, but could not ensure the necessary saving, or sufficient speed to ensure that your family will need income. Raul will realize that life insurance is the only way that you have to buy a fixed amount of future income for your family with a small monthly premium.

Economic crisis, inflation, wages low … too many economic problems to worry about today, do not let your relationship will also come down for reasons of money! We know that talking about money is not as sexy of a relationship, but if you do not seriously affect your finances and your relationship. One way to improve communication on these issues is to turn the talks on the money on something that favors the intimacy of the relationship.

Money talks should be honest about your monetary situation, your concerns and the future to which you aspire. This can be difficult to achieve, especially if every time you talk about your finances starts a fight and someone ends up breaking into tears. Here we present four points to help you achieve a successful talk about money so they can agree on a more stable and prosperous future.

1. Seek solutions, not guilty
If you want to end these financial problems and improve their relationship must be willing to take responsibility for the situation. Blaming each other will not solve things. Look at the situation objectively, find your role in it and look for solutions to improve it. In addition to taking responsibility for the situation, if you want to rekindle their relationship and to that person redescrubrir they fell in love, then you also need to reassess their level of willingness to want to make change and surprise to the couple.

2. Commitment to the meetings
Once you have decided to move forward in their relationship, the following is the regular schedule of the talks of their finances. An hour schedule meetings at least once a month, and in a place that can not be interrupted or distracted. Initiate the first encounter with a little fun, share their stories about money and talk about things they like to do with it. Do not start loosening monetary problems, insert these issues when they are relaxed and willing to listen. Perform these talks with attachment on the agreed dates build trust between you and increase your discipline. Find the courage to discover and express what is really important to you. Read the rest of this entry »

Set different categories for the use of our money helps us effectively manage cash flow and keep more money to invest and secure our financial freedom. Many have tried budgeting and establishing financial categories that were too complicated to follow when there were problems or little time for maladministration. In this post I will show you four simple categories of personal expenses that you can use now to achieve your financial goals.

The four categories of our personal finances

You’ve seen budgets and endless spreadsheets containing many categories of personal expenses. The problem with these is that they are too complex to live with them, they take the fun out of life. You can become an expert in the process of making budgets, but will involve both categorize and divide your expenses you can lose sight of the original intention of making them. When it comes to success in managing your personal expenses the best is keep things simple. I present the four categories of use of our personal finances that I consider the most basic when it comes to managing our cash flow:
Expenses: Represents the cost of housing, food, transportation, etc..
Donation: Is the money we give to a religious institution, a foundation, who are homeless, etc..

Reservations: You put the money together for future purchases, emergencies and lack of work or health.
Investment: All the money for financial investments, real estate and businesses.

Each expense that you can fit into one of four categories. By keeping track of your expenses in these areas and plan your cash flow according to them, it will be easier to maintain control of your financial life. Now we will see an easy way to manage these categories.

The order of the categories is the key

Making the four categories of use of our personal finances is a matter of assigning work our disposable income according to our priorities. Here’s an example:
Donation: 5%
Reservations: 10%
Investment: 15%

Once the priority of these three categories, the remaining 70% is usually more than enough to pay your expenses. Of course, this can be hard to believe if you’ve been living “adjusted” to your pay, but try for a month. If you can manage your expenses according to the above categories, you will have more control of money and get more value.

Achieving financial freedom requires perseverance and commitment. This is the reason why many people struggle to succeed, and this is true not only in the financial system. Staying focused and disciplined is always difficult for those who are also looking to lose weight, increase muscle, improve your confidence, stop smoking, etc.. So what makes the difference when it comes to stay engaged rather than get distracted or lost motivation? It all starts with having a specific plan to deal with things that make people away from their targets.

In this post we will see some of the most common obstacles that we can avoid to maintain our commitment and we can do about them.

Most common reasons why people give up before reaching financial freedom

As you read the following list of obstacles, Evaluate on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 1 being the worst and 10 the best) on how much you need to improve in that area. Remember, there are no right answers, only honest:
Lack of specific knowledge of what to do
Inattention
Lack of a written plan
Prioritize activities unimportant
Impulsive spending habits
A bad attitude with the wealthy
Yielding to the influence of other
So how did you do? If you got a score lower than five in one or more areas, it is time to seek solutions to the problem before it occurs. Select an area to be corrected at once and then do address the following: it is a simple advice, but powerful. The key to staying committed is to confront problems head on and the best time to address them is now. The saying “the best defense is a good offense “is true when it comes to stay committed to achieve our financial freedom.

Another thing to remember is that our objective is more important than the plan and keep our plan and we will be flexible, willing to change if things go wrong. Do not obsess over a plan that will be willing to change when things do not walk so well in the end, what matters is the result. If you keep your plan with flexibility and focus on achieving your goals and address problems before they occur, will be on track to achieve your goals and your freedom.

Venezuelan environment
It is a commonplace to say that Venezuelans lack of entrepreneurship. That is not just a phrase often heard, is also an observable fact daily. In each city, we find the same phenomenon: Most business leaders were born in other lands. The owners are Portuguese or Italian bakeries, and the old bread that tasted our ancestors has vanished from the market. The restaurants are usually owned by Spanish, Italian and Chinese, with few exceptions the local food has been confined to the popular markets, the cheap restaurants and the “streets of hunger.” Most hotels are in Italian and Spanish, and Venezuelans just own the lodges financed by regional governments. The country is being created not by the Venezuelans by birth, but naturalized Venezuelans. This is not inherently negative. What we delimit only to designate that entrepreneurship is absent in most of us.

To speak of our own city, we live in modern Mérida has been built mainly by Italians. Innovation in bakeries and cafes have been the work of Portuguese and Italian, followed by Venezuelans. The appliances and furniture trade is dominated by native Arab countries. Best restaurants serve Spanish, Italian, Chinese and international. There are few quality establishments that serve typical Venezuelan food. All this may mean that Venezuelans lack of entrepreneurship and are foreigners who are developing the country.

In a way, this should not surprise us. Entrepreneurship is inseparable companion of the capitalist economy and in Venezuela have shown a consistent rejection of capitalism. Our intellectual and scientific elites have expressed anti-capitalist attitudes continuously pro-socialist and even after the demise of Soviet socialism. Our larger culture, largely agricultural, pre-industrial, anti-messages is transmitting wealth and pro-poor.

In this paper we talk about entrepreneurs as a synonym for entrepreneur. In general, in speaking of entrepreneurs think of people with ability to initiate behavior aimed at creating new businesses. By definition, the entrepreneur is exposed to new situations, try to succeed at something that requires greater efforts to those made so far. The entrepreneur enjoys the challenge, risk, the sense of testing their knowledge, skills, competences. Let us look more global entrepreneurship within its historical context.

The accumulation of wealth

The accumulation of wealth today seems natural, but was virtually unknown to mankind until the emergence of the first industrial revolution (1760-1840). In pre-capitalist economies are rapidly consumed everything that was produced. Or it came to accumulate wealth (the pyramids of Egypt, the Forbidden City of China, the Parthenon in Greece), but not given to reproductive use that wealth is not generated capital.

Capital formation was not appreciated in previous societies to the capitalist. Economic growth was not desired nor desirable, nor was it perceived as caused by individual efforts. For most of its existence, humanity lived without expectations of change, accepting as a natural social order imposed by the ruling classes for their own benefit. The good people are devoted to their lands, church, army, navy or civil service, but not to make money. The pursuit of money for the money it was, and still remains for many, morally improper or incorrect. The money was not seen as a commodity, but as an instrument inherently corrupt and corrupting.

It is in a capitalist society where wealth becomes accumulated capital to be used reproductively. The capitalist system is organized around a market economy emphasizing private property, business opportunities, technological innovation, respect for contracts, payment of wages in money and credit availability (McCraw). All this is aimed at individuals, through their own efforts to produce and reproduce the wealth. The capitalist system is based on investment as a means to finance innovations, changes. It is the nature of the capitalist cause permanent changes to continue to expand. In this sense, capitalist societies are betting on the future. Do not expect things to happen, but deliberately provoke their occurrence.

In pre-capitalist societies, and in most underdeveloped societies today, the rich were or are frowned upon. In the West, early Jesus stated that “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God” (Matthew, 19, 24). In Japan, until the mid-nineteenth century, merchants occupied the lowest place of their social hierarchy. Religions like Christianity and Islam prohibited interest loans and considered sinful. Even today, most Venezuelan culture teaches anti-wealth attitudes. The rich are, by definition, exploiters, thieves, corrupt, and doomed to hell. The poor, also by definition, are humble, good-hearted, honest, and have won the sky.

In short, Venezuelans learned beliefs, attitudes and behavior contrary to the generation of wealth. Worse still, we learn beliefs, attitudes and behaviors destructive of social wealth, be it public transport, public square, government office, public hospital, school, high school, college, or simply pay phone. We continue to learn that being poor is good and bad to be rich. We learn that if we want out of poverty we must produce wealth. We learn that wealth is produced through the efforts of each one of us, we can create a society in which everyone has opportunities to improve our standard of living through our productive behavior. The limitations should not be set by society but by our skills and our work. Briefly: In Venezuela, we learn a capitalist conception of wealth, but a pre-capitalist conception of it religious. Why not learn that entrepreneurship is the engine of the capitalist economy and, in turn, is reinforced by it.