Today’s economy is drastically different from the economy of the past few decades. Business transactions and investing are no longer ruled by the elite stock brokers and high-rolling traders. Today, anyone can open a investment account for a small fee and be trading international stocks or foreign currencies by the end of the day. Listed here are some thoughts and ideas that are applicable today…and tomorrow. [adapted from passionsaving.com]

1. Paying yourself first isn’t always a good idea. The “Pay Yourself First” strategy does produce results for many who employ it. But the “Pay Yourself First” approach to saving is a “Just Do It!” approach to saving. Force yourself to save and you will never come to love saving with the intensity of most Passion Savers. The more effective approach in the long-term is to pay yourself last, after comparing the value propositions offered by spending and saving and electing to save only in those circumstances in which saving offers you a better opportunity to achieve your most important life goals.
2. Writing a budget won’t help you achieve your financial goals. The benefits of budgeting come from the enhanced understanding it provides of the trade-offs involved in electing to spend or save. After living with a budget for six months or so, you will be ready to craft a revised budget, one calling for better-informed trade-offs. Each new budget will permit you to obtain greater value from the dollars you earn.
3. You only 25 times your current annual salary to live comfortably for the rest of your life. There is an end in sight and you don’t NEED to work forever to achieve your financial goals. The “Multiply-by-25 Rule” assumes that you can earn an average real return of 4 percent on your investments. The rule can be applied to individual budget categories, permitting you to calculate how much you need to save to have a fund large enough to cover a lifetime of spending on magazine subscriptions, or electricity, or car repairs.
4. The compounding concept applies to both spending and saving. A young person generally obtains a greater benefit from spending on education or physical fitness or travel than does an older person. This is an important reason why young people find it hard to save. The benefits of saving are greater for the young. But so is the cost associated with cutting back on spending.
5. Effective savers are usually motivated by some goal other than the desire to finance an old-age retirement. Human beings respond better to goals that can be realized within five years than they do to goals that cannot be realized for two or three or even four decades. Break your quest for financial freedom into parts, and focus your energies on a goal that can be achieved within a short amount of time, and you will feel more enthusiasm for the saving project.
6. Planning is the key to winning financial freedom early in life. Planning early and continuously is important. Some successful savers have large incomes, and some have modest incomes. The common denominator is that successful savers plan their financial affairs. The benefits of planning cannot be overstated.
7. The old rules of money management don’t make sense anymore. The conventional advice was developed for a time when middle-class workers earned less and when job security was greater. The exciting but dangerous New Economy requires a new approach to most money management questions. There are more investment opportunities and more investors then ever before. There are new ideas born in this New Economy every day.
8. More than likely, you will become more dependent on your paycheck as your income increases. Increased pay is often viewed as justification to spend more. Workers trying to maximize the lifestyle improvements they obtain from each dollar they earn often save large percentages of their pay increases.
9. It is often easier to save 20 percent of income than it is to save 10 percent of income. Why? Because saving 20 percent allows the saver to make quicker progress on realization of her financial freedom goals. Each step forward adds to her enthusiasm for the saving project. Those saving 10 percent do not see tangible rewards for saving for a long time.
10. “Retirement” is being redefined. Most middle-class workers enjoy the sense of fulfillment they obtain from doing productive work. Rather than leave the world of work altogether at an early age, many would prefer to save enough to be able to continue to enjoy a middle-class lifestyle while doing work that pays less than their current employment but which provides a greater sense of personal satisfaction. There are thousands of opportunities for semi-retired or those on a mini-retirement.