It's Financial Literacy Month. How's my financial literacy?
In Grade 10, Ontario students have to pass a literacy test. If you fail, you take it every year until you pass it. Not many people fail, but if I were to take a financial literacy test now, I would absolutely fail. Me looking at financial stuff is like Vince Young looking at anything other than a playbook.
Everybody praised the documentary Inside Job because of the good job it did at explaining the 2008 financial meltdown in the U. S. in such basic layman's terms. I didn't understand a thing that happened in that movie. I just know Wall Street did some bad stuff and is now being occupied for it.
My financial know-how goes about this far: buy low and sell high, pay my credit card off in time and don't give money to the African prince who's desperately asking for my help in an urgent e-mail. That's about it. I don't invest my money.
My dad tells me I should invest and that I should learn about it, but I just give him some money and tell him to turn into more by the time he gives it back to me. He's my financial guru. He does my taxes and gives me all the money advice I never listen to.
He told me to open this account at the bank that would allow me to buy stock. I did exactly that. It sat around for a year or two and I didn't think about it again until I found out the bank was taking money from it. I took all the cash out of there as fast as I could, which is pretty fast thanks to online banking.
I wasn't using the account for its intended purpose, so it was just costing me to keep money there. The account is still open, but now there are just zero dollars in there, so if he asks me if I still have that account, I can say yes.
My dad will tell me about what I should be doing to invest. The Canada Pension Plan won't be around when, or if, I retire, so I will need to create my own wealth somehow.
My dad has informed me of what I should do to save, but I still don't know how. I know that it is good for me, the same way spinach is good for me, but I never buy spinach. I'm a chronic procrastinator, so just because I know something is good for me doesn't mean I will do anything about it until it absolutely has to get done. Even then it depends on how good a sleep I had the night before.
The latest investment my dad wants me to get into is the tax-free savings account, except he gave me a great opportunity to procrastinate. Apparently I can put money into these accounts at any time. I can still put in the maximum for the first year the accounts were made available. So in 30 years, when I get around to it, I can open up a TFSA and put in $5,000 for the first year it was available. What's the hurry? I'll miss out on $200 of interest, but that's only going to be half a tank of gas in 30 years.
In the world of finances, I'm lost, and being a naive young person, that's kind of how I like it.
