About a week ago, I scored some really really cheap Christmas lights at Lowes. It was a heck of a deal. After I had gloated about the find to anyone who would listen, I mused that I am cheap, perhaps to the point of miserly.
I see my role as a stay-at-home mom to manage the household and ensure that we make sound financial decisions and manage our money with prudence and grace. CFO of Searle, Inc. And I really enjoy that part of it. We've had some huge, unforseen expenses this month and the money was there in part due to my prudence. We cloth diaper, breastfeed, and ignore the "need" for child-specific foods. It's saved us THOUSANDS so far. And I don't exaggerate.
But I'm cheap. And sometimes I wonder who pays for my cheapness? Because material costs don't go down, so someone is taking a hit when I scrouge for the rock-bottom price. I have no illusions that profit margins can and usually do cover sales when they happen. But I lived in a community that is full of wonderful, locally owned shops. When I fall back on Amazon.com, who am I hurting more?
Gavin is getting a trike for Christmas (SHHHH! DON'T TELL HIM!), and the purchase of said trike was the object lesson for this conundrum of mine. We wanted to get him a locally purchased, durable, nice trike. And we were prepared to spend around $100 on it. But a trip to the local toy store proved that what we wanted really cost $175. Ouch. But that's price of a German-made, non-Chinese quality trike. What's a trying-to-be-quality-and-morally-minded parent to do?
We ended up compromising - a Chinese-made bike from the German company, manufactured directly under German supervision. So we reap the benefits of cheap Chinese labor and government currency manipulation, but still get a quality product.
Much of me really, really wanted to buy the trike in town. But when our already generous budget, when you can get a $35 trike at any Wal-Mart, was blown out of the water, we took a step back.
The solution to my conundrum is, of course to either ignore fiscal responsibility for the sake of conscientious purchasing, or for me to go back to work so I can buy things while someone else raises my children.
But I guess we all make compromises.
