节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2012-05-01
难易度:High
关键字:fall back on something, evaporate, principal, expenditure, diversify
Welcome back, everybody.
Saving money doesn't have to be hard or painful.
You don't need a financial advisor or some complicated budget to save money
either.
You can do it yourself, starting with the three steps found in this lesson.
Now let's wrap up Step 1, save differently for different things, on line 9.
(Music).
Saving for a Rainy Day.
Create an emergency fund that you only use in a real emergency.
Since emergencies are hard to predict, this fund should be quickly accessible
and in a place where the principal is secure.
Next, think about saving for purchases and expenses you don't have every month -
insurance payments, gifts or vacations.
Since these expenditures are fairly predictable, this money could be placed in a
number of short-term investments.
Also save for long-term needs like retirement.
Unless you will retire in the next few years, these savings can be diversified
into a range of long-term investments.
So we're talking about different categories that you can put your savings in to
gear them towards certain needs.
Well, what are those?
Well, we're going to see a couple now.
We see maybe the first category is to create an emergency fund that you only use
in a real emergency.
That's right.
An emergency fund would be... well, let's talk about a fund.
Well, "fund" is a set-aside amount of money to help in a situation.
So an emergency fund is to help with an emergency.
Right. You're saving money for an emergency.
Now sometimes people can have funds to pay for something that they need.
So if someone wants to go on a trip, to help people on a mission trip, they can
have a fund, and people can help them pay for that.
And they're basically saving money for it.
And I think, Ryan, this is a good point.
It says to save for real emergencies.
Now I know sometimes you're like: Oh! I really want something new and exciting!
I really want to try it.
I want to go scuba diving.
That is not an emergency.
No, it's not.
And this is what happens to many of us.
We save for the future and we think:
Well, I'll save for emergencies, or if I want something nice or I want to have
fun, and we just spend it all on something fun.
But this is one category of your savings, just for the real emergencies.
Now since emergencies are hard to predict, this fund should be quickly
accessible and in a place where the principal is secure.
So you can't predict, you can't tell when an emergency is going to happen.
That's why we call them emergencies.
Exactly. And so that... that means you want to be able to have your money be
quickly accessible.
If it's accessible, that means you can get it.
And so you want to be able to get it quickly, get it fast.
And you want it to be in a place where the principal is secure.
OK, let's talk about what that means.
Well, when we're talking about money, the word "principal" refers to the amount
of money we put into something.
So we say it's the amount you invest that is going to start earning interest.
So it's the first amount of money is called the principal amount.
Right. So basically, that's the amount of money that you put into a bank...
basically.
So this is... you want to make sure your principal or the money you would give
to a bank or maybe save somewhere else is secure, is safe.
It's safe.
You want to be able to get to it quickly because emergencies come when you least
expect them.
Exactly. OK. So that is stepped... step 1 is have an emergency fund.
What about the next category?
Well, next, think about saving for purchases and expenses you don't have every
month like insurance payments, gifts or vacations.
Oh, OK. So now we're talking about things that aren't actually uh...
emergencies.
These are expenses or purchases such as insurance payments, or things like gifts
or vacations.
That's right.
And these are things that don't happen every month but do happen often.
That's right. So these expenditures, well, they're fairly predictable.
You know when you're going to need to pay for your insurance.
You kind of know when you're going to give gifts and when you want to travel.
So this money could be placed in a number of short-term investments.
That's right. We say these expenditures.
Now "expenditure" is the act of using or spending.
So these are just referring to expenditures saying this act of spending, this
certain amount of money.
Right. Now expenditure, I think is important to talk about could also be talking
about like energy.
If you're doing a lot of hard work, you're exercising, you are... your
expenditure is your energy.
And here we're talking about money, so this is the amount you are paying or
putting out.
So since you can predict these, since you can tell when they're going to happen,
you can put them in short-term investments that will earn more interest but that
you can also get to when you need them.
Right. We remember that an investment is when you give money to maybe a bank,
and you'll get what's called interest.
Basically, they'll give you more money.
And so you're giving money in order to make more money.
But this is a short-term investment.
What does that mean?
"Short-term" means it's only for a... short amount of time, maybe a couple of
months.
Maybe just a couple of years.
That could even be short-term.
OK. But you should also save for long-term needs like retirement.
And long-term, therefore refers to long time investments.
So things over a long amount of time, a lot of years.
And retirement is one of those.
Right. When you retire, that means you finish working, you're no longer working
anymore.
You're just living off of the money you have saved, usually when you're much
older.
So unless you will retire in the next few years, these savings can be
diversified into a range of long-term investments.
So if you are thinking about retiring soon, this is not the best way to do it.
But you should diversify if you are retiring in the distant future.
Right. And we are talking about the word "diversify" here.
And that means to do many different things.
If something is diversified, that means that it... it is many different things.
That's right. So think about this when you're investing for retirement.
Long-term investments, you can put them in different categories.
Well, we have a couple of more tips to talk about tomorrow.
But we want to watch today's skit.
Surprise! Life is full of surprises.
Hooray! I love surprises!
Surprise! You have extra bills this month.
Insurance payments, car repairs, health bills and more.
I wasn't expecting financial surprises.
I don't have enough cash.
That's why it's important to have money to fall back on.
Save for a rainy day.
But saving money is easier said than done.
True.
But fortunately, I have some simple steps.
Follow them, and you can save.
Do it yourself.
Great!
What are the steps?
First, save differently for different things.
Divide your savings into different categories.
Different categories?
$10, $20 and $100 bills?
No, no, no... Three categories of funds.
Each one is geared toward a different goal.
Well, what is the first category?
First, you must create an emergency fund.
But emergencies are hard to predict.
So this fund should be quickly accessible and secure.
Another category is a fund for purchases and expenses.
Well, these expenditures are fairly predictable.
Right. So place this money in short-term investments.
OK. What's the third category?
Ah, the final category is long-term needs.
Oh, like retirement.
Yes! You can diversify these savings into long-term investments.
All right. Thanks.
I'll follow your advice.
Good for you.
Saving for a rainy day can give you peace of mind.
Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle.
(Chinese).
And that concludes our Language Tips today.
I'll see you tomorrow.
Bye-bye.
Thank you, Michelle.
We appreciate those helpful tips.
Now saving money is not as hard as you think.
According to our author's first step, we should create three separate funds into
which we direct our savings:
an emergency fund for emergencies, a short-term fund for things like vacations,
and a long-term fund for the big stuff like houses, retirement and your kid's
college education.
OK. Tomorrow we'll discuss perhaps the easiest of these three steps: Pay
yourself first.
Until then, I and everyone else here at Studio Classroom hope you have agreat
day.