How Americans Are Tricking and Trapping Themselves Into Better Money Behaviors

On this Motley Fool Answers episode, Robert Brokamp is on his own to interview Rachel Schneider, a senior VP at the Center for Financial Services Innovation, and professor Jonathan Morduch, who teaches public policy and economics at NYU, about their new book, The Financial Diaries: How American Families Cope in a World of Uncertainty. For the study behind the book, their team tracked essentially everything about the finances of 235 families in five states for a full year, giving them deep insights into where we are succeeding, where we're not, and what obstacles are most commonly in our paths.

In this segment, they talk tactics: With money tight and fiscal pitfalls everywhere, the families in their study have come up with a number of tricks to keep themselves from winding up in worse shape. Some seem counterintuitive, as in "Wouldn't that cost you more in the long run?" But personal finance isn't just a numbers game. It's a human game.

A full transcript follows the video.

Source: Fool.com