[Governor Dinwiddie]

The Micawber Principle

The Micawber Principle, derived from Charles Dickens' character Wilkins Micawber in "David Copperfield," is a financial concept that emphasizes the importance of living within one's means.

According to the principle, if your annual income is twenty pounds and your annual expenditure is nineteen pounds and sixpence, the result is happiness; however, if your expenditure is twenty pounds and sixpence, the result is misery.

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen
pounds nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income
twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and
six, result misery."

- Wilkins Micawber in Charles Dickens' David Copperfield

[Gay State Conservative]

My Dad,a child of the Depression,always lived below his means. Later in life he was very successful...to the point where he could easily afford luxury goods. But he always drove an Oldsmobile when he could have afforded a Mercedes and he always wore a Timex watch when he could have afforded a Rolex.

But OTOH he was always very good to his family. While he was driving Oldsmobiles my mother was driving Cadillacs and Lincolns. While he was wearing Timex watches my mother was shopping on Newbury Street in Boston (high end shops) and on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach.

And when he passed on (my Mom died long before him) he left a nice little sum behind for his grandkids. He told us that he had done his part for us so he wanted to focus on the grandkids. And we fully agreed with that attitude.

[Buttons12]

Alfred P. Doolittle would agree.
“Let’s give him ten.”
“No! Ten pounds is a lot o’ money...Makes a man feel prudent, and then goodbye to ‘appiness.”
— My Fair Lady