COST OF LIVING

In Malaysian government’s efforts to lead the country towards a high-income country, the issue of rising cost of living turned out to be one of the biggest challenges. The cost of living includes the amount of income earned and daily expenses that can be said to be enough to eat, or there are a few people who have a “reduce or refrain from eating because you want to save”.

In general, the increase in the cost of living occurs because the increase in individual income for a period of time cannot cover the increase in the price of the same goods or services for the period involved. If such a situation occurs, an individual is forced to increase his routine expenses without changing his spending pattern.

Cost of living and standard of living are two words that are closely related to each other. The cost of living is the cost that households have to bear not only to meet basic needs such as food, clothing and shelter but also other needs for the comfort of life including education costs, broadband connection costs and vehicle costs for daily use.

An increase in income that is not in line with the increase in the cost of living is squeezing society today. The majority of income is used for installment payments such as housing, vehicles, education and personal loans. This situation causes them to have no surplus money to spend on other goods. The increase in the cost of living occurs every year despite many complaints and moans from the people about the increase in the price of consumer goods. The issue of the rising cost of living has become a hot topic of conversation among people everywhere.

Surely many complain due to the increasing cost of living these days. However, not many are able to cope with or mitigate the effects of the rising cost of living. There are actually several ways to deal with this situation:

1. Buy Items During Sales
Making a purchase during a sales or warehouse clearance can actually help you to save because at this time the seller will surely make a promotion with a very reasonable discount price compared to the original price.

2. Make a Price Comparison Before Shopping
Before shopping, do a price comparison first. In this age of advanced technology, making price comparisons has become easier. Compare the prices of goods by comparing the prices in several supermarkets before buying. In this way, you can save and reduce the cost of shopping for basic necessities at home.

3. Use Credit Cards Wisely
Using a credit card actually has its own pros and cons. It actually depends on how each one uses it. There are also credit cards that offer reward points when you shop. When the reward points collected are enough, you can redeem the reward points by getting various kinds of gifts offered by the card issuer

4. Plan your expenses wisely
Make a price comparison before shopping, need to save electricity at home, cook at home instead of eating out, reduce vehicle use and consider the decision to own or change a car to increase debt. In addition, it is necessary to get rid of bad habits such as frequently changing new mobile phones, vacations abroad, avoiding bank loans aimed at adding vehicle accessories or upgrading the house.

All parties need to join hands in dealing with the increase in the cost of living so that the people do not continue to be burdened. As an individual, careful planning should be done before spending and only spend on items that are needed and do not waste. It cannot be denied that when the government reduces spending on services and goods, it affects household income, tax increases will burden the community and will provide impact on psychology, economy and individual social.