Can Your Screen Time Habit Be Beneficial to Your Finances?
People who are old enough to remember a time before the Internet became part of everyone’s everyday life will tell you that your device addiction is as bad for your finances as it is for your physical and mental health. Of course, even though you are young enough to be a digital native, you are old enough to know when someone else’s advice is out of touch and out of date. Despite what some alarmist journalists might say, you use your phone to be productive, not just to waste time and money; never mind that your parents and their friends are using Facebook and email to share their paranoid speculations about your online behavior. The latest panic is about Fin Tok, the shady world of personal finance influencers on Tik Tok. If we are to believe the NBC news website, more than a quarter of adults have followed bad financial advice they heard on Tik Tok. In its mildest form, the bad advice on Tik Tok just encourages people to spend money on products and services they don’t need; it is a variation on the coupon clipper’s fallacy. At worst, dishonest social media influencers encourage cash-strapped young gig workers to commit fraud, leaving themselves vulnerable not only to financial losses but also to criminal penalties. If you are still in debt after trying every personal finance strategy on Tik Tok, contact a Miami debt lawyer.
Social Media Financial Dos and Don’ts
Almost everyone who is old enough to wait for the bus after work or sit at a red light during their afternoon commute consumes social media content; the ones who say that they don’t are lying. The more disciplined among us manage not to spend four hours every night doom scrolling through the news, but almost everyone’s inner life, including financial goals and worries, is connected to the Internet. Social media is a nervous habit, and some social media habits are more harmful than others. These are some ways of consuming financial content that can be beneficial to your finances, or at least neutral:
- Participating in “buy nothing” communities
- Consuming budgeting content or sharing your budgeting and debt repayment journey with friends in a group chat on a messaging app
- Scrolling through coupons and promotional offers that don’t have a short expiration date, having firmly resolved not to use any of them until your next payday
Where you run into trouble is when influencers try to sell you services that they claim will improve your finances; they are even worse than brick and mortar financial advisers, because you don’t have to wait until Monday morning before sending payment. Even worse than these are the ones that promote illegal hacks, such as cashing a check so quickly that the cash will be in your pocket before the bank finds out that you have insufficient funds.
Work With a Debt Lawyer About Getting Out of an Online Doom Loop About Your Debt
A South Florida debt lawyer can help you discuss solutions to your debt problems by the light of day. Contact Nowack & Olson, PLLC in Miami, Florida to discuss your case.
Source:
cnbc.com/2024/09/26/27percent-of-adults-have-taken-bad-money-advice-from-tiktok.html
