SAVING VS INVESTMENT
Hello fellow Steemians, its lovely to be a part of this great family and also a proud participant of this contest. The issue of the conflicting use of the words "saving" and " investing" in our day to day life has brought about interesting discussions and debates on which of it holds the key to sustainable wealth.
source : Google images
I will start things off by saying that saving and investing often are used interchangeably, but there is a tremendous difference between both. To me, saving means setting aside money or keeping money you currently don't spend at the moment, for emergencies or for further coming events or purchases. Meaning that when saving money or a valued commodity, you are just keeping it, or piling it up for a known purpose or for emergencies.
Investing on the other hand is buying assets such as a land, a real estate, shares in a company etc with the expectation that your investment will make money for you the future. An investment doesn't only deal with monetary gain, but it may go as far as being valued in resource-worth.
Source: Google images
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SAVING AND INVESTING
In my own view, I prefer investing to saving. An investment is always a long termed future plan, envisaged in it's potential to solve a problem in the long run. An investor sees a particular project differently, seeing not just opportunities but also solutions the project might solve in the near future. The business world today is currently dependent on the shift between supply and demand, guiding every business opportunity towards focusing on problem solving rather than the pursuit for riches. The good news is that wise investors invest in solutions, because this guide the demand for a particular investment, concomitantly generating the wealth over a period of time.
The long termed nature of investing leads to investors not enormously involved in liquid cash but having investment in resource-worth. Significantly, investing have a higher rate of returns.
On the other hand, saving is a short termed project , largely depending on liquid returns. Saving money only gives you exactly what you've piled up. No increment is expected and in most cases value of the money might have reduced. Money in savings are easily withdrawable,and any shortage is only replaced by saving again.
MY PERSPECTIVE
I will always advice people to venture in investing rather than saving. It doesn't matter whether you are working or not. "Let your money work for you", is what I will tell every Nigeria youth or adult. Savings can serve a particular purpose but cannot solely make you rich. Take for example, those cashing out in cryptocurrency trading. They do this through investing. The cryptocurrency trading world is driven by demands and supply. Any cryptocurrency bought from any particular blockchain is like buying a share in the blockchain. It follows suite that any profit obtained as a result of investing in the blockchain will be share equally to all the shareholders, who happened to be the cryptocurrency traders. This can be seen when Bitcoin Rose from 100 USD initial trading price, to about 60,000 USD in a space of 10 years. Saving is more influenced by inflation and devaluation of currencies more than investing. A person who saved five thousand naira 10 years ago, and a person who used the five thousand naira to buy a plot of land at the same time can be used as a clear illustration. After 10 years , one will realize that 500 thousand naira that could have bought you an enormous plot of land will not even be enough to carter for one-tenth of the price. Meaning that a person who bought a land using the same amount of money would have generated more than 10 times of his capital. On the other hand , the person who opted for saving the money would have realized a tremendous loss in the value of the money he had saved .
Therefore this leads me coming a conclusion that it more beneficial to opt for investing, more than saving.
Thank you for reading!