No Tomorrow?

The link between ethnicity and economic prosperity brings a fresh challenge each time a new set of statistics is made public. We can’t deny that people’s life chances are heavily influenced by their place of birth, their place of residence and the language they speak. Nor can we always reconcile that with our sense of social justice. But what if the language issue goes deeper? What if the grammatical structure of our native language is steering us in one direction or another? 

Some analysts, notably behavioural economists, believe it is. In a wide-ranging study, Keith Chen of Yale School of Management found a link between grammatical structure and the tendency to save money and plan for the future. We’re all familiar with the concept of “living like there’s no tomorrow”. Chen’s findings suggest that some of us are saving and spending like there’s no tomorrow, and are influenced to behave this way by our native language. 

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) monitors financial patterns in 34 countries. Chen was intrigued to find that while prosperous and highly industrialised countries shared many social and economic qualities, they showed radically different habits when it came to the act of saving money. Citizens of countries as different as Germany and Japan, or Luxembourg and South Korea, resembled peas in a pod when it came to saving habits. South Koreans and Luxembourgers were found to be squirrelling away over 25% of their Gross Domestic Product each year. The flipside of the coin sees Britain, the United States and Greece barely saving at all.  

With no clear geographical pattern, Keith Chen looked for a linguistic one. He found that the languages we speak can be classified in many different ways, and one of these ways relates to their treatment of the future tense.  

Futured languages such as English and Greek make a clear distinction between the future and the present. Futureless languages, on the other hand, refer to future action and current action in the same terms. Japanese and German speakers, who use the same verb conjugation for past, present and future action, put up no linguistic barriers to future action, and Keith Chen posited that this was a contributory factor when it came to financial planning. 

When we see the future as something far removed from us, there’s a built-in temptation to shield ourselves from it. Fans of “The Simpsons” will have laughed at Homer’s habit of cheerfully signing up for credit agreements that promise to bankrupt him in the future. He does it because in his mind, the future is a long way away. He also does it simply because he’s Homer Simpson, but the point still stands. I wouldn’t go so far as to say his approach to spending and saving is typical of English speakers, but research indicates that when our native language prompts us to feel that way about the future, we’re more likely to take that direction.  

The bottom line? Futureless language speakers: 

• Are 30% more likely to save money in any given calendar year 

• Finish their working lives with an average of 25% more money saved for their retirement  

Applying this nationally, countries where residents speak futureless languages save an average of 5% more of their GDP than their futured language speaking neighbours. Is this a coincidence, or do speakers of futureless languages really have that much of an advantage? As contradictory as it sounds, are they saving like there’s no tomorrow? And, crucially, where the behavioural pattern is negative, what can we do to break it? 

The first step is to acknowledge that during challenging times, we have lower disposable incomes and less flexibility over what we do with our money. That only underlines the value of making good choices where we can. The People’s Library works in partnership with money-management and debt-management advisory services and has close ties with skilled counsellors and support services offering aid to those who are in fuel crisis, lacking the means to buy new clothes or struggling to put food on the table. 

It’s painful to see anyone in this position. It’s painful to see families experiencing these problems even with both parents working. It’s painful to see people who’ve worked hard all their lives experiencing these problems because they’ve lost jobs that they did diligently and well. It’s painful to see disadvantaged members of the community experiencing these problems because they’re restricted from earning money through no fault of their own. 

Can we help these people with words? It’s always better to use the right words than the wrong ones, and I believe the language we use can make a difference. What are your memories of sitting exams at school? Was there a time when you looked at the calendar, saw an important exam scheduled six months ahead, reassured yourself that it was a long way off and didn’t plan your studies as thoroughly as you might have? And then did you wake up one morning and realise you had a week left to revise and a month’s worth of material to get through? We all face similar looming deadline scenarios at different stages of our lives, and if the structure of our native language is encouraging us to put off until tomorrow what we really ought to be making a start on today, the challenge is all the greater.  

The People’s Library routinely supports men and women who find themselves suddenly overwhelmed by financial problems.  

They are treated with respect, and with an understanding of how these things happened to them and how easily they could happen to any of us. We obviously seek ways to solve the problems at hand, and also set out preventative plans. By choosing words with care we can look past the futured nature of the English language and make clear the imminence of what’s coming.  

The problems we need to solve six months from now often need solutions in place today, with month to month, week to week and even day to day planning. The small actions we take on days one, two and three can accumulate into a substantial protective shell by day 180. If the language we use encourages us to face up to our situation and plan in advance how to manage it, the right actions are more likely to follow. It’s okay to laugh at Homer Simpson burying his head in the sand – it’s difficult not to – but we aim to help our friends avoid the mistake of acting like him. There is a tomorrow, there’s always a tomorrow, and the People’s Library can help you plan for it.