#190 What if I made the Union Budget?
Let me start with a ridiculous anecdote from my own life. A couple of weeks ago, I splurged at the book fair, buying books with wanton abandon (many of which will collect dust on my shelf over the next decade).
Towards the end, I started to semi-panic each time I received an SMS from my bank stating the amount that had been debited from my account.
My solution?
Start using a different debit card tied to a different bank account.
Now that I’ve typed this out, it makes even less sense than it did back when I chose this method of “managing money”.
Why am I sharing this silly story? Just for you to laugh at me? (You have free reign, I deserve it).
No. It’s to make clear how bad I am at budgeting. And that brings us to today’s Thing: The Budget Game. I came across this game on LinkedIn (of all places!).
Created by the Accountability Initiative, the Budget Game aims to provide us, mango people, with an understanding of the challenging decisions faced by the Indian government when it allocates its limited resources.
The interactive online game offers information on the significant social sector schemes implemented by the government, their connection to Sustainable Development Goals, and the financial costs involved in financing these schemes.
Additionally, the game helps us grasp how allocating more funds to one sector can lead to a reduction in funding for another (the govt. can’t just switch to aNoThEr dEbIt cArD).
This game gave me a taste of the difficult choices and trade-offs that come with being in the government’s shoes. I was told, at the end of the game, that the budget I’d created was “beyond the confines of reality”. I’m sure no one is surprised to hear that.
Play the game yourself, and see if you can do a better job than the government (I’m 100% sure that loads of you can).
P.S. Sharing Just One Thing with friends and family is part of the UN’s SDGs. Don’t believe me? Look it up. And get to it.