Don't Buy Stuff - Saturday Night Live
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN posts it as a favorite comic summary of debt avoidance and spending discipline, and as a joke in buy-now-pay-later threads.
What it is
A 2006 Saturday Night Live fake infomercial with Steve Martin and Amy Poehler selling the sure-fire way out of debt: don't buy stuff.
Recommended by 2 HN commenters across 2 different months, 2016 to 2026.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec FrontierPsych · 2022-12 · on “The Cost of Being Poor: Why It Costs So Much to Be Poor in America”
I understand what you're saying. However, I pretty much learned all there was to learn about them in 15 minutes when I got my first one. I read about them. I'm not the smartest person in the world, by far. If I can easily learn now, then anyone can learn this stuff on their own, in 15 minutes. It is NOT complicated. Getting information is exceptionally easy, and a LOT easier than when I got my first one. I knew from when I got my first credit card that I had to pay off the balance in full, every month. That using a credit card should be the exact same as using cash. You never buy anything unless you actually have the cash first. Then you can use the credit card and pay it off at the end of t
Recommends ezequiel-garzon · 2016-03 · on “Golden Rules for Making Money (1880)”
SNL made a wonderful infomercial in 2006 about point 3: avoid debt. Depending on your location you should be able to watch it in [1] or [2]. During my years in the US it always puzzled me that, upon reaching my credit limit, it would not just increase without any interaction, but sometimes double! American "plastic", as hailed in "The Graduate", was a significant lesson for me. [1] [LINK] [2] [this video]
Cites lkbm · 2023-01 · on “In Their 20s, Struggling to Save and Tired of Being Lectured About It”
> “I feel like the older generation is constantly pushing you to do stuff like they did when they were in their 20s, but it’s not even comparable to when they were in their 20s,” To be clear, much of the older generation didn't do this in their early 20. It's been a building concern for many decades. And they've been lectured about it forever, same as 20-somethings are today. It's not clear what "older generation" here here, but Millennials and Gen-X got stuff like SNL's 2006: "Don’t Buy Stuff You Cannot Afford" [this video] This isn't "Gen Z is poor; Boomers/Gen X/Millennials were rich". This is "I'm poor, and know some older people who aren't". There's no shortage of people in their twenties ma