saving(s)
saving(s)The excess of income over consumption. This is a way of acquiring assets; for the economy as a whole it is the only way, since while individuals may gain or lose assets through inheritance or gambling, these cancel out on aggregation. The average propensity to save is the ratio of savings to income; the marginal propensity to save is the proportion of any addition to income that is saved. The interest-elasticity of saving measures the proportional response of saving to changes in interest rates.
Saving and savings are words which have caused great confusion in economics, as they are used to cover a number of different, though related, concepts, concerned with acquiring assets and ways of holding them. Saving is a flow; savings refers to stocks of assets and ways of holding them. ‘Life savings’ are a stock of assets built up by past saving. ‘Saving up’ for things...
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