Personal finance journalist Dana Miranda proposes a radical idea in You Don't Need a Budget: that readers should free themselves from what she calls "budget culture." Like diet culture, Miranda suggests, budget culture keeps people busy and distracted, focused on personal actions rather than systemic issues. Miranda recommends that readers instead review their individual needs and determine how best to use their money, including not paying off debt as quickly as possible, or at all, and spending money rather than socking it away in a savings account for a rainy day.
Like an anti-Dave Ramsey, Miranda empowers readers to take control of their finances by making their money and debt work for them rather than the other way around. She encourages generosity, working less, and rejecting the notion of earning the right to live, shifting the personal finance discourse from the capitalist perspective that a person is only as good as their financial status to one that views all people as worthy.
Unlike the authors of many budgeting books, Miranda discusses government and community programs resources readers can utilize as a part of their overall financial praxis, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), free or reduced-cost school lunches, and food pantries, rather than shaming and instructing readers to work multiple jobs to earn more income.
Miranda presents a refreshing way to look at and use money--embracing liberation rather than restriction--and advocates for using resources rather than hoarding wealth, asserting that these are acts of resistance to budget culture. Readers don't need to get rich, she suggests, they just need to understand that the freedom they desire isn't tied to wealth. --Alyssa Parssinen, freelance reviewer and former bookseller