The Swing Theory

I have problems with money. Problems with money go way back on my dad’s side of the family and each generation manifests them differently, but let’s just say, I come by these problems naturally.

One of my biggest problems with money stems from something called “The Swing Theory.” I grew up with a tacit understanding of The Swing Theory because my father, Cohen Sr. was always referring to it, but it wasn’t until my parents visited me during my freshman year of college that he clearly explained how it actually worked.

Cohen Sr. with me and Mr. Happy in Australia, late '80s.

We were at Tyson’s Corner Shopping Mall and I was looking at a pair of sunglasses. I don’t actually remember how much they cost, but for argument’s sake, $35 sounds reasonable. I thought I liked them well enough until I saw another pair that I LOVED and they were, let’s say, $60. I really wanted the $60 glasses. I think they were Guess! or Fossil (did Fossil ever make sunglasses?), but whatever they were, they made the $35 glasses look silly.

$60 was a lot for me as a freshman. What was a girl to do?

So Cohen Sr. explained his Swing Theory to me. His reasoning was, “If you were willing to spend $35 on glasses that you didn’t really like, and it will only cost you $25 more to buy the ones you want, then really, you’re only spending $25 because the first $35 is a given cost and therefore negligible.” In that example the swing was 25 bucks and totally worth it.

If it sounds a little fishy to you, you are not alone. I was explaining the theory to a friend last month and she looked at me as if I had grown another head. “It sounds like your father’s Swing Theory forgets a little thing called The Bottom Line.” She’s right about this of course, most of the time.

What, you may ask, does this have to do with a move to the West Coast?

Today SMS and I went to get a membership at Costco. We had the opportunity to pay $50 for a regular membership or $100 for a special membership that gives us back 2% of everything we spend at the end of each year. “It a really good deal,” the saleslady said (she was really nice, a bleach blond in her late 30s with a “sun tattoo” of the playboy bunny logo just above her cleavage), “Don’t even think of it as spending $100 – because you’d be paying the $50 anyway, so really you’re just paying $50 more, and if you think you are going to spend more that $2500 in a year, you’ve already made it back!!” It was The Swing Theory in action. And in this case – it actually works. We were going to pay $50 for the membership anyway (we had already picked out a flat screen HDTV, a vacuum cleaner (anniversary/housewarming gift from SMS’ grandma) and a microwave), so the first $50 was a given: it was, in a sense the cost of doing business. The second $50 was a no-brainer, and gave us the opportunity to earn back both the second $50 and the first $50, if we spend enough!

SMS will tell you that the saleslady used The Swing Theory because she was just that, a SALESlady, but I would say Cohen Sr. is laughing somewhere right about now. It doesn’t matter whether or not The Swing Theory is true, it just matters that someone outside of my family is using it as a logical explanation for why you might part with more money than you thought you should.

We bought the special membership. By the time I buy my treadmill and we stock our place with paper goods, we’ll be in the black, I’m sure.