Budgeting - Let's decide what we want!

[Robert Uhl]

Jesse Guardiani <jesse at wingnet.net> writes:
> 
> I think the above can be accomplished WITHOUT implementing an entirely
> new "Virtual Account" concept.  I think the current GnuCash
> subaccounts are adaquate.

>From the expense side, yes--budgeting can be done simply by looking at
expenses.  But from the asset (e.g. bank, cash &c.) viewpoint, virtual
accounts would be very useful.

Right now I have subaccounts on my cheque account to represent budget
areas: whenever I spend money with a non-cheque instrument, I credit the
budget account and the actual source of the funds, and debit the
appropriate expense account along with the main cheque acct.

I'm not certain that virtual accounts are the right answer, but they're
possibly a step in the right direction.

Perhaps budgeting could be simply and attribute of each expense account?
Of course, that may be too granular.

-- 
Robert Uhl <ruhl at 4dv.net>
Indeed, if we (as a society) took a bit more of a 'tough love' approach
to things, really allowed people to suffer from their own bad choices,
and made it damn clear that one can't just assume something is safe
because `they couldn't sell it if it wasn't!', we might start seeing
'thinking' coming back into vogue.                          --lizard