IA05

Hunter Swartz

IA05

13 December 2018

Guest Speaker Reflection

            The speaker I would like to do a reflection on is William Mooney. William Mooney is a professor at Chatham University that teaches Accounting and Finance. His LinkedIn is https://www.linkedin.com/in/williampmooney/. Professor Mooney talked to our class about Finance. I have always been really interested in ways of making money and what to invest in but never looked too far into things. However, after Professor Mooney’s presentation and what he taught us I found everything very interesting and now realize that everything really is a business in its own way. Professor Mooney said that no matter what your major is, finance was always going to be a part of your life. Not even in the business aspect, but life in general. Everything that you do is an investment, especially your time. I never thought of things in this sense, which is what sparked my interest with his presentation so much.

            One of the things that Professor Mooney harped on was opportunity cost. In our book, opportunity cost is defined as “the loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen” (Collins). This really makes you think whether or not you are using your time wisely and working towards your end goal in life. Going along with this, Professor Mooney also talked a lot about how time is money, which makes a lot of sense. The book also comes up with the fact that “you have to choose a career at an early stage in your financial life cycle isn’t the only reason that you need to start early on your financial planning” (Collins). I think this is very important because now I know that I must start putting away at a young age to have more as I am older. 

            

            Something that has been going on in the current business news is the fact that there have been many students putting away amounts of things comparable to their paychecks and leaving them in a bank account until they graduate. This really sparked my interest because they are almost doubling the amounts that they currently have with not doing anything. I think this is really important because if it is locked away, you won’t be tempted to spend it on something that is really meaningless. I plan on doing this exact same thing whenever I am on break to try it on my own and hope that the same thing goes as well for me as it did for these students. 

            On the Financial Times I read an article about Sustainable Finance. In the article, it wants banks to “catalysts of change” (Financial Times). This means, the United States is relying on banks to become more green friendly. This could possibly affect how your money is taken care of and/or how the bank itself operates. However, in Professor Mooney’s speech he said that no matter what happens to the bank, you will always get your money because you own it. I don’t believe the banks will have a problem with the change, but if something does happen, in the end you will always get your money back so it will all work out.