With high interest rates and persistent inflation, many consumers have to get creative to make finances work in this economy. And one creative budgeting method that’s taking off on social media combines nostalgia with Instagram-worthy aesthetics and a desire to get better at personal finance.

Cash stuffing is a modern twist on how your grandmother might’ve balanced her books — the “envelope system.” Cash stuffers post videos of perfectly manicured nails delicately organizing their bills, almost like an unboxing video for their paycheck.

Lily Cohen, 25, is a Trailer Registration Specialist in Bangor, Maine. She started making cash stuffing videos in 2021 on her YouTube channel LilyBudgets. Now, Cohen has over a million views from strangers watching her separate her paycheck into a pink wallet binder.

Her viewers are often people her own age who are also trying to build good financial habits. She finds the public accountability helpful. But the actual cash is cumbersome.

“Oh yeah. I drive to the bank multiple times a week and I’ve made very good friends with the tellers,” said Cohen.

Her paycheck comes via direct deposit. But then she drives to the bank and pulls it out in cash.  She asks the teller for exact denominations for each budget category, like housing, gas, and fun.  And, like a pro content creator, she asks for the most fetching franklins the bank has.  “The prettier bills kind of draw the attention of the viewers. It’s nice to look at clean, crisp, new bills versus the dirty old one,” she said.

The videos have a spa-like vibe with wood tones and candles, even when Cohen is just counting coins. Cohen said the cash helps her curb impulse spending. “If the money is in cash locked up in a safe at my house, I cannot spend it,” she said.

And it’s true consumers spend less with cash than plastic. “Studies show it’s actually more painful to part with cash than it is to pay with a card, because you actually fork over your hard earned money,” said Ted Rossman, senior industry analyst at Bankrate. And he pointed out that this might be a way to get a handle on rising debt.

“Credit card balances are up 51% from the beginning of 2021,” Rossman said. That’s partially inflation and high interest rates. But consumers are just swiping more often — especially Generation Z. 

“Gen Zers have substantially more credit card debt than millennials did at the same age, and they’re also more likely to be using credit,” Rossman said.

But cash stuffers like Lily Cohen think the tangible nature of cash helps them save.

That could be because of something called the endowment effect, said Jon Rork, a professor of economics at Reed College. “When you hold onto something, you cherish it more, and so you’re less likely to let it go,” Rork said.

He said there is a downside though. “I know this is going to sound silly, but if you lose your pretty envelope, there’s no recourse,” he said.

Rork doesn’t think there any academic papers about whether making budgeting pretty makes a difference to financial outcomes, but that might be due to lack of study. After all, “the people who’d be doing the research are economists, and we are not the people who are into aesthetics,” Rork said.

Cohen isn’t just into cash stuffing for the aesthetics though, she invests her money — after she stuffs it in her “Roth IRA” envelope on her YouTube channel.

Then she drives it back to the bank, deposits the cash, and transfers it to her brokerage account. But she doesn’t mind the legwork.

“I love the process of opening it up, of stuffing the money in, of counting it and having those pretty things can just make it more enjoyable experience,” Cohen said.

And she said she would keep doing it, even if she didn’t post online.