System and method and article of manufacture for making financial decisions by balancing goals in a financial manager

A system, method and article of manufacture are provided for balancing attainment of goals. First, a plurality of goals are presented to a user. The goals may be previously selected by the user or may include a default set of goals, for example. The user is permitted to adjust preferences related to a selected one or more of the goals. An impact on attaining some or all of the goals is determined based on the adjusted preferences. The impact on attaining the goals is then displayed to the user.