Ask:
I've always thought that our schools don't do very much to teach kids about spending and personal finance. This is something that really falls on the shoulders of us as parents: to teach and model financial responsibility at any age. What do you do to teach your kids about money and personal spending?
Answer:
Well when I potty trained Kameron last year I gave him a quarter every time he went potty. Heck he was potty trained within 3 days with that trick. Eventually I started cycling out his quarters and giving him the same quarters, he had no idea. He doesn't get them anymore and he still goes potty, he forgot about it. But we used his quarters to buy some cars and toys and stuff.
So now when we are at the store and he wants something and I say, I don't have that money right now, he says, "We can use my shiny quarters that I got for going potty!" But I still don't buy them anything besides movies. I collect disney DVD's for them, so occasionally when a new one comes out I will pick up a new one that comes out and we will have movie night as a family. But other then that we don't give in to the asking for stuff at stores and usually they don't even ask anyway. They aren't used to getting toys all the time or candy.
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I actually did have an awesome class in high school that taught us alot about budgeting, balancing a checkbook, comparison shopping and paying bills. He taught us that sometimes you pay more for "packaging" than you do the actual product. Which is basicly along the same lines as generic vs brand name. Like if we picked up a bottle of hand lotion and read the ingredients off the back, both products contain the same ingredients only one is more expensive because it has prettier packaging and a major name behind it. He had us go thru the newspapers and try to figure out how much rent we could afford and would give us a fake salary to try and live on. I try to do this with my kids so they realize what things cost. I also have them earn their own money so if they buy something of their own they appreciate it more then they would if i just gave it to them.
Answer:
We had a class like country-mouse in high school. We received a job with a salary, had to go throught the want ads and research how much the wages for that job was- we would get the lowest going rate (since we just got the job). We got a place to live, and the prespective bills- a real eye opener for us! When we did it he brought in grocery ads as well. We also did something similar in health class when we had babies- (had to figure out prices of the baby essentials- yikes!).
As for my children- the oldest is starting to grasp the concept of saving money. She sees how expensive things are. A few years ago (before the 2nd one and I was working), I would compare to how many hours I would have to work in order to get things. The youngest seems to do fairly well with starting to understand money- mommy does not always have the money for things you want, mainly the things we need. Heck- sometimes that is something I have to try to remember! One thing though, my girls receive savings bonds. I think it is a nice way to start teaching them to save and when it matures they might be able to buy their first car or help pay for college!
Answer:
My kids go to yard sales with me and have realized that for 50 cents to $1.00 they can get an entire toy - a nice one - yet at Target or Walmart the same toy would cost them $10 or more. When my son got into Yu Gi Oh cards, I got an entire box (several hundred cards) for $2.00. When he sees them at the store FULL price his eyes bug out of his head! Same with Pokemon. BTW ds now has 1,300 yugioh cards, which cost us about $10. Crazy. (even crazier that I let him have than many, I KNOW!!! )
My kids get an allowance, plus have bank accounts. dh is a financial guru, so I leave all that up to him. I just handle the yard sale end of things.
Oh, also, we recently started having our kids pay for certain things, for example, my 7 yo wanted to go to his school carnival so badly, but we were really broke at that time. He had just gotten birthday money, so we told him we would take him but he'd have to pay out of his own pocket! He was so proud, and even prouder when he bought his mom (me) a pickle! He beamed with pride as he paid the lady for that silly pickle, and told her "I'm buying this for my mom with my OWN money!"
I now make him spend some of his own money if we go to a peter piper pizza place (or chuck e. cheese). I used to buy 100 tokens for $20 and just let the 2 kids blow them all in one visit... not anymore!
Also, they hear us talk about money all the time. I'm sure my kids will grown up and always remember that every Saturday was like Christmas!!! When I come through the door after yard saling... they all run to see what goodies I have brought for them! (I have to be careful not to make them constantly need *new* things. I am trying to buy fewer toys, but sometimes I can't pass them up!!!)
Answer:
I'm not sure what my kids know about money. Meghan is learning in school about money and counting it up. She doesn't ask me very often anymore to buy her stuff every time I go grocery shopping. I have a rule, don't ask! and my kids can recite why: Cuz if mommy has to spend money on junk that we want, it takes away from the other things we have to buy.
Meghan wanted a Nintendo DS for Christmas, I brought her in thestore, and we looked at it. it was $129! When she saw that price tag, she actually 'got it' that it was too much money to spend on something like that. My mom ended up getting her a game boy and it was only $80.
I don't give them an allowance, I can barely allow for myself sometimes. BUT I do want to start giving them their own money to budget as they see fit.
Answer:
My kids are REQUIRED to deposit 10% of his/her allowance into a savings account. They don’t even think about it any more, it has become part of the routine. They also participate in a stock program offered for kids by USAA. They each have a kid’s checking account at USAA with a debit card. They use this for the remainder of the allowance. We balance checkbooks after each purchase.
I do not buy toys or games for them. I buy clothes and books but they pay for anything else they want. My son saved up to buy his Nintendo Gameboy Advance and Play Station 2. When my son bought his Play Station 2 he considered buying a Xbox but after looking at the cost of the Xbox games and the Play Station 2 games decided the PS2 was more cost efficient. My daughter wanted a new canopy daybed and she saved to buy it. Anytime they want to buy something we go over the pros and cons of buying it.
Both of my kids would rather shop at resale shops. My daughter LOVES garage sales. She wakes up on Saturday mornings ready to go.
From time to time I have one or the other sit with me and go over the bills and help me prepare them for mailing. We use credit VERY sparingly. We discuss what we are saving for and how we are saving it with our kids.
Answer:
Oh, Kim, you have hit on one of my pet peeves! As an Economics major, this has always bugged me! There should be a requirement (I know there are someplaces) that EVERYBODY must take a basic economics class to get out of high school. It would help with personal finance, but also explain the US economy. Both of these are sorely misunderstood concepts in America. It shocks me how few people know the power the Federal Reserve has in this country - shoot the worldwide power it has!
I have often thouht of going back to school to become an economics teacher for this very reason.
As far as my own children, I have started with my older child (6) to show him how much things cost and there are times he is in the store saying, "WOW! That is $20??? That is so much money!" We are working on the "saving" concept currently.
Answer:
Originally Posted by Claire
Oh, Kim, you have hit on one of my pet peeves! As an Economics major, this has always bugged me! There should be a requirement (I know there are someplaces) that EVERYBODY must take a basic economics class to get out of high school. It would help with personal finance, but also explain the US economy. Both of these are sorely misunderstood concepts in America. It shocks me how few people know the power the Federal Reserve has in this country - shoot the worldwide power it has!
I have often thouht of going back to school to become an economics teacher for this very reason.
As far as my own children, I have started with my older child to show him how much things cost and there are times he is in the store saying, "WOW! That is $20??? That is so much money!" We are working on the "saving" concept currently.
I totally agree with you Claire! The one class I took was an elective "math" class. It was "Business Math" and I thought that class was wonderful! One of my good friends in high school did not take this class and took the "smarter" math classes and after filing bankruptcy and struggling still she said that she wished she would of taken that class so she was not so stupid about her money and credit cards (the class went over everything money related in the "real world" and accounting and etc.). I think it is really needed and start it young- sometimes in High school you program yourself not to be as receptive!
Answer:
I really wish it was taught in all schools too!
For us we have given the kids a very small (started at $1 a week and now it's up to $2 a week) allowance. Whenever they ask for something, we always say, "Sure you can have it, do you have enough money saved up?" They sure want less stuff when they have to pay for it themselves!
Now that they are in grade school, I've opened a bank account for each. I give them their allowance once a month by cheque, they depsoit it (so they learn how). They save 10%, give 10%, and have 80% to do what they like with. Any Birthday or Christmas money goes into their account too.
I've also never said, "We can't afford that." I don't want them to feel poor even though we have very little. When we can't afford something I'll say something like, "Well, let's start saving our money and see if we can save up for it." 99% of the time they forget about what it is they wanted and that 1% of the time they really work hard at saving it up. And I'll often say, "Our family is so rich. We're just full of love." It will be interesting in the future to hear from the kids to see if they knew how little we really had.
We also volunteer once every few months feeding the homeless. This goes WAY outside of my confort zone (but I don't tell the kids that) and they love it. They feel incredibly rich after helping people who have so much less than we do.