Resisting the Culture of ?Spend Spend Spend?

[1sttimemom]

My parents encouraged my brother and I to start working at an early age. At age 10, we rode our bikes up and down hills delivering the daily paper and at the end of every month, we'd go house by house collecting subscription fees. That was hard work and really taught me the value of money.

As a teenager, I earned CDN$8 - 17/hr at different jobs during my teenage years, and always spent it carefully. I think it was when I watched a show (no idea what it was) and learned to calculate how many hours I would have to work to buy something. That really woke me up!! (Buying a pair of shoes it would take 30 hours of work to cover was out of the question!!)

My parents only gave me necessities by the time I was about 16-17. Yes, I got the occasional "just because" gift. For big purchases like cars, they would buy for us only after we earned the amount needed.

As for being materialistic, I think for many it's using brand name products to make up for something missing in their lives. "Buying" confidence for example. Of course, true confidence cannot be purchased. Perhaps this is also something to consider...

 

[Dadspin99]

Okay, I'm not joking, my first job at 14 was flower shop, cutting thorns off of roses. I'm 42, still have the knife. My kids are younger. Rather than just give them an allowance, I hooked up with Kidworth.com. My sons use it as an online way to manage their money. So, they track what they get for birthdays, holidays, etc. Then they pick what they want to spend it on, chart it out. We added buttons to save for college and they picked charities. Then they manage it. What they can't afford, they have to keep saving for.

 

[ssheng]

That's a really interesting idea - having your kids save for their own college educations! Given how extremely pricey primary/secondary schooling is already (assuming your kids go to international school), I never thought about this. That is an interesting idea and could also teach the value of an education in a financial sense!

My main comment however was that we usually learn spending habits from our parents (at least I did), so beyond teaching them by telling them something, having an allowance, etc, look at how your family discusses money in the household and how you spend. For example, for a long time my husband would be seduced by the latest 'gadget' and buy it when he felt like it. There was no sense of waiting, saving, discussing the price, discussing whether it was necessary, etc., and we ended up with a lot of functional but wasteful and useless gadgets in the house. Or for example, when we buy groceries with our child sitting in the cart, usually we don't discuss or consider which olive oil is the best priced or whether to buy the meat that is on sale. It's small stuff like that, but I think if money is never a consideration or a concern, children will end up mimicking the spending habits of the parents and/or not realizing the value of money via observation. It's hard to explain to them that different rules would apply to them - Daddy can buy all the electronics he wants because he works hard - doesn't mean that much if they just see Daddy buying whatever he wants. Anyway, our baby is still too little for these lessons but a lot of you have some great strategies I will employ!

 

[Dadspin99]

Well, I'm not REALLY having him save for college, but we came up with a number ($US 4,000) that seemed like an understandable goal for an 8 year old. We plugged that into the site as a goal and he puts a little bit in.

As for buying stuff, I agree - if the parents don't have limits, kids don't learn limits. But that's kind of two joint discussions-- being a role model, then letting kids manage their own money.