Many parents tell me they feel guilty about allowances.
They aren’t consistent about when and how they give their kids money. They wonder if allowances should be tied to chores. Even how they dole out money can be a problem. Cash is easiest, but much of what kids want to buy — downloads of a favorite show, a toy on Amazon, a realm in Minecraft — requires plastic.
I’ve used our daughter as a guinea pig to test all kinds of allowance systems and apps , starting when she was just 3.
In my latest for the Associated Press, how to start teaching your kids about money at an early age.
This reminds me of the time when I told my kindergartner that we had used up all our “fun money” for the week, so a special treat would have to wait. Their answer was “just go to the bank and get more from the machine in the wall.” The look of shock when I said that you can’t get money out of the bank machine unless you put it in first from your paycheck was priceless.
I love this. Thanks for sharing!