Here is some information about how to teach healthy money skills to children. It comes from a Los Angeles Times article by Kurt Smith and was in the Sunday edition on October 23, 2016:
- Model good financial behavior. Don’t make fun of people who use coupons to save money, and don’t crave the latest technology gadget or newest car.
- Make them wait to buy things they want. Teach them about delayed gratification.
- Teach them to save for the long term. Allow them to set aside money for their own college, or save up for a bike.
- Teach them how to compare prices. Set a budget for back to school items and check the newspapers or Internet to compare prices on similar items. Quote: “Take them to the grocery store and show them how the same food item can have two different prices and let them help you decide which one to buy.”
- Let them learn from their mistakes. If they have the money to buy something that you feel would be a mistake to purchase, something they will later regret, let them make the decision and learn from it.
While I would recommend the above five suggestions, the only difficulty I see is that most parents lack those skills to teach their children.
How can parents teach the skills they lack? They didn’t get those skills from their parents and they can’t give them to their children. Where the heck are these skills supposed to come from?
These are just a couple of questions to ponder as the holiday season of spending money on too much stuff no one needs is approaching.
To your prosperity,
Rennie
