Teach Your Children Well

I love this series by Debt Free Revolution. Tired of being eaten out of house and home, she decided to give her 14 year old son his very own grocery budget. I think that this is a fabulous idea, and people have generally been supportive in her comments. However, she has also gotten some backlash in her comments that I am genuinely puzzled about.

Many of the backlash comments center around three particular issues:

• the amount of money she has allotted him: $35/ week for food for himself alone.
• The concern is that he will not be able to buy enough milk for a growing boy on that budget.
• The argument that, since she is the mother, it is her job to provide food for her son and he should not have to worry about a budget at his young age.

It is not my series, but I have done quite a bit of thinking about issues such as these, especially surrounding the issues of children/teens learning to live within a budget. Some people seem to think we expect to much. I think we expect too little.

I am not saying that a teenager should know *everything* about the family budget, but I think it is reasonable for them to learn that money is finite, and that groceries cost money. Unless she lives in Manhattan or LA, I think that $35 dollars for food alone is more than adequate- but he will have to learn to live within a budget.

Will he have to make hard choices? Of course- he can buy an extra gallon of milk or he can get something else that he wants. Or he can learn to look or markdowns, eat cheaper things for calcium, or learn to coupon to get other food at a fraction of the price. I commend her for showing him these things now, and giving him freedom to make mistakes at this young age. These are choices that he will someday have to make anyway, and it is far better to learn how to do these things while he is young and has people to fall back on, to ask for advice, to hold his hand through the process.

He will make mistakes. He will run out of milk. But he will also learn how to stretch that $35 dollars, what food keeps him full longer, what apples are the best deal. He can get Brand X chips for less than Brand Y. He will think twice before spending $10 on soda and drinking it in one day. This is such a gift that she is giving him. These are lessons that he will have for his whole life, and he's learning them with her help. Many people are not taught these things by their parents and have to learn it the hard way.

I realize that I am not a parent and that it is harder than I can even imagine. But my mother and father (who, clearly, are parents) have discussed their parenting philosophy with me as I've gotten older. Although they are well off, they have told my sister and I not to expect an inheritance. According to them, my inheritance is my education- both what I learned at home and my formal education. A small list of my inheritance (should I choose to use it) includes:

• being raised frugal, taught about money, shown how to use coupons, make menus, plan.
• being taught to cook from scratch, and that cooking from scratch every day was a normal thing that was not difficult. That may not sound like a huge thing, but I stunned (STUNNED) one of my college roommates by making popcorn on the stove. She about fainted the first time I made a pizza crust. She said she grew up on Tuna Helper and Minute Rice.
• Being taught the difference between "want" and "need." This is a lesson that is lost on many people. I want a lot of things, but I need very little. Wants are nice to have. I can have them when my needs are covered and I have extra to spare.
• Being taught that saving is normal and that credit card debt is not normal. Saving was a given, and I did not even get a credit card until my junior year in college. Frankly, it never even occured to me to not pay any balance I had in full, because debt was bad and I bought only want I needed, got creative, or did without. I usually used cash or wrote a check. I almost never used my card in college.)
• My formal education. They saved and invested so I could do to school debt free. I had to pay for my books and fees. They also put a time limit on it- after four years I was cut off. I finished my degree in four years. My Master's was on my own, which I did without taking out a single loan. While college is not everything, having a degree does open doors.
• They had us pay for our extras, with the philosophy that "If you want it enough, you will find a way." We sure did- paying for my choir trip to NYC when I was 16 helped me realize how many things are possible!
• They taught us that you can go broke on bargains! That ShinyThing may only be a $1, marked down from a million, but if you don't have that $1, it is not a bargain.

There are many other things that they did to help me become a the self-sufficient adult I am today. They made mistakes, and I made mistakes, but they did their best. When you have a child, you are training him or her to leave you and live on their own. I don't think it is a good idea to suddenly spring adulthood on a person when they turn 18. Fourteen is young to be doing your own shopping, but it is a great lesson to learn. She is giving him his inheritance now, and can be confident that he will be taken care of long after she is gone, because she has taught him to take care of himself.

Weird Rules My Parents Had That Save Me Money Now: Cable TV

Gentle reader, I’m about to make a confession that may shock you. Please brace yourself.

Here it goes…

I grew up without cable TV. From my birth until when I left home for college at age 19, I did not have access to cable television. We never, ever had it. Not when we lived in a place where we could only get two very fuzzy channels. Not when we lived in Europe and only got one very boring channel. Not when my mother got a job outside the home. Not when different, lower priced cable packages were offered. We never got it.

My parents are not big TV fans. My mother is a librarian by training, and she believes that all you need to be entertained is a good book. My father just never really gets into many shows, although he does like to catch a football game here and there. I think my mother would have gladly given away the TV as well as not having cable, but my father drew the line there.

Since I never had it, I never really knew what I was missing. I enjoyed watching shows I did not get at my friend’s homes, and I kind of wished I could watch some of those shows on Nickelodeon, but it never was a big thing to me. I’ve had cable twice in my adult life. During the three years I lived in the dorms, because it came with the room, and at one apartment I lived at, where it came with the apartment. I tried to see if they would drop the cable in exchange for a lower rent, but no go. I have never once had it when I had a choice. I barely watched any of the cable channels when I did have it.

I know that a lot of very frugal people still pay fifty dollars a month for cable. I know people who work 80 hours a week and are barely home and still pay for cable. I went to grad school with students who were so in debt that collectors were calling them…and they still had cable. Cable seems to be one of those sacred cows in frugality. The suggestion that the cable be cancelled entirely (all of it- not just dropping down to basic) is met with indignation- “I could NEVER do that! It’s our only entertainment, so it’s justified! We hardly get any channels at all/the channels are fuzzy if we don’t have cable!” If all your debts are paid and you want to spend money on cable, more power to you. But I really get annoyed with people who say they’ve cut out everything possible and they still can’t get ahead, but they are spending 180-900 dollars a year on television. Since when has cable television become a “necessity?” I’ve heard people say that they don’t really like it, but their kids have to have the Disney channel. I did not have the Disney channel, and I did not grow up to be a serial killer or anything like that.

Many shows can be viewed online for free. If you can’t get your show online, consider buying the DVD set when it comes out. You may even be able to get it used on E-bay or Amazon for a little less. After you watch it, you can sell it on E-bay or Amazon. If you don't want to mess with shipping, try Craigslist or a local pawn shop.You will most likely get less than you paid for it, but you’ll still spend less money than if you spent 50 dollars a month on cable service. If you’re really patient, you may be able to get the DVD set to watch for free at the library. I’ve seen Sex and the City and Six Feet Under at my local library. I liked the History Channel when I had cable, and I frequently pick up History Channel videos at the local library. Another plus to going the DVD route- you’ll get the added benefit of no commercials! This also solves the problem of not having very many channels or only getting fuzzy channels. You’ll also find that you watch less TV. If the shows are not available because you don’t have cable in the first place, you won’t even know what you are missing.

Assuming that cable cost an average of 30 dollars a month during the first 19 years of my life, my parents saved 6840 from the time of my birth until I left home for college by not having cable. That’s a lot of money for a college fund.

A Somewhat Mini-Series- Weird Rules My Parents Had that Save Me Money Now: Juice

My parents had some strange rules when my sister and I were growing up. For example, they never bought soda or juice- our choice was water or no sugar added iced tea. (We did not like milk, so we never drank it.) They had reasons, of course. My mom's reason about the juice and soda was that it disturbed her to see kids who would only drink these items, or worse, kids who flat out did not like water! It horrified her, and she wanted to teach us to like water or other unsweetened items that did not come in a can. We were allowed to order a coke or whatnot when we ate out (almost never!) but at home, water or iced tea, end of story. Now that I'm in charge of my own groceries, I almost never buy juice or soda. It's not that I don't like it, it's just that I don't think about it. This saves me a decent amount of money now. (Note: I'm not saying you should never buy juice or soda, I'm just giving my personal experience! If I drank nothing but juice or soda, as some people I know do, I would be spending a lot of money. I drink A LOT of water. I drink so much that I've been tested for diabetes more than once, because of my excessive thirst.)

I was thinking about this particular rule of my childhood as I was reading a discussion over at Vegan Lunch Box. It seems that the author had given her kid tons of juice as a small child, and now that's just about all he'll drink. She is thankful that she finally found a product that is not as sugar filled as juice that her son will drink.

It's not so much the article that I find interesting, but the comments afterwards. Many people seemed to think that a kid needs juice, and that if the child does not get it, they will be secretly buying cases of soda elsewhere, and will become full on sugar junkies as an adult. That water and milk (or in my case, tea) will not be acceptable to a child. I just found it a really interesting discussion, since I was raised without juice or kool-aid or soda, and I'm not a sugar junkie, I almost never buy soda or juice, and that I really did not mind only having water except when I had to bring it in a thermos to school. Water is still my favorite beverage. I don't even buy bottled water, to the shock of some. I also found it interesting that people seemed to allow kids to make so many of these choices for the family, as I grew up in a home where the children's opinion was rarely ever asked, and mom and dad's word was final once the decision was made.

Of course, my sister just about lives on Diet Coke, so grain of salt...

...but she does like water!