by
Carl Hampton
12/11/2009
Its here, the moments Moms dread. Your
little girl learned a new word in school
today. It’s not a good word. It is one of
those words that will haunt you until-well;
she’s 5, so- the next 13 years or even
longer. A word you hoped she wouldn’t learn
until at least kindergarten, yet here it is,
right in the middle of your Sunday dinner;
allowance. You don’t know whether to ignore
her completely or to wash out her mouth with
soap; aw heck, you knew it was coming
anyway.
The amount of the allowance is a big
decision for parents because it feels like
you are putting a dollar amount on your
child’s day to day worth. Many parents
choose not to do allowance all together, but
in my opinion that doesn’t teach the child
the value of a dollar either. But then
again, what financial crisis is little Jenny
going to get herself into anyway.
Some parents give the child a weekly
allowance equal to their age, this may work
for you and it does teach the value of a
dollar and good saving and spending habits
at a young age, but it doesn’t teach
anything about the value and satisfaction of
work and getting a job done properly. You
work hard for your income, why shouldn’t
your offspring be made to earn that much
needed allowance.
One thing you should take into consideration
when evaluating the allowance question is
planning. What does your child plan to do
with the money they are getting? More
importantly, what do they plan to do to earn
it? Some parents don’t pay a flat rate when
their pint sized bill collector comes to
call.
Their answer is to pay by the job, for
example, Jimmy cleans up the toys that
usually lay strewn about the living room,
Good Job, Lad, here’s a quarter. Or, little
Suzy takes the initiative to sweep the
kitchen, Good Show, Little Lady, Here’s a
dime. This system teaches children that they
get awarded money not just for being there
and being cute but also for being a useful
member of the household. Later this life
lesson can translate into becoming a useful
member of the community and workforce.
Later on children are given a set number of
chores and paid accordingly, they get a
weekly ‘paycheck’ as long as, say, the
dishes are done and the driveway swept. This
being said, by this age children should be
responsible for keeping up with their own
spaces and perhaps their own laundry too. So
if the driveway is swept but teenage slob,
Melvin, didn’t take a snow shovel to his
bedroom, no paycheck, tell him to go refer
to human resources (Dad), because his
attentiveness to his duties have been out of
line.
There are no rules for this, you are the
parent, don’t let the “but all the other
kids get $20” sway you, you are master of
your household, and you shouldn’t care if
they get a 20 with a bright red bow, Melvin
barely earned his $10.50. This being said,
at a young age you should start acclimating
the child to the idea of the household being
a community that needs everyone’s helping
hands to keep things running smoothly, not
only will this keep you from shouldering all
of the burden of household chores, it will
give your child a sense of pride in a job
well done.
