
Ask HN: Allowance for kids? - romanhn
For those of you with children, what is your approach to allowance? The three common approaches are having a regular allowance, tying it to chores, or no allowance at all. That said, there can be huge variations once you get into the details. I&#x27;d love to hear how you help (or helped!) your kids grow into financially responsible adults.<p>If you yourself had an allowance structure set up when you were growing up that you think had positive impact, would love to hear about it as well.
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peterburkimsher
My parents gave me a large allowance, but they didn't give me extra money if I
needed it. That made me more independent.

For practical purposes, assume 1 CHF = 1 USD (it's actually 1.04 USD, but
close enough). Also note that my parents lived in the countryside and didn't
have "curfew" rules. There was no bus to their house, so if I stayed out after
they went to bed, I wouldn't be able to get back home! It was lonely, but
effective at keeping me out of trouble.

From age 5 to 11, I got 10 CHF.

From age 11 to 14, I got 25 CHF. Of that, 12.5 was "current", 10 was "savings"
(only spend on things that cost over 100 CHF), and 2.5 was "giving". From my
own money, I had to pay 10% of all my trips (e.g. church camp, travel alone,
etc).

From age 14 to 16, I got 125 CHF. Of that, 25 CHF was the same as above. The
extra 100 CHF was for "trips". Then I had to pay 50% of travels. This was a
big expense, and important for some volunteer service projects I joined.

From age 16 to 18, I got 270 CHF. Of that, 23 CHF was "current", 20 CHF was
"savings", 27 CHF was "giving", and 200 CHF was "trips". I then had to pay
100% of trips, although I negotiated with my parents to let me pay only 50% of
a trip to visit universities.

I used an Excel spreadsheet to manage my money from when I was 13 years old.
It has a record of 230 expenses over 4 years, and is interesting to look back
at now, to see what was important to me then (iPod accessories, the price of
my first date).

The allowance money was not tied to chores. I could earn an extra 0.5 CHF for
washing or drying dishes, or 5 CHF for some gardening. I also got some lunch
money for school, and secretly saved the change from that.

My dad gave me a broken computer when I was 8, which I fixed and then used
until he gave me my own laptop. That broke, and I then bought & sold a class
set of old laptops from the school to let me upgrade.

My parents did not pay for TV. They said that my brother and I would have to
share our allowance and pay for the subscription to Sky TV if we really wanted
it. We couldn't afford that. However, we had the best Internet connection
available in our area (ISDN). So all my entertainment has been web-based. The
TV set was too old for consoles (only SCART, no composite video), so all my
games were on computer (and we used Mac, so there were very few games).
Instead, I started building my own things with AppleScript, and I'm still
doing that now.

~~~
Cyph0n
The current/saving and % of travel is a very interesting approach! I'm
assuming that the numbers represent your _monthly_ allowance?

~~~
peterburkimsher
Yes, that's right - those were monthly values.

I paid for half of my iPod (the other half was a Christmas present), all of my
food expenses outside (but none if eating with my parents). Education was paid
by my dad's job (CERN). They didn't pay for me to learn to drive, and I still
can't (I bike to work). They now want me to pay rent if I want to live with
them, which is why I call it "my parents' house" not "home".

The bleak reality is in most places I lived since, my disposable income (after
food & rent) has usually gone down from that time, now I'm working.

------
Onewildgamer
I don't have kids but I can talk about my dad.

For all the regular purposes like transport, school fee, repairing the vehicle
etc. he gave a little more than required, he knew how much it cost but still
let me keep the rest. That was enough to hang out with friends, go to movies
(it was cheap back then), a little snack here and there. For anything bigger
than that I would ask him and he'd mostly say yes. But never encouraged
regular allowance on a monthly/weekly basis.

We weren't affluent, I had to be a little conservative on my expenditure. Was
also taught early that you should do/buy four things that you need and one
thing that you want.

For better or worse I think this made me more responsible than others who grew
up with me.

~~~
Cyph0n
This was exactly my father's approach, especially as I grew older. He
eventually gave me my own CC with a limit for emergency use. I think it was a
great approach, but I also see the merit of having a limited allowance per
period.

Perhaps it's just my nature, but I'm just terrible at tracking my spending in
a detailed manner. For instance, if you asked me how much I spend on groceries
per month, I would not be able to give you an accurate number.

------
nxsynonym
No kids myself but my parents did not give me an allowance.

Instead, they were very transparent about our finances. We were situated in
the lower-to-mid working class, we have basics covered and some "fun money"
but no vacations, new cars, little eating out, etc.

If there was something my Brother or I needed (things we wanted but were not
necessary were usually given as birthday/holiday gifts only), they would walk
us through their thought processes on how they decided if they could afford
it. They included us in the decision and explained how buying certain things
would mean sacrificing others.

We were also given money management tasks that were used for necessities. For
example, we would be given $20 each to come up with meals we wanted that week
at the grocery store. Same thing with new school clothes, sports gear, etc.
They let us be decision makers but didn't hand us money to do with as we
pleased.

I also got my first job at 13 (farm labor), and haven't stopped working yet.

I was always a little jealous of the kids who got $5, $10, or $15 per week to
do with as they pleased - but I will say I feel like I've had a leg up on
budgeting, saving, and general money management than many of my peers.

If I have kids I will probably have some sort of similar system. I don't like
the idea of giving away "free" money, and tying it to chores is weird to me
because they are something that need to be done and won't ever be "rewarded"
again after you're a kid.

~~~
skfroi
I read this as if I would have wrote it.

I never got an allowance but I mostly got want I needed and wanted within
reason. This was basically determined by the chores I did and how much I
generally helped in the house.

My parents and grandparents always sat me down to do the monthly budget with
them. I learned early on the way money flowed in and out of the household.
That gave me a perspective on debt and credit that many of my friends didn't
have.

I did get cash on birthdays and holidays and on some other special occasions.

Once I started working (around 13) that money was mine to do with as I
pleased. There was a great sense of personal responsibility. I think that
really helped me once I left my parents home at about 17.

I have no opinion on the "free" money of not doing chores. All kids and
families are different. I will say that having my parents be honest about our
finances and not shielding my as much did help me in the long run.

------
guidoism
I have a six-year-old and started giving him an allowance when he was five.

The goals for the allowance are:

1\. Teach him about saving and compound interest 2\. Get him off my back for
buying things

Therefore, it's not tied to chores. Getting work out of him would be great but
I figure the benefit of teaching him the benefits of saving are much more
important.

I pay him $5 a week because it's large enough that he can buy something at the
toy store but not anything particularly nice so he needs to save.

And here's the crazy part, I pay him interest for saved money, a crazy large
amount. For every $10 he has saved I give him another dollar before I dole out
his week's allowance. The money grows fast!

He's already seeing the benefit. He reaaaaaaaly wanted a remote control BB8
and was super good about saving for it. Every Saturday morning we laid out his
money, we traded in 10 ones for 1 ten dollar bill and then I paid out his
interest by placing a one dollar bill on top of each ten dollar bill, and then
I paid his normal allowance.

He's already better with money at 6 than I was at 25.

At some point I'm going to have to lower his interest rate or I'll go broke.

~~~
mod
10% compound interest, compounded weekly?

I can't believe you made it a a year, to be honest.

~~~
guidoism
I retroactively instituted a $100 cutoff too. :-)

~~~
davchana
That's clever :-)

------
mattbgates
Don't have kids.. but I got paid $1 a week for doing chores, and eventually it
was raised over the years, $2.. until $5. Mom helped me get a job around 14-15
years old and my money started being my own.

I think it definitely teaches lessons. I had to save up to get a $5 ninja
turtle. That was like 5 weeks worth of work for a while! Chores included:
dishes, laundry, vacuuming, dusting. I think I split them with my sister. My
mom would even make me cook for myself, teaching me hot to boil pasta, cook an
egg, cook steak, etc.

I can only say that it gave me all the life skills I needed to survive. Thanks
mom! Thanks dad! Appreciate it! As for the value of money? Which $5 ninja
turtle should I save up for? Which one was worth it the most? Which one would
be able to keep me happy until I could afford the next best ninja turtle?

This logic has stuck with me and I've managed to mostly stay out of debt.. at
least credit card debt for my entire life. Student loans.. paid those off. I
currently just have a mortgage and a personal loan that I took out to help my
girlfriend is the only major debt I have at the moment.

~~~
rosege
They say that one of the things that determines future success is the ability
to defer spending and not have to have something instantly. So this is a good
way to see how your child would do. Can they save up for something bigger and
better or do they blow it all straight away.

------
andrewhillman
Allowance for doing nothing works pretty well. When you go to stores make sure
they bring their money. They ask for less if they are holding their money.
When you tell them they can buy anything they want with their money. Suddenly
the crap items that said they wanted are long forgotten. The moral of the
story is always go shopping with them but make sure they have their allowance
on them. This helps them learn the value of a dollar. They become really
cheap.

------
neuromancer2701
My son is only 2 so we haven't gotten there yet. But I like the block of tasks
that the child has to do with no reward because that is a refection of real
life(we all have to take out the trash, mow the lawn, etc).

But in addition to that you encourage the child to think outside of those
tasks and to proposal tasks for money/reward mini-business plans. Get them to
think entrepreneurial. Then hopefully as they grow older they may petition the
neighbors, etc.

~~~
closeparen
The incredible amount of time my family spent maintaining, cleaning,
improving, and repairing our suburban house definitely motivated me to choose
housing as an adult that wouldn't require so much work.

~~~
NTripleOne
Out of curiosity, how good are your DIY skills?

Were you involved in said repairs/improvements or just an onlooker?

~~~
closeparen
Decent. I got the _spirit_ from my dad but most of the actual practice on my
high school's stage crew, and a part-time technician job at one of my
university's concert halls.

I couldn't finish a basement or build cabinetry from scratch like my dad did,
but I can use a drill and table saw to put together sets that'll look
reasonable at 30 feet. Or go at basic household issues with my bag of hand
tools.

More to my interests, I can spec, build, configure, troubleshoot, solder, etc.
my way around a performance venue's sound, communications, and lighting
control systems.

------
Rodyland
In our household, the kids have chores. The kids also have an allowance.

The important part for us is that the allowance isn't tied to the performance
of the chores - chores are mandatory, part of living in a household.

The allowance is tied to doing said chores promptly and completely when asked,
without complaint.

Complaint or lack of completion of chores results in deductions from the
allowance. But importantly, the chore must still be done.

Works pretty well for us.

~~~
joevandyk
Confused how that's not tying allowance to chores.

~~~
Rodyland
It's tied, but indirectly. Completion of chores properly is obviously required
for allowance to be received. But it was important to us to not give the
impression that this was "pay for work done". Rather, the work has to get
done, the payment is for doing it properly and without complaint (ie. to save
my and my wife's sanity).

But the important bits are:

1\. The job gets done always. There is not an option for the child to say
"keep your $2, I'd rather watch TV today."

2\. If the job isn't done right, the child has to re-do or otherwise complete
the job.

3\. Complaints about the job, or failure to do the job promptly (ie. nagging),
lead to deductions in allowance, but #1 still applies.

4\. The size of the allowance and the size/number of chores are not directly
related.

We also give the kids the option to change chores (within reason) - because
the allowance isn't tied to specific chores. As they get older, they get more
responsibility (more and/or more complex chores) but also more allowance.

Like I said, it seems to work well for us. The chores range from feeding the
cats to doing a load of washing to helping cook dinner. They quickly learn
that complaining about chores is a no-win situation, and accept that it's
simply a part of week to week life.

------
lucozade
With the caveat that they're not quite adults yet (eldest is 16) so there are
no actual results to this experiment...

The children get regular money put into their accounts. We don't put many
restrictions on what they spend it on. We take the approach (with this as well
as internet access etc) that we trust them until they prove us wrong then we
will stomp on them from a great height. Touch wood not much stomping so far.

They have assigned chores that are not directly connected to the money. I
guess if they didn't do their chores we could pull some money but TBH there
are better levers.

Although some of the chores are there just so they participate in the
household (taking out bins/recycling etc), we also require them to make
lunch/dinner or go shopping for the family periodically. The main reason is so
that they're reasonably self sufficient when they eventually fly/get pushed
from the coop.

None of them actually earn money yet (as in from outside family and friends)
although only the eldest would be technically legal. He does have a regular
job in the voluntary sector which gives him most of the discipline skills
having a job entails.

I would say that they're all fairly aware of the cost of things. I'm not so
convinced that they're sufficiently aware of the value of things. Maybe that's
hard to do unless you've either genuinely lived on your earnings or struggled
for money.

------
bluelu
I have kids, but they are still too young to set any rules.

When I was younger, I didn't have any allowances at all. I was lucky to get
bought what I needed and wanted as long as it made reasonable sense, e.g.
books, clothes or toys which kids in my age would have, but I did not get
everything. For a while we didn't have any TV at all, then only one for all of
us. I never had a NES, playstation, etc... and I had to "work" on my parents
for more than 1 year for us to get the first PC. If I got money from my
grandparents or other family members, then it was put on my savings account
which was put aside, where I didn't really had access to.

I was also lucky that my parents paid my studies afterwards. This would also
cover going out, small vacations, etc... I assume as long as reasonable.
Whatever I earned in side projects/work was my personal money, and wouldn't be
deducted from what my parents gave me. This kept me very much motivated to
work on my own projects and gave me the opportunity to start my own company
afterwards.

------
fuzzygroup
I'm a parent of two boys (16 and 10) and I'd strongly, strongly advice tying
it to chores and then using it to teach that performance matters. Do a good
job? You get your allowance. Do a bad job? Sorry; no allowance. Saving is a
hard skill to learn as is that performance matters. An allowance is a great
way to teach both.

~~~
willmacdonald
I have been told the opposite. Kids should learn to do chores as part of
living in a house, not to be paid.

------
joe202
We started giving our kids money to spend on a comic or similar at the corner
shop as soon as they were old enough to handle it. From school age they had
regular pocket money that they could save or spend. This was mostly not tied
to chores, which were expected anyway, though we did give them opportunity to
earn extra for doing extra chores when they were saving for something
significant. From early teens we gave them a monthly allowance intended to
cover clothes as well as spending money. I would say that they've turned out
very good with everyday money and also very helpful about the house. They are
all grown up now.

------
todd8
I had a meger allowance of 0.25 USD per week. At the time, in my cohort, it
was below average but at least it was something.

What really benefited me was having a before school newspaper delivery job. I
felt a responsibility to my employer and the subscribers and would get up
early in the dark to walk though the cold Detroit winters to deliver papers
every day.

In retrospect, it was just the right level of challenge and reward for me as a
kid. I saved enough money to buy some things I wanted as a kid: a new bike, a
tennis racket, and a slide rule!

~~~
Cyph0n
> a slide rule

Now that is interesting! Care to share the story behind that?

~~~
todd8
I used that yellow Pickett slide rule from junior high school through my EE
degree at MIT. It was a yellow Pickett model N4
([http://www.sliderule.ca/pickett.htm](http://www.sliderule.ca/pickett.htm)).

The slide rule was a wonderful thing for me. I got the idea that I would like
having one from the book _Have Spacesuit--Will Travel_ , by Robert Heinlein, a
book I read when I was around twelve. The paper route a couple of years later
gave me enough money that I could buy one.

Growing up in the 1950s and 60s, there were no computers used in everyday
life. The slide rule was the only practical way to perform calculations
quickly, sadly to only 3 significant digits. An important skill taught in High
School back then was using tables of logarithms and trig functions to perform
calculations (with this approach one can easily get 5 significant digits of
accuracy). I still have my CRC handbook of Mathematics that I bought for
myself in High School, I learned a lot by studying each formula and each kind
of reference table in that book.

I taught myself to program from a book on Fortran in 1967. I was able to
submit programs punched on cards to a friend who would run the program on the
School district's single computer used in their administration building. A
couple of days later I would get my listing back!

Like the TI Calculators today, slide rules were ubiquitous in my engineering
classes. Although I went to college in 1969, I've taken classes at the local
University as recently as ten years ago for fun. I brushed up on my long
unused differential equations and learned some new things, a Graduate course
on Combinatorics.

It's very interesting to see the difference between my approach to working
through problems and the methods used by other students in my differential
equations class. They would almost invariably reach for the calculator to work
through a complex expression, entering each term and finally coming up with
the answer. By habit, I normally simplify, factor and reduce the complex
expressions before doing any arithmetic. The younger students are masters of
the calculator; I'm not very fast with a calculator. I just never had access
to a calculator while in school and never gained the proficiency of today's
typical college students.

I've got an advanced TI calculator sitting in a drawer (and the old slide rule
stashed somewhere in the house), but I never really use it. If I need to do
some quick calculation my preferred method is to simply fire up the Python
REPL in a terminal window.

------
adamb_
Growing up I initially had tiny regular allowance, which gradually became tied
to specific weekly chores & subsequently bigger. As parent myself now I think
approach works well, as it balances "I'm giving you this $ because I love and
support you" and "hard work should be rewarded"

------
meagher
Don't have kids, but heard of a cool company doing something tangential:
Current (current.com)

> The debit card for teens (and parents)

> – Automates chores and allowances

> – Notifies you about spending

> – Works with your bank

~~~
ThrustVectoring
Tools for snooping in on your kid's spending is an instant ugh reaction from
me.

~~~
MikeTheGreat
I used to think so too, then I had kids :)

One interesting approach is to use snooping tools but to then explicitly tell
the kids and to discuss the results periodically. I.e., "my job as a parent is
to help you figure out how to be a grown up. Part of that is managing money. I
noticed you spent money on X and wanted to talk about it"

I think for the 'cellphone based GPS-tracking' there was also an explicit rule
that the parents wouldn't get the kids in trouble for information gathered
from the GPS tracking. They might talk to them about it afterwards, but they
wanted the kids to be willing to not circumvent the device for safety
purposes.

But yeah - it's weird how it both ughs me out and at the same time scratches a
deep itch/fear that I'll still be able to keep my kids safe even as they age.

~~~
ThrustVectoring
Keeping your kids safe at all costs isn't good parenting. It encourages
suffocating closeness and loss of independence. The point isn't to get your
child to the age of 22 without getting criticized for it. The point is to
provide the necessary conditions for a successful adult to form.

>"my job as a parent is to help you figure out how to be a grown up. Part of
that is managing money. I noticed you spent money on X and wanted to talk
about it"

This will teach children to spend like someone's watching. It's external
motivation, and it's likely counterproductive IMO. Better, in my opinion, is
to let them find out the natural consequences of spending money - that is, not
having it for other purposes, or needing to do things to get more money.

~~~
davidgould
> The point is to provide the necessary conditions for a successful adult to
> form.T

+1000

When I grew up it was routine for children to deceive their parents,
especially about stuff like friends, smoking, drugs, drinking, sex etc. The
assumed parental answer was always no so if you did any of that stuff you had
to hide it. It was amazingly easy, we (four brothers) lead our secret lives
and the parents mostly had no idea. There are problems with this: if the child
gets in a bind there is no way they can ask for advice or help; if the parent
finds out and overreacts badly it can seriously damage the relationship. I
have a stepfather who I've never contacted since leaving home partly due to
this.

Raising our son my wife and I agreed (mostly) that there is no practical way
to completely control a _person_ and that trying to do so would just make him
hide things from us. We thought the best we could do was to try to instill
decent values and good judgment and to avoid useless opposition. This was a
bit scary sometimes, "good judgment" and "14 year old boy" are not an obvious
combination. He has turned out really well. It may have been just good luck,
but I like to think that we avoided a lot of the mistakes our own parents made
and that it helped.

As for allowance, we tried to pick a reasonable basic amount for the age and
set no conditions. He could earn extra by doing extra work around the house.
We also set up "Bank of Dad" where he could save money and get a good return.
Learning how to make choices was definitely part of the plan.

Chores were not optional but were not tied to allowance. This was not
completely satisfactory as he often delayed chores more than we liked unless
cajoled into it somehow. I do this too sometimes.

------
Cyph0n
I don't have kids yet, but I just wanted to thank OP for starting such an
interesting thread. Definitely bookmarking for future reference.

