Whatever happened to delayed gratification?
I can remember that when I was child that I had to do chores and errands to earn an allowance. I had to mow and rake lawns, deliver newspapers, wash cars, take out the trash, weed the gardens, and even baby sit if I wanted to earn any money. There was no such thing as easy and fast money for me. Life was not easy; if I didn’t do the work, I didn’t get any money at all. Now I read in various parenting magazines that children are supposed to be given an allowance even if they don’t do any chores to earn the money! The experts claim that giving the children an allowance will help the children learn to budget their money wisely. These same experts offer the advice that the children should get at least $20 to $25 a week for an allowance as a minimum!
Personally, I think that if the children don’t earn the money through chores, they will never learn the true value of money. You don’t really appreciate anything if you don’t have to work for it! If our children are being raised this way, thinking that they are entitled to an allowance simply be virtue of existing, and don’t have to work at all for it, then these same children will be non-productive employees when they enter the workforce. With the unemployment situation we are experiencing right now, these children will be hard pressed to keep a job; no employer wants to hire people who don’t want to work for their paycheck!
And I think that these are the same people who are going to be irresponsible with their money and get some sort of payday loan, (instant gratification) then default on it. I think that this sets a dangerous precedence. We need to teach our kids to delay their gratification.
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