Essay Example on Should Parents Give Their Children an Allowance

📌Category: Child development, Life, Personal finance, Psychology
📌Words: 777
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 16 April 2022

Prompt: “Many parents give children a weekly or monthly allowance regardless of their behaviors because they believe an allowance teaches children to be financially responsible. Other parents only give children an allowance as a reward for completing chores or when they have behaved properly. Explain what you think parents should do and why” 

When raising kids you should want to teach them basic valuable skills they’ll use in life, from money management to decision-making. If you don’t know these skills you're going to have a harder time navigating life. This is why one of the most useful skills to learn that you'll use for your whole life is money management. There are many ways you can give your kids an allowance. Some base it off behavior, doing chores, others make their kids put all their allowance into a savings account for their future, and some parents choose to not give an allowance at all. I believe parents should give their children an allowance and it should not be tied to chores. An allowance teaches them money management, how to pay for their own things, and the consequences of poor financial decisions.

Body 1 (why I think an allowance is necessary): Around the ages of 3 or 4, kids can start to grasp the importance and consequences of money, and they can start to differentiate needs versus wants. Around this age your child is also going to start wanting things, this is a great opportunity to introduce money, and how to pay for your own things. When you first give them their allowance you should expect them to make mistakes, spending all their money on a toy they later regret buying or losing their money. But it's all a part of the learning process. When they make these mistakes you can step in as their parent and set boundaries. If your child is spending all their money on Legos that can be a problem. The whole goal of giving them an allowance is to teach them, and when your child is buying every Lego he sees that’s not teaching them anything. You can step in and set boundaries of how much they can spend each week. But kids are smart, and they’ll quickly learn from these mistakes, learning from a young age how to save their money, and spend it wisely which sets them up for good spending habits in the future. 

Body 2 (why chores shouldnt be tied to that allowance) Chores shouldn’t be tied to an allowance. When you tie money to chores your child will only want to ever do them if they're getting paid for it, they likely won’t do it willingly. Instead, chores should just be a regular thing they have to do. But by paying them to do chores it creates a mindset where when you ask them to do a chore they’re not getting paid for they think “well, what’s it for me?” or “why should I do this, i’m not going to get paid for it” “How much money will you give me if I do that for you?” There's also another side to it, where what if your child doesn't want to do their chores? What are you going to do when they decline the allowance because they’d rather play video games than do their chores? Now you're stuck, your reward system has failed, and your child has declined the allowance and is refusing to do the chores because they just don't want to do it and don’t care for the money anymore. This doesn’t set up good habits for the future. You can’t just not go to work one day because you don't want to, and rather stay home watching TV. 

Body 3 (other side/arguments) Now you might argue that by giving your child an allowance without them having to do chores to earn it, they will think money’s just going to be handed to them in the future. But, I don’t believe that’s the case, because if you've taught them about money, and how you earn it, they should expect that one day they won’t be able to live off their allowance and will need a job. You can also set an age limit, to make this clear to them. For example, at this age, you’ll no longer receive your allowance and will need to find a job if you want a way of income. 

Conclusion: Raising financially smart should be something you value. Giving your kids an allowance, while not tying it to chores, will teach them great skills they’ll use forever. But, tying chores to rewards is not productive, rewards just don’t work, they do exactly the opposite of what they are intended to do. But, while growing up and during the process of learning about money they will make mistakes but also learn from those mistakes. They will learn ways they can save, spend, and budget and more than likely, go on to form these skills into good habits which will benefit them throughout their life.

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