Did You Get An Allowance?

[LizzieMaine]

I was talking to my 16-year-old niece the other day, and was amazed to discover she's still getting an allowance -- $30 a week. She doesn't have to do anything to get it, it's just paid out and she spends it however she sees fit without any kind of accountability.

I found this kind of jarring, both for the amount and for the fact that she's still getting it at her age. Admittedly, I don't have kids so I'm not up on what the current trends are, but when I was her age I'd already been working for wages for three years. Before that, from the age of eight to ten, I got 50 cents a week from my grandmother -- raised all the way to $3 a week on my eleventh birthday. Even accounting for inflation, I don't think I was given anywhere near the disposable income that my niece gets today.

I got that until I was thirteen -- when it ended and I was expected to hold down a job. I remember being rather upset about this at the time, but in retrospect I think it was a good thing -- it taught me the value of a dollar, and the value of the work that goes into earning a dollar, which is a lesson I think my niece, unfortunately, has really yet to learn.

What do folks here think about this? Did you get an allowance growing up, and if so, for how long? And if you have kids, do you pay allowances?

 

[Tommy Fedora]

I got an allowance of about a dollar a week back in the late 50's. My parents really didn't have any money so it didn't last very long. Got my first job at 16 because I knew it was the only way to get money (still is). I couldn't wait to turn 16 so I could get my working papers !
My kids never got an allowance but they never went without either. And they have no complaints. Of course, I never took the change from the twenty when I sent them out for bread ! lol

 

[beaucaillou]

My sister (who has two) has talked to me a lot about this. We grew up in a family where no money skills were taught to us and it did us a great disservice when we first came of age. Looking forward - should I ever have kids, it would be very important to me to teach them financial savvy.

My sister's kids don't get paid for chores because she and her husband don't believe they should be compensated for doing maintenance and contributing to the family. I agree with this. Task-based contributions to the household should be done without expecting a financial reward. They do get a *small* allowance (they are 7 and 5) each week just to begin learning money skills.

My brother-in-law has said that they will both be expected to have jobs at the age of 16, but imagines that their own ingenuity and financial understanding will have them holding down lawn mowing and various neighborhood jobs long before that.

They both give 20% of their allowances to charity each month and whenever they have lemonade stands the profits are broken up the same way (except for the one where all profits when to Katrina relief). So I think what I've learned is: start them early. Don't reward them for basic maintenance of themselves and the house, but teach money skills constantly on a small scale. Let them learn consequences and make decisions early to be prepared for greater ones later.

 

[Paisley]

I didn't get a nickel from my parents for an allowance. I did earn some money taking care of neighbors' pets and houses while they were gone...until a saintly neighbor boy started doing it for free.

Nor did my parents save any money for my education. I spent three years in the military to get the GI bill. (My parents did give me money for my first semester, though.) Yet my parents were fond of telling people they "sent me to college." They also liked to brag on how they raised me...but never mentioned the three juvenile deliquents they raised. Not that I'm bitter or anything, but my entire estate is willed to charity.

 

[Paisley]

I was talking to my 16-year-old niece the other day, and was amazed to discover she's still getting an allowance -- $30 a week. She doesn't have to do anything to get it, it's just paid out and she spends it however she sees fit without any kind of accountability.

I'm curious: does your niece's allowance have to cover things like lunches, bus fare, clothes, school supplies, etc.? Around here, that would barely cover the first two items.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Well, I'm pretty sure she has to pay for her lunches out of it, but she walks to school, so there's no transportation costs. Mostly, from what I've seen, she buys lots and lots of junk at the mall.

I think the fact that she doesnt try to actually *save* any of it is what bothers me the most -- which gets back to the whole idea of "if you don't have to work for it, you're not going to be responsible with it." But she's not someone to take advice, even when constructively offered.

(Of course, I have to keep reminding myself that I was a short-sighted know-it-all when I was sixteen too...)

 

[Elaina]

I was given an allowance only from 12-17 because my mom went to school and I cooked, cleaned, and took care of my dad. For $10 a week. I got my first job at 15 (also moved without either parent knowing) and from 15-17 my dad gave me $50 for not getting pregnant, and my mom gave me $10.

I give my son about $5 a week, but he works for it: clean his room, oil the sewing machine, weed the garden, water the plants, and get all A's in school...he's 8 and it pays for his icecream at school and through the truck outside.

 

[Doctor Strange]

I didn't really get an allowance, per se, but I was helping out in the family photography business from an early age (sporadically at first, but from 7th grade on, after school nearly every day), so it was more like salary.

At first (circa 1967), it was around $5 a day for afterschool work. As the years passed, it eventually grew to $125 a week when I was working full days during vacations when I was home from college.

As far as my own kids go...

Since I'm divorced and have them with me less than half the time, I only give them their allowance on alternate weeks. (Their mother *should* give them allowance on my off-weeks, but she's perennially broke and doesn't even try to manage it.) My 16-year-old gets $10, and my 14-year-old gets $7 - I started them about three years ago at $7 and $5, and they'll be due for another raise in the fall. I also give them lunch money for school every day that I take them, but I gather that they have to dip into their allowance money for that sometimes when they're mother doesn't have lunch money for them...

And no, I don't expect them to do any chores or anything to earn it (apart from being generally obedient, keeping up with their schoolwork, etc.) After all, we're talking pretty darn small amounts of money in this day and age... and the truth is, I'm an easy mark!

 

[Vladimir Berkov]

I seem to recall that I got $10 a week. This was in the mid 1990s, and I generally either spent it on snacks at school or saved it up to buy antiques.

 

[Orgetorix]

My sisters and I were given an allowance. We were given money to put in three categories: money to save, money to spend, and money to give to church. It started out at $.50 for each category, then rose as we got older to $1.50 each, then $5 each.

We did have to earn it by doing chores around the house. I vaguely remember Dad docking my spending money when I didn't get all the chores done when I was supposed to.

 

[Helen Troy]

When I was a kid, a got a small allowance: One Norwegian Crown, (then about a cent?) pr. year I was. I put them in the piggybank and saved for something nice.

When I became a teenager, from my 13th birthday, I got a bigger allowance of about 100 dollars pr. month. (Very difficult translate money from one country to another and from one decade to another.) I thought it was a lot, but then it had to cover about everything except for food and roof over my head: I had to buy school supplies, clothing, shampoo, cinema tickets, and everything else a teenager needs.

That was the system my parents used on all us four kids. We had to do chores around the house, but never got paid for them. We just thought of that as everybody having to do their part in a family.

I think it worked well, and taught us how to handle money, and the value of it. It also taught us how to negotiate: I remember my sister and me negotiating and winning a small raise to the monthly sum to cover feminine hygiene products- so we got a little bit more money than the boys. Hey, it's only fair!

 

[Joie DeVive]

My parents had an interesting outlook on allowances.

My father had been raised very poor. He basically was working and paying for his own clothes by the time he was 10. Due to this, many of his brothers and sisters were more focused on making money than school. My father made it out through an education, but he was the only one out of 7 kids.
So, it was my Dad who insisted that going to school was our job. That was where we were to focus our attention. And so, our parents covered all our basic needs. They bought our clothes, school supplies and supplied us for lunch.

But my parent's recognized the need for us to learn how to manage money too, so we did get an allowance as well. It started when we were about 5 or 6, and we got a small amount for setting the table and picking up our toys. The amount grew as we got older, but our responsibilities did not keep pace. That is a mistake I think my parents made. At any rate, our final allowance was enough to pay for one evening movie per week (without popcorn!) What I did with it was up to me.

Overall, I thought my parents did a pretty good job.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

I don't think I ever got an official "allowance" or anything...

Well unless you count the pennies I won off mom playing poker.....

 

[Dinerman]

Mine's 5 a week.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Mine's 5 a week.

Which pays for the shipping of one (lightweight) hat.

.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

At my high school, some classmates got $200 a week their junior year. That's not including their BMW convertibles.


At our sister school, the girls got even more. Had their daddies wrapped around their pinkies.


I knew of a 17 year-old guy at Fairfax High School (a public school) who totalled his first car, a Ferrari. His parents punished him by then getting him a used Porsche.


.

 

[Joie DeVive]

His parents punished him by then getting him a used Porsche.
.

Oh, punish me too!!

 

[Daisy Buchanan]

I got an allowance of $20 a week from the mid 80's into the early 90's. For the most part it went towards lunch, for I don't recall my Mom ever making me an edible one!!
My parent's and Grandparents helped me out with spending money and a car while I was in college (the first time) but I was paying the tuition.

I do think it's crazy nowadays the things that kids have, and that they don't even realize how good they have it. Cell phones, computers, fancy cars, and they still want more[huh]

 

[Dinerman]

Which pays for the shipping of one (lightweight) hat.

.

yeah- it doesn't go far, but what with ebay, I make enough to fund my hat habit.

 

[Orgetorix]

Oh, yeah--I forgot to mention that mine stopped as soon as I started earning my own money by mowing lawns and such. Around 14 or so.