Should You Give Kids an Allowance

Learn if you should give kids an allowance in this video with Janet Bodnar.

Host: Should I give my children an allowance; if so, at what age should I begin giving an allowance? Janet Bodnar: I think an allowance is the best hands on learning tool there is for kids and this is a very good transition. Once kid starts, say at the age of six or seven, they are starting to learn about money in school. They are getting a little bit more sophisticated about understanding the whole abstract idea of money, so that if they get five or six dollars a week, they now how far that would go. So, I think that's a good age to start and it really covers that whole elementary middle school age. As I said, I think allowance is a great teaching tool. I always say that kids will spend unlimited amounts of money as long as it's yours. When their money is on the line it's a whole different story and certainly for this middle school years, when they don't have a job of their own, the best way to get money into their hands, to get them that learning tool is with an allowance. So I think it's very important. Giving allowance is very important; you don't have to start at the age of six or seven you can start a little later if you would like, but certainly if you do start that young, you can use it as a foundation on which you can build as the kids get older.