Money and the Kid


I wrote earlier about the difficulty of trying to teach one’s kid the value of money. And it just keeps getting worse: these days, even kids in the 7-9 age bracket compare how much money their parents have!

After one such discussion, my 8 yo came to me, and without any hope whatsoever, asked, “Do we have at least 1 crore rupees?”. Apparently, that’s the minimum amount to be part of the kids’ club downstairs. If she’s ejected from her group, then she’ll be at home in the evenings. And if she’s at home, she’ll chew our brains out. So, I reasoned, the smart course of action was to say, “Yes, we have a crore”. Pariah status averted.

A few months later, she noticed a car with a moon roof and asked if we could buy one too. “No, we don’t have the money”, I replied. “Why”, she countered, “I thought you said we have a crore”. That she can remember, but try to get her to study…

More recently, she came home one evening all riled up. Turns out they were all setting up stalls downstairs for an apartment celebration. One set of friends wanted to sell lemonade and make money. My daughter and her friend, on the other hand, wanted to, er, give away bookmarks. “We’re just kids”, she railed, “We want to have a stall just to have fun.” And then she switched into the Old Testament God mode, pouring fire and brimstone on the lemonade kid:
“All that girl thinks of is money, money, money.”
And then cranked up the scorn quotient a few notches:
“As if she has to make money for her family. Hmmmph.”

So is this the light at the end of the tunnel? Where my daughter stops caring so much about “money, money, money”? Or was this just a kid saying something to sound righteous and morally superior? I suspect it’s the latter, but one can always hope…

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