Chores, Allowances, Sticks, and Carrots

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Clothes inside a washing machine

Let’s talk chores and allowances, readers. Do you differentiate them in your house? At what age did you start giving your kids an allowance or making them do chores? Are chores tied to money for you?

My husband and I, in general, stink at both of these, so some general observations from someone who is still learning:

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Chores vs. an allowance: I never had either growing up, to be honest, so it’s only recently that I’ve understood there’s a difference between the two:

  • An allowance is money you give your kids so they start learning the idea of saving, budgeting, and so forth — a tiny bit of money so they have a sense of how to manage it.
  • Chores are tasks your kids do — while some people tie the chores to an allowance, as in “in order to EARN your allowance, you must do these chores,” some people view chores entirely separately, either in a “we all live in a collaborative space and this is how you can help out” way, or “you can earn money IF you do these chores.”

When I was growing up, the daily tasks I had (which felt incredibly weighty at the time) were things like practicing the piano and doing my homework — nothing like laundry or dishes.

In terms of money, it was never a problem. If I wanted a new toy or outfit, there was always a “treat” coming — for a good report card or piano recital or birthday (or my brother’s birthday). (We went to public schools in the Cleveland suburbs and lived in typical suburban homes, so it isn’t like we were raised like Rockefellers or anything — but we were comfortable.)

As my kids get older I find myself… not wanting to raise them like that. Yes to comfort and security, but no to… feeling like housework is someone else’s job. (Particularly since I’m raising boys!)

My kids get plenty of money from their grandparents for birthdays and major holidays, but I haven’t necessarily told them about all the checks I’ve deposited into their accounts. I recently did start gifting my eldest with money to use in various accounts (Fortnite, iTunes, STEAM games, Kindle), but I wanted him to have a sense of saving money, budgeting for things he wanted, and so forth.

We’ve started using the Piggybot app on Kate’s recommendation, and I randomly decided to give my 9-year-old $6 weekly (the app encourages you to split it into spend/save/share, which again is something we never did growing up), and $3 to my 6-year-old. It’s a great app, and it’s surprising how the money does add up. (Note: Unfortunately, Piggybot is no longer available to download; Kate recommended RoosterMoney in our recent post on the best apps for parents.)

The “sharing” part is interesting to me, since in my youth, “charity” was something I only had a vague understanding of beyond the weekly church envelope or the occasional Girl Scouts cookies… I like the idea of helping my son(s) pick out a charity or DonorsChoose project and letting him fund part of it.

Still, I wonder if cash would be better for teaching about money. One friend, whose kids are grown, made an interesting comment that she always preferred to give her kids cash so that they really got a sense of money accumulating, money going away, and so on… My husband and I almost never have cash on us, but we’ve talked about possibly getting a few hundred dollars out from the bank in singles for the kids’ allowances.

Readers, how about you — did you have chores or an allowance growing up? Have you given your kids either, or do you intend to?

Stock photo (washing machine) via Stencil.

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We do a combo system for my 6 and 8 year old. There are certain chores that are part of being a family – feeding the dog, setting the table, cleaning your room, etc. Those are expected and not rewarded.

However, my kids starting asking to earn money in elementary school. So we came up with a “jobs” system so they could earn extra money. If there’s a job that is for adults or takes extra work – like planting the garden in the spring, a whole house clean out, sweeping the leaves out of the garage, etc – we write it with a dollar amount on a post-it and stick it on the fridge. The kids can choose to do it or not, and if they do, they’ll earn those dollars. (They have to “be in good standing” on their regular chores though.)

Then similar to avocado above, we talked through save/ spend/ give and match any “give” dollar for dollar. To encourage saving, we give them $1 for every $10 they have in their “savings” at the end of the month. They use their money for toys (I will buy any and all books they ever want) and special clothes, and keep a running list of their “wish list” and cost so they know what they’re aiming for. My daughter saved for two months this winter to buy a crop top for the summer, even though she knows it’s not allowed under school/ camp dress code. (TBD on whether she decides that was a good use of money.)

Once they start asking for more things beyond the occasional toy or clothing item, we’ll likely add a weekly allowance and budgeting spreadsheet, but that will be in the tween years I’m guessing. And then yes, once cars come into play we’ll add debit/ credit cards so they can start to understand virtual money as well.

We tell the kids all the time that our job as parents is to help them learn to be good adults. Money management is such an important part of that, and my goal is that they graduate high school without fear of money or budgets.

I have a 14-year-old. We started giving her a cash allowance of $5 per week in kindergarten and raised it to $10 a week at some point during middle school. She was responsible for buying all her own toys, craft supplies, graphic novels (I still bought books with no pictures), makeup, souvenirs, etc. We encouraged her to donate by matching dollar for dollar. The purpose of the allowance was to teach her to save and budget. We let her make mistakes like spending money on cheap junk that she quickly lost interest in. She quickly learned to consider her purchases carefully, to save for big purchases, and to keep contingency funds on hand.

When she entered high school this past fall, we looked at our budget and added up how much we were spending on her clothes, toiletries, school supplies, etc. We increased her allowance to cover all these expenses. She shops on line for herself and fills up a shopping cart, I check out for her with my credit card, and she tracks her expenses in a budget spreadsheet that’s a simplified version of the one I use for the household budget. She has been doing great, although she tends to procrastinate on clothing purchases so she ends up having to wear too-small snow gloves or dress shoes or whatever when the need materializes. When she is older I plan to set up an on-line checking account and make her an authorized user on our credit card so she gets used to tracking credit card charges and paying bills. I think using actual cash makes things concrete for younger kids, but older kids need to learn to deal with “virtual” money.

In our house the purpose of an allowance is to learn to save, budget, and spend wisely. The idea is to let her make mistakes and experience success while the stakes are low. The allowance is not earned by doing chores. Chores are a way to learn to be an adult and are part of living in a family, and are not rewarded with money. She has had a variety of regular assigned cleaning chores, including cleaning her own bathroom, since she was 10. She is also required to help out with one-time requests as needed. If something needs to be done (vacuum, shovel snow, pick up after the dog, etc.) and she’s got time on her hands, we ask her to do it. She usually responds well to being treated like a mini adult in this regard.

She has a savings account in her name where we’ve been depositing cash gifts, the proceeds from selling her baby gear, etc. This money is earmarked for non-tuition college expenses such as travel. Her actual college savings are in a separate account without her name on it.

Great topic, I’ve been thinking about this a bit myself lately. My son (8) has suggested doing some sort of chores to earn money a few times recently, but we’ve sort of been at a standstill about what we could assign to him. (He and his 5 year old sister clear the table, clean up their rooms and family room, and inconsistently help empty the dishwasher, but I’m having trouble coming up with much else that they can effectively do on their own.) Chores or not, I do think it’s probably time for him to start getting some allowance, just so he can start understanding the concept. Like Kat, we almost never have cash, but I’m having a hard time really conceptualizing doing this in any sort of non-cash way at his age.

I don’t have a lot to offer here, but I’m interested to see what others have to say.