<p>Awesome to see so many parents/students helping to stimulate the economy with discretionary income! </p>
<p>Insomniatic - where do you think jobs come from?</p>
<p>I believe it’s normal to carry a balance, but we never have. Being “normal” is overrated.</p>
<p>Our kids get a tiny allowance ($12/month) which has a long and silly history. S1 had well paying part time and summer work starting in high school. S2 earned some (but considerably less) money in high school, and has mostly found ways to spend rather than earn money in the summer. He is working this summer and most of his pleasure spending comes out of Christmas money or his meager earnings.</p>
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<p>LOL - great point! There wouldn’t BE the local fast-food / quick-serve restaurant / coffee shop / ice cream stores for college students to work at to earn money for college, if there weren’t people who had discretionary money to buy fast-food / lattes / ice cream cones!</p>
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Perhaps. But not always as regards to income and discretionary spending.</p>
<p>Now I get it when my son claims that he’s the “poorest kid he knows” at his college. I really had never considered the fact that most other parents were giving generous allowances to their college-aged kids. After reading this thread I’m feeling fairly neglectful.</p>
<p>Not hard to guess that we did not provide a credit card to either son while in college. Both used debit cards tied to their own accounts. S1 got his own credit card at some point, probably prior to his senior year in college.</p>
<p>Do kids discuss their allowances with one another? I would really never want my kids to discuss their financial status / info / allowances with others.</p>
<p>PG, honestly, until this thread, I had no idea that college aged students got allowances. No one talks about it around here.</p>
<p>I actually didn’t know college kids got allowance either, though maybe it’s just semantics when people say they provide their kids a certain amount of spending money throughout the year.</p>
<p>And if you wanted to go out to dinner with one of my sons, romani, I promise you they could use their credit card for that dinner out!</p>
<p>Aw shucks, thanks bd :)</p>
<p>It may be partly semantics. D has never had a meal plan–we give her money to spend for food and whatever else in an amount we think is reasonable, on top of paying her rent & tuition. It works for us. She usually doesn’t spend all that was allotted & is able to have the balance for other needs and/or savings.</p>
<p>D1 and I were just talking about navigating the tricky bit of friendship when friends don’t have similar spending power. She’s got some good college friends who have carte blanche from their parents. It allows them to take part in some spendy ECs, which D1 knows are not in her price range. What’s more an issue is that when her friends say “let’s go out to dinner”, that’s not always within D1’s budget. She’s got a great attitude about it, and has great ways of dealing with the situation (e.g. giving other excuses besides “I can’t afford that”, suggesting splitting meals, not cheaping out on the final bill down to the the last quarter or dollar). </p>
<p>It’s a delicate balance, but SUCH an important life skill. It’s just as important for her friends (or D1, when she’s the wealthier friend) to be straightforward about the situation, sometimes going for less expensive options, other times being able to not feel guilty that you’re doing something that your poorer friends can’t afford.</p>
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<p>Privileged and spoiled can be two entirely different things. D1 has a lot of wonderful close friends who are highly privileged. She’s also got wonderful close friends who would certainly consider her privileged. Saying that anyone who’s privileged can’t be your friend…sounds awfully snobby to me.</p>
<p>We cut D1’s allowance when she turned 18. She was making good money babysitting by that time to pay for discretionary items. We pay for the bills that come from college, plus books. She is responsible for her entertainment expenses, including club costs. Given she’s on the equestrian team, that’s not a small amount. (She is working 40+ hours/week this summer with 2 nanny jobs and is banking a good amount of money that will cover her needs next year and possibly allow her to get an unpaid internship next summer).</p>
<p>This will probably engender all kinds of comments, and I take no responsibility for this other than being the bearer of the tale, but when H was in college, his parents were concerned about him dating Jewish girls, and so they gave him their Amex with the understanding that if he took out a Jewish girl, the dinner was on them. As I qualified, we had fun. LOL.</p>
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And often that need ends when they start earning their own income through p/t jobs and no longer need to be so dependent on the parents’ finances and can start exerting their own independence and budgeting and reality checks. </p>
<p>What some parents do is segregate direct college expense which might include tuition, books, transportation, housing, basic food (meal plan or basic grocery money) from ‘extras’ that aren’t needed for college - eating meals in restaurants outside of the meal plan/groceries, movies, partying money, buying bf/gf stuff money, etc. and pay for the former but not the latter.</p>
<p>But there’s a variety not only financial capabilities but also of parenting styles. I have my own opinions of the best way to handle this financial area but clearly others have different ideas.</p>
<p>And again - while other people can do what they see fit and that’s fine - I would have a real problem with my kid taking an on-campus or near-campus job that could have gone to someone who REALLY needs that money to stay in school. Ethically, I just don’t think that’s a nice thing to do. (I’m referring to what I’ll call scut-work minimum-wage type jobs - not referring to internships and the like.)</p>
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<p>This was a big challenge for me when I was in school, as I rarely had any spending money at all my last year. I had a really good friend who considered herself to be a “poor college student,” but she wasn’t by a longshot. She had no job but her parents gave her money for everything, and she wanted to go out to eat ALL the time-- something I could afford to do maybe once every month or two. Any time I tried to suggest something more affordable, she didn’t get the hint. I finally had to come out and say that I didn’t have the money to do those kinds of things because she wasn’t interested in doing things that didn’t cost money and was getting mad at me for not wanting to hang out with her anymore outside of class and studying, and she said she understood but she really didn’t. I ended up just making myself a lot less available. It was a source of great stress at the time, kudos to your D for figuring out how to handle it gracefully! It’s not easy!</p>
<p>oh, I never addressed the credit card portion of this thread’s intent - yes, D will have her two debit cards - one from her dad with a minimal 100/mo and one she populates with Christmas and birthday money and jobs (babysitting and the ones she had previous summers) and one “emergency” credit card from her dad. I guess she and her dad have discussed what is allowed on the credit card - none of my business.</p>
<p>SlitheyTove: That was also a conversation that we had to have with S2, mainly because so many of his college classmates travel during breaks and the summer. I think it was easier as a guy to avoid shopping and costly weekend entertainment, but I also know that his freshman year roommate paid for a lot of their joint late night snacking.</p>
<p>PG - I think that’s one are which I disagree with you. At some point, your kids are separate from you. Even if you could support them through college without working, at some point they will have to. A lot of employers (managers) want to hire students who had previous work experience, even if it just shows they could take direction from senior people, show up on time, work well with different kinds of people. I have known some well to do kids who would decide not to show up for work sometimes because it wasn’t worth their while, or they had some family obligations which were more important than their work. I also do not think your kids would be taking jobs away from other people. Employers tend to hire most qualified people. You don’t give a job to someone because you feel sorry for him/her.</p>
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<p>Here is why it’s not an ethical problem: because you have no assurance that the on- or near-campus job would go to someone who REALLY needs the money to stay in school. The employer (unless they’re using work-study funds) isn’t considering financial need. The pool of potential employees will consist of people who are just looking for a little extra spending money, people who need that money to eat, and everything in between. If your kid generously steps aside, there’s no guarantee that the job then helps someone who needs the funds.</p>
<p>We are pleased at ways our D has figured out how to reduce her expenses while still socializing. One of her most well-heeled friends has her pay for parking when they go to VERY NICE meals (dinners beyond our price range–had been wondering about the random parking charges since she didn’t have a car). She sometimes eats before hand & then just has dessert and/or a salad with her friends when they go out. Sometimes she does join them in a less expensive meal. She makes it work & most of her friends are similarly lwatching their funds, so aren’t very extravagant.</p>