@khanam’s comments - I wonder how, in the future, young people will prepare for college - or even for employment at Target or a factory - when there is a dire shortage of teachers in schools, because young people today are constantly being told that teaching is a worthless endeavor?
At the adolescent level, teachers must have a degree in the relevant field at a certain GPA level, so they are educated people with solid credentials.
In some areas, like here, teachers make respectable (although not lavish) starting salaries and have benefits that most of us can only dream of, which are compensation, as well.
Maybe my son should move to wherever you live. Starting salary for a high school Physics teacher in Florida is $38-40K/year and thanks to our legislature the benefits are not at all as good as they once were. Certainly if money were his goal, my son would be far better off to use his interest in Physics to pursue engineering. My husband makes far better money and has far better benefits than my son will likely ever see.
The question is why do we see engineers as more vital than teachers? Not all countries do.
But alas, I’m thread drifting again. Sorry.
Would he like to live in NYC? The benefits for our City employees are quite good. My husband and daughter are both City employees and, while her salary isn’t as good as my husband’s, her benefits are and pension are really good. Many teachers, if they choose, can add about $10,000 per year to salary by doing summer and/or after school programs.
@BeeDAre @delilahxc the truth is we need a shock to the system for people to start appreciating teachers. it is absolutely a noble profession but so severely underpaid that I am cynically suggesting that kids avoid going into teaching as a career to cause a shortage of teachers which, hopefully, will correct this imbalance. if society wont pay you enough to be a teacher, don’t be until it pays them as much as they are worth.
Of course! Will you take a personal check? 
Markets go up, markets go down. Over the long term, the equity markets are a pretty good bet. Short term is a different story. If your 5% return could be had through a CD or similar vehicle, people would be all over it.
Since there is a teacher shortage, some states are likely to reinstate loan forgiveness programs for teachers. The California legislature will be discussing that and other plans to deal with the teacher shortage this session.
@BelknapPoint Lol yup a personal check will do :)) well we have taken 70 LTV bank loans on the rental portfolios at 5% to leverage the returns but it is difficult to offer the same product to individual investors. the documentation and maintenance costs just add up too much in trying to service individual investors.
I just have to say it. I HATE the term “skin in the game.” Makes my skin crawl to hear it.
OK, now I feel better. Sorry about that.
My plan to have our son share a bit in the pain of paying for college is rather backfiring. I cleverly thought his contribution should be a part that he had some control over, stuff that he could learn to budget and spend more or less on. We chose food. I said we’d pay for the weekly groceries in his room(supposed to be primarily for breakfast) and meals whenever he comes home, which is at least once a week. He is to pay for the rest. I thought this would encourage him to buy the cheaper dorm food rather than more expensive restaurant food. The university has no meal plans, just ala carte purchases, though reasonable prices.
So guess what happened? His weekly requests for grocery deliveries have ballooned and whenever he comes home he eats enough to last for several days. He requests stuff like hard-boiled eggs, and trays of cooked chicken pieces and home-cooked bean stews that he can microwave at school and whole grain organic cookies because ‘the dorm food is full of MSG and other bad chemicals.’ Meanwhile his part-time job earnings are piling up in his savings acct. Smart mom, huh?
Next year I think I’m thinking of trying books and supplies. Teach him to shop for used books online and look at sales in the office supply shops. I can see pitfalls in that too though. He’ll be getting free bootleg electronic copies of books instead of the paper copies he actually likes to read. Borrowing paper from his roomies. I can see it now.
edit.
^ Smart kid 
But @celesteroberts, he did learn exactly what you wanted him to, to spend his money wisely and and not waste it. He eats for free. He eats healthier food. You could charge him for the grocery deliveries, but right now he’s getting it for free so why should he change his habits?
I thought the same thing about @celesteroberts post - He was given the responsibility of coming up with food, and he fund a way to do it for free! And is saving his money! Sounds like he’ll do fine in life, if you ask me. Many young adults would have spent the money already on frivolous stuff…
Not to mention, he’s learning a valuable lesson - it’s much cheaper to eat at home (in his dorm) and prep his own food than to go eat out all the time. Some adults still haven’t learned that.
If you still want him to spend some of his own money, maybe ask him to split whatever the grocery bill will come out to, for next year.
But if the kids wants to save his money, let him save it, I say! He’ll need it later.
It is pretty comical. I don’t actually care if he pays for anything, but everyone else seems to think it’s important. I started to feel like I must be missing something, so I came up with a plan I thought would have him be grown up and pay a bit of his own way. Funny kid.
He is coming to understand about the reality of college costs even though he doesn’t pay for much. So many of his friends at his school and high school buddies at other colleges have serious financial problems paying for school. For the holidays I got him a couple of gift cards to his favorite bad fast food places for binges, like Buffalo Wild Wings. I asked if he’s been going out there with friends and he looked at me like I was insane. He said nobody would have money to join him at a place like that. He’d have to pay for the others. Everyone is so broke they can hardly afford the cheap dining hall food. He says he doesn’t know how he would manage if he had to worry all the time about paying for everything like some of these other students. He is a worrier, so that would occupy a lot of brain space that is supposed to be available for studying and experiencing life at college. He is much more grateful now that he sees this than before he ‘left’ for college, thanks us all the time for everything. I know there are students who are flush with money, but it is the ones who aren’t that make an impression on him. Especially the ones who come from backgrounds much like his where the scrimping is not at all what he expected.
He and my H were discussing retirement funding not long ago. Sounded like H was going to start a Roth-IRA for him for a gift. Turns out he talked S into putting $1,000 of his OWN money into a Roth-IRA. Jeez. Not very generous of H. I said,“Aren’t we at least going to match it?” Probably he thinks the money we spend on college is generous enough. Anyway, I have an easy out for gift-giving now, never have to worry about fit or style. I hate giving just plain cash, but money in a retirement acct seems different. Yay!
Re: #88
Seems like he is doing well at gaming the system you set up.
Seems like it would be simpler and less game-able if you just said that you would contribute $X (set at just barely enough for minimum expenses, or slightly less if you expect him to contribute his work earnings) and let him budget. And charge him for any groceries needed to feed him when he comes home on non-break periods.
@celesteroberts that was funny for sure lol! that’s a good sign - he will do fine in life. hope my kids are as enterprising.
Why not pay for everything if you can do so?
Otherwise, there will be more to distribute when you pass away–meaning that the government can take more via an inheritance. So think of paying for college as a tax-free way to pass on assets to children, and while you’re alive to see them enjoy them.
Different families have different customs and different expectations. Dad was educated via the GI Bill, and I always presumed I’d be on the hook for half my education (and was sincerely grateful for that). We feel strongly that our children should help pay for their own education for a variety of reasons. How much will vary with the kid, the kid’s abilities, the kid’s aspirations and the kid’s major. It isn’t just about money, but it sure isn’t “not” about money either.
If someone else feels differently, I won’t criticize their choice.
The main thing that seems to meet with widespread disapproval on these forums is parents promising or implying a lot in terms of financial contribution in fall of 12th grade, but changing their minds (not because of unanticipated financial setbacks during the year) in April of 12th grade to a much smaller or no contribution, so that the student may have no affordable choices at that time (but could have applied to a more affordable list if notified earlier of the tighter cost constraints).
The problem also is that college expenses have ballooned to astronomically high numbers. And as a percentage of post tax savings for a typical family, college is more unaffordable than ever in history.
It is illogical to believe that any parent wouldn’t want their kids college expenses to not be a burden on the kid so that they could focus on education, just like our own parents did for us. But many a times it seems financially impossible by the time sending a kid to college is a like a few months away. Until then, many parents haven’t come to terms with their own financial situation, nor the fact that there aren’t too many scholarships or other sources of financial aid to help every kid.
The richest kids don’t have to worry, the kids who are simultaneously academically brilliant and financially underprivileged can solve the cost of college issue by going to 100% need met ivies/great LACs and the 3.8 to 4.0 kids will always find universities willing to buy stats with scholarships - maybe not full rides but at least enough to make college affordable. The ones who have issues are the 3.0 to 3.6 GPA middle class kids. And that is most of the kids.
These discussions will increasingly occur in households until colleges are forced to cap fees and link them to inflation. Most colleges are very inefficient with extremely bloated administrative structures and no it’s not because the professors get paid a lot. By the way a similar experience in the healthcare industry with huge overheads is why our healthcare costs are so high.
Instead of pointing fingers at any parent who is forced to think of making the kid bear part of the cost, we need to worry about the reason why the parents are having to deal with this.
The loss of our industrial base has also taken away an entire career path for this generation. You can’t work in a steel mill after high school because they are all in China now so I guess you have to apply to college and get “a job” after college. That’s also where we are. A lot of kids who, in different times, would’ve not gone to college and still had a way ahead have to do something else. We have a structural imbalance that is also being reflected in college applications.
Rant over