<p>I’ve been doing just fine on less than $50/week and I certainly don’t go without. </p>
<p>It’s all relative and personal.</p>
<p>When I lived in the dorms, $25 a week usually here, though I rarely paid for my own alcohol.</p>
<p>At the beginning of the semester just stock up on enough things like toiletries and snacks to last for most if not all of the semester.</p>
<p>And then only eat out on Fridays or Saturdays.</p>
<p>Use blue bucks & dining dollars for snacks, beverages, and laundry, but use them wisely.</p>
<p>I’m fortunate enough where my family takes care of tuition and housing for me, but when it comes to food, leisure, clothing, travel, and basically all personal items, I’m on my own so I definitely like to keep a tight budget.</p>
<p>It’s all based on the financial situation. If the parents are willing to give the kid enough to blow $50+ a week, then by all means, go nuts. No matter how much money you allot to a college student, he/she will find a way to spend it all.</p>
<p>For those who suggest $40 a month like MidwesternHeart:
Just curious, when your son/daughter makes 15k-20k over their sophomore and junior summer internships, are you advocating that they get to have almost 300/week the following year since it goes both ways?</p>
<p>If my kid were to make that kind of money for a summer internship, I would expect him to put that toward the cost of their own education the following year. If their full educational costs were already covered with scholarships, then I would advocate for them to start a Roth IRA and max fund it for the year and save the bulk of the rest of it for future years/grad school. But once those were covered, I would have no problem with him giving himself a little bit extra in his own slush fund.</p>
<p>So basically your kid should tell you that he/she got an unpaid internship :p</p>
<p>Wow, are people really making 15-20k for internships? I had no idea people were making that much.</p>
<p>Well, hopefully I’ve raised my children NOT to lie to me. I suppose, however, once they are considered “adults,” if they choose to do as they wish with “their” money, then they are telling me that they no longer need financial support from me. I will do what I wish to do with “my” funds at that point. ;)</p>
<p>If any of you expect your kids to get by on $0-$40/month, then they just flat out will not have a good time unless they have some source of income for themselves. If they don’t already have that, saying they should just “get a job” is a little arrogant, as though you think there exist jobs for simply anyone who wants one. Even on college campuses, it doesn’t really work that way.</p>
<p>What are they going to do if they want to go to a movie or a concert with friends? That’s $10+ right there, sometimes even as much as $50, especially if you factor in transportation. It’s October 27th and all of their money for the month is used up (all $40 of it), and their friends are going out to eat for some occasion. Oh well, they just have to stay home, I guess. It’s one thing if you don’t have the adequate funds to provide for them, but just having a policy of a restricted amount of money will limit their experiences.</p>
<p>I’d recommend what others were saying at about $200/month minimum, and just keep an eye on their expenses. I almost never hit that mark because I budget myself, but it’s always nice to know I have the money to do things that will keep me happy and busy.</p>
<p>If you really need a better reason, then just think about the fact that the responsibility of having enough money but not blowing it all is an important life skill to have. After being on the $40 a month for a while, once they do start making their own money, I would bet that their paychecks don’t last too long once they come in.</p>
<p>^ What’s going to end up happening is they will either get their own credit card and max out or get a loan from UMCU. It’s so easy to get either as a student, almost predatory in a sense.</p>
<p>15k-20k sounds ridiculous, but he was talking about 2 internships.</p>
<p>so 7.5k-10k. If that is after taxes then it is definitely on the high end. Bearcats is assuming every is an engineer and getting well paying internships. </p>
<p>400-600 a month is ridiculous though. If you are already paying for tuition, rent and the meal plan, then I don’t see why any more money is needed. If they want more spending money then they should 1) have saved up in high school 2) get a job on campus 3) get a job in the summer</p>
<p>Most good internship pays first year base salary annualized, so that’s 60-90k over 2-3 months which puts you at 60000<em>2/12 to 90000</em>3/12 (10000 to 22500 gross). Often times you also get a 1-3k relo/housing stipend. So that puts you at 11 - 25.5 gross per summer. </p>
<p>After expenses over the summer, travel and tax you will probably be left over with 7-15k.
I am assuming the parents claim the kid as dependent because otherwise after standard deduction and education credit effective tax rate should be near 0% and the net number would be higher.</p>
<p>This is standard pay for high finance (80-90k base), consulting (70k-80k base), computer science (90k base) and most other good engineering internships (60-70k base).</p>
<p>You are still talking on the high end. No one should expect 15k after taxes a summer. Not everyone will have finance or consulting interndhips. Many majors won’t even have paid internships. The numbers he is claiming are average are not</p>
<p>The data is available on the ECRC Salary report for monthly internship and co-op salaries. These are only the ones that got reported too. The highest average is comp sci I think at 5k a month. That’d be 60k a year. So saying you’d be the same as 60-90k a year is pushing it. </p>
<p>Bearcats likes to come in here and post about his fancy trips, suites, unrealistic salary numbers, etc so he can get an ego boost. It is apparently super important to him that high school seniors and college freshman know he is successful.</p>
<p>Interesting, I didn’t know that salaries were calculated that way. Most paid internships I’ve seen pay pretty close to minimum wage, but they’re mostly in the nonprofit sector.</p>
<p>It all depends. I wouldn’t say most engineering salaries are calculated like that at all.</p>
<p>Eh, I have a couple friends who did iBanking internships last summer who took home 30k pretax. Yes, that’s the highest end of the spectrum, but 15-20 pretax out of Ross isn’t uncommon at all for a summer internship in finance.</p>
<p>I’m not doubting these jobs are out there in finance, especially depending on where you are living during the internship. I am just saying for the majority of students and majors it is nothing to bank on.</p>