Daily Excerpt: Clean Your Plate! (Bayardelle) - Chapter 1/Do you need any money?, Part 2
/Excerpt from Clean Your Plate! (Bayardelle) -
Chapter 1
Do You Need Any Money?
(continued from May 22, 2024)
So, How Do Kids Get Money?
So, now that we can all agree kids need some kind of financial experience, the questions become how do we give them money, how much should they get, and what (if any) rules should be attached to the way they spend it? We’ll go over each of these questions in the upcoming sections, but before we go any further, I want to make one thing very clear: not all household chores should be paid.
The Case for Unpaid Chores
There is a wealth of psychological research that demonstrates the long-term benefits of having kids do chores. Kids who were given chores at home have been shown to have better social relationships and higher grades, get better early-career jobs, and manifest a higher degree of self-sufficiency (M. Rossman, 2002, cited in Wallace, 2015).
These findings were strongest for kids who started chores early (around the ages of 3 or 4) but still existed even for those who started chores as teenagers. The reason these chores were so important is that they taught children how to be a member of an ecosystem, assess their surroundings for what needs to be done, and then help out by taking care of it. If you think about this skill set in the context of a friendship, romantic relationship, or work environment, it is no surprise that kids who develop these skills by helping out around the house would be more successful later in life. As if all the benefits of having them do chores without compensation weren’t enough to convince you that you shouldn’t bribe, pay, or otherwise financially motivate your kids to do their chores, there are also some serious downsides to the act of paying your kid to do their chores which might just swing you.
Dangers of Paid Chores
It’s important to note that the benefits described above disappear when children are financially compensated for doing those chores. Yes, you read that right. If you pay your kids for doing something, you are actually making it less likely that they will ever do that thing again…unless you continue paying them to do it. Think of it this way. By paying a child for a chore, you’re sending their little mind the subliminal message “this task is so unpleasant that you would never voluntarily do it so I’m going to make it worth your while with this here fiver.” On the other hand, if you have your kids do chores without financial compensation, other forms of bribery, or punishment if the chores go undone, you’re sending the message, “Yes, this might not be the most fun way to spend a Saturday, but we’re all members of this family so you are expected to pitch in.”
I want to bring up an important psychological concept here: intrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is the desire to do something for your own, personal satisfaction rather than because someone told (or paid, bribed, or blackmailed) you to do it. This applies strongly to the concept of chores because a majority of a kid’s chores are things we eventually want them to be able to do of their own volition. A great deal of psychological research has been done on the subject (Deci & Ryan, 2015), and the consensus is clear: paying a child to do something is the absolute fastest way to kill their intrinsic motivation to ever do that thing again. This is why it’s so important to have a base of unpaid chores that have to be done nonetheless to have your kid help out as a productive member of the family.
So, What About Paid Chores?
But wait, you say, this section started with a discussion of how necessary it was for kids to have access to money in order to build their burgeoning financial savvy. What’s the catch? This is where it gets complicated because both of these completely contradictory facts are true: You should not pay children for doing their fair share of household chores. It’s important for kids to get paid for chores in order to learn essential financial skills. These statements seem to conflict, but it is indeed possible to do both of these things at the same time. You just need to get a little creative with your system. In the next section, we’ll go over how to create a financial system that will dodge all the potential ways you can turn your kid into a lazy freeloader while accruing all the benefits of chores and allowances.
The Anatomy of a Chore Chart
In my humble (yet well researched) opinion, there are four main components to any good chores system. Each of the following parts has a practical, real-world oriented purpose that should teach your kids a specific set of skills they’ll need later in life.
Part 1: Mandatory, Non-Paid Chores
Primary Goal: To teach your children that they are part of a family, and, as
such, they have to pull their own weight without needing to be compensated for it. You know, without us having to beg, blackmail, force, nag, swindle, plead, and bribe them to do it. It’ll be a bit like Neo dodging bullets in The Matrix. Get pumped.
If you want a printable version of this chore chart, you can download the free fillable/printable PDF
from my blog at https://www.thestaysanemom.com/chores.
Remember, these should be chores that serve the family, not just chores that serve
the kid themself.
Real-World Equivalent: In the scary land of actual adulting, the degree of goodwill your children have with their boss, coworkers, or family will not be determined by what your children (by then full-fledged adults) are “required” to do. They will be good employees, spouses, or parents because of the things they do without compensation just to make their immediate surroundings better, happier places.
Sample Chores: These are usually “keeping the peace” and “doing their part” type chores, like keeping common rooms clean, clearing plates after dinner, or putting away laundry (older kids can fold or even wash as well). I wouldn’t put anything too huge on this list, just enough chores that kids actually pull at least some of their own weight and help out as part of the family. Bonus: this can (and should) actually take some work off your plate.
Part 2: A Small, Flat-Fee Allowance Base
Primary Goal: To teach your kid how to manage money. This shouldn’t be enough to buy anything significant (or they’ll casually neglect their flat-fee chores because they don’t need the money), but it should be enough that you can use it to teach them the basics of saving, spending, and giving.
Real-World Equivalent: In real life, this won’t really exist (because no one gets money for nothing), but childhood is a time to practice things they’ll use later on. So, now is when they need to practice their future financial skills.
Sample Fee: This differs based on the child’s age, but I’d give a loose guideline where you take 1/5th the price of an average toy. That way if the kid foregoes their paying chores (parts 3 and 4) completely, they’d have to save for five weeks to buy a toy. For a toddler, this would probably be $2 or $3. For a teenager, it might be $5 to $15.
Part 3: Mandatory, Flat-Fee Chores
Primary Goal: To teach your kid that there’s a certain standard that has to be upheld in order for him/her to get a paycheck. This is not negotiable, and you can’t split it up (aka no “you did 5 of 6 chores so you get 5/6 your allowance”). It’s all or nothing.
Real-World Equivalent: This teaches your kids how it is to work for a salary. There’s no haggling, and you have no say in it. You do 100% of your job and get 100% of your paycheck. If your kids miss a chore you should act like a boss would: give them a warning, and if it happens again (or, with a three strikes policy, two more times) they get “fired” and don’t get allowance that week. If you want to be really “authentic” with it, you can let them skip chores on special occasions (e.g. the night before a big test or the day of a long sporting event) if they give you written notice in advance, just like a boss would give leave upon employee request.
Sample Chores/Fee: Make sure the amount of chores is enough that they do something every day but not so much that they can’t get it done on a normal homework night. In our house, our 14-year-old has to fill up all the dog bowls (daily), do the dinner dishes, and keep her areas of the house clean. I’d probably have this weekly fee the same amount as one cheap-ish toy for the age group or 1/3 to 1/2 of one nicer toy for that age group.
Part 4: Optional, For-a-Fee Chores
Primary Goal: To give kids a way they can earn extra income when they have something they really want to buy. This is important because, as they ask for things, you can control their spending by making them earn it. Is your child begging for that shiny new *insert crazy, useless kid gizmo here*? Now you can just smile, say “you know what to do, kiddo,” and hand over a mop.
Real-World Equivalent: This is similar to picking up some extra shifts at work, taking on more contract work, or other variable-fee jobs in the adult world.
Sample Chores/Fees: I’d make a “menu” for kids so they have a list of tasks to choose from, each with a different amount of money. This could be stuff like helping vacuum, cleaning windows, folding laundry, emptying the dishwasher, walking the dogs, or basically anything that’s age-appropriate. If you want to maximize real-world parallels, you can also add a “propose a task” option where they have to suggest the task and negotiate their fee for completing it.
Two Quick Caveats: Before you make your menu, keep these two, key points in mind. They might not make a huge difference now, but they’ll play a huge psycho logical impact on your kids later:
1. Don’t put anything on this list that you ever want them to do for free again. It’s very hard to turn a paying task into something they have to do for free.
2. Don’t add anything here like reading, studying, or other tasks you want them to end up enjoying. Things on this list will be mentally filed under the “work” category, which is usually also named as the “things I don’t enjoy doing” category. If you put reading on here, they’ll end up with the impression that reading is something unpleasant that they need to be paid to do. The “chores menu” should be comprised of things that are pretty universally “unfun” tasks like cleaning or other busywork.
For more posts about Liz and her books, click HERE.
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