It's Only A Penny

It’s only a penny.

Or is it? To me, money is money is money.

At least, that’s what I told my son as he walked so proudly into the bank last week to deposit his plastic cup full of coins. He’d been collecting our leftover change, and money he found here and there, and putting in this cup in our kitchen. My lesson to him is always “know where your money it. It’s a very powerful tool.”

I told him about which account we’d be opening and why. I told him about interest, and let him in on the secret that if you let a bank use your money to lend out, they’ll pay you money in return. He thought this was brilliant. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that they lend it out for even more and make a killing on it, but that lesson will have to come some day. What I want him to learn is that it’s important he never become someone banks lend a lot of money to.

As we sat with the kind woman who opened his account, he got rather impatient waiting for all this “stuff” to be done. He wanted to count the money in that cup! I told him that it was important that we get this right, that we learn his account number and that he understand the terms of his account.

Then he looked at me like I had two heads and said, “Hey, where is all the money in this bank?”

Perfect question to ask, isn’t it? Especially given all the money we’ve all given banks recently. This question produced giggles from the tellers nearby, but they were really happy to see a small child ask these questions and get excited about his account.

I told him that the money is in the back and that they don’t just leave it out for everyone to see. This seemed to satisfy him for the moment.

Finally, we got to dump the change into the “money counter” run by a cute little avatar named “penny.” He was SO excited to see her and listen to her talking to us. We guessed how much money was in the cup then dumped it in. He was ecstatic. We got the final number (much more than we had thought it was!), and he got to take the receipt up to the teller with his deposit slip. Then he chose the PIN for his ATM card. He made it the four-digit balance of his new account.

Pretty clever that kid.

One day, I'll take him to the ATM, he’ll take out a 20, and we’ll talk about what just happened to his balance, the amount of interest he won't be learning and what he chooses to spend the money on. He can learn for himself what is worth buying and what isn't. That part is his call to make, all I can do is teach him the consequences of saving and spending. The rest is up to him.

I sure wish someone had taken the time to teach me these lessons. I think that every time I have a balance on my credit card and see how much of my money I've given to some institution for no good reason. Makes me crazy.

I don't want my kids to ever pay someone else so they can use their own money. I don't want them to be slaves to bills, credit card companies or mortgages.

But I think for a lot of us, money is hard to talk about. Most of us seem to have been raised with one or more of the following beliefs and experiences:

• Money isn't talked about at all, which makes it feel "bad"
• It's "dirty" and it causes problems
• It causes our parents to fight with each other
• It makes people greedy
• Only scheming conniving people have money
• The rich get richer and the poor get poorer
• No point in saving your money, something will always come up to take it away

Just look at those "expereinces." I'm sure that not every person grew up with kind of example, but many did. Look at how intrinsically negative it all is. And I don't happen to believe that any of this is true. But if you're raised thinking it's true (as I was), then it's really no wonder we are the nation of debt. It's no wonder "no money down" spending is so big – and causes so much trouble. Just look at the state of our economy now.

Money is the most powerful tool that we have at our disposal at this time, and I want to make sure my kids know now to use it.

Money buys us time with our kids, it buys clothes, food and homes. We can use it to donate to causes that are important to us, and if we make enough of it, we will have a say over that much more in the world.

Say you're an environmentalist. Instead of hugging, you could go out and buy an entire forest. Then you would have a say, 100% over what happens to all of those trees. You could open up a recycling plant, you could start a school program that makes recycling mandatory, you could go into classrooms around the world and teach children about how they can help out in small ways. The possibilities are endless.

And, as will all things, you don't need money to help you do all of these things, but it certainly does help.

So if all of that is true, why do so few people understand how money works? Why are our children not taught about money in school? Did you ever see a class in college titled "Manage Your Personal Finances 101?" I certainly didn't.

I'm starting to think this is borderline criminal. I wonder how much it would change things if we were actually taught about money instead of left to assume that we know what to do with it.

It's very important for moms, especially, to understand money, to know how to save it, how to grow it, earn it and play with it. We have children to look after, and we have children to teach good habits to.

So here's to putting an end to financial illiteracy for our kids. We can't rely on anyone else to teach our kids about money, and money is one of the more important tools they will have to learn to interact with in their lives. I say we’re up to the task.

At least, that's what I was thinking as I held my son’s hand as we walked out of the bank to the car and he studied his brand new ATM card with his name on it.

Author: Sarah

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