What are kids doing better than their parents? Saving their money, it turns out.
Last year, children between the ages of 4 and 14 received about $471 in personal spending money, or roughly $9.06 a week, according to RoosterMoney, an allowance tracking app. The company analyzed data from nearly 30,000 of its users.
On average, the children were able to save 42 percent of their earnings.
Comparatively, the personal savings rate for adults (the ratio of money saved to income after taxes) in the U.S during 2017 was only 2.4 percent, showing a significant difference in the spending habits of the two age groups. (Of course, kids don’t have the money stress their parents have, like paying for food, clothes and shelter.)
While RoosterMoney has previously gathered data on the allowances parents give their children, this year the company tweaked its chore-tracking system so that it can more closely follow the payments earmarked for specific household tasks.
The chore that commanded top-dollar from parents was washing the car, which earned kids an average $4.60.
Kids were paid an average $4.34 for gardening and $2.71 for cleaning bedrooms, RoosterMoney found.
The top three things kids saved money for were mobile phones, Legos and tablets, respectively.
By teaching your child to save for costly items, you help him understand that he’ll have to make sacrifices in the present in order to afford those luxuries in the future, said Cristina Guglielmetti, a certified financial planner and founder of Future Perfect Planning in Brooklyn, New York.
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