Aside from their use as cheap exploitable labor, kids can also grow up into interesting adults, as long as they’re properly trained along the way. One thing that any parent needs to convey is information regarding the proper use of credit cards.
At an appropriate age, show your child the entire lifecycle of the average American credit card. Sit them down and talk about what a credit card is and what it allows people to do, and then go through the various cards that you’re considering and talk about the pros and cons of each. Evaluate what works for you and why, and explain some of the sales decoys and tricks that credit cards use to entice people and why they don’t make financial sense in the long run.
After you’ve chosen and adopted your new credit card, have your child assist you in its care and upkeep. Review the monthly statements with them, and show them how an item purchased at one time will increase the amount due on the card, and how all of it will need to be paid for eventually.
You should mention that good spending habits and paying off your card on time will keep your credit score tidy and that unattended credit cards can cause balances to quickly balloon out of control. There aren’t many things more destructive to a credit score than an unmanageable and disorderly credit card.
At the end of its useful life, you should also explain how the credit card has outgrown your family and that it’s time to give it up. Your child may have grown attached to the credit card and not want to say goodbye, but be clear and concise. If you think that your child can handle it, you might even provide them with the scissors to let them end things themselves, but you should always check the waste basket for the remains once they’ve done so. Otherwise, you may want to fall back on the apocryphal credit card farm up state where old credit cards live out their remaining time in playful happiness.
As a parent, even though your child might expect you to have all the answers, it’s unlikely that you will. Still, learning about credit cards and other forms of common American financial institutional offerings will give you an opportunity to strengthen your understanding of card features, terms, and provide basic financial literacy for your child as well.
As professional financial trackers and preparers, we are always available to help tackle, rope, and geld bigger financial quarries, and deal with the questions that they might spawn.
Tags: weirdly funny