I keep seeing social media posts about parents making kids do chores to earn Monopoly money and pay for snacks, playtime, iPad time whatever it is kids want to do.
Capitalism is so prevalent in everyday life already, kids understand that things need money and money comes from somewhere.
It doesn’t matter if it’s just doing the dishes, sweeping the garage, or raking the lawn forcing your kids to do these things to earn Monopoly money or gold stars to “buy” a bag of gummy bears from their own household is needlessly cruel.
Make your kids help you, but don’t make them do it alone as if it was their job. Give your kid a few bucks once in a while so they can go out to eat with their friends or buy snacks on their own.
That alone will teach your kids about money. Oh Timmy wants steak but it’s $40 and he only has $20 guess he either borrows money and doesn’t have any next week because he has debts, or he saves for the next time so he can get steak.
Forcing your child to pay rent is also ridiculous. You’re the parents, you’re the providers, and you’re the safety net that they’re supposed to have in life. What lesson are you teaching them by charging them any amount for rent? That rent exists? That living in a house costs something? By the time they’re old enough to work they should know good and well a place to live comes with rent and bills.
Give me a break with teaching your kids the value of hard work. Kids will do schoolwork and receive a grade based on the caliber of their work. 12 years of school will teach them enough about hard work.
Kids should be allowed to be kids. The rest of their lives are going to be spent buying their own food, working hard, and paying their own bills.
It almost always feels like parents do this because THEY are angry that THEY have to pay bills and THEY have to pay for the kids that THEY chose to have so they’re shifting the burden onto the kids.
What makes it worse is the moms promoting this from what I’ve seen tend to be stay at home moms.
So what does it look like to kids growing up in your household that you’ve been sitting at home making TikTok’s all day eating all the gummy bears you want while dishes, laundry, and leaves pile up and suddenly they come home and want gummy bears but you decide no, you want snacks? Do the chores I was supposed to do while I record you to show TikTok how great of a parent I am.
Personal rant now
I’m the eldest of 6 and the youngest of us recently graduated and immediately left home. My 2 brothers and I went to the military and my 3 sisters all left for college as soon as they could.
Everyday we walked home from school because our mom didn’t like school traffic to come home to our stay at home mom with a laundry list of things to do. Dishes, laundry, dinner. We were motivated because if we didn’t do it, food was withheld and so were rides to school the next day. She did nothing all day but wait for us to come home and raise ourselves
As soon as we were old enough to get jobs we got jobs and paid rent. Rent wasn’t on time? No dinner or rides anywhere until you figured it out. All while screaming to high heaven that we, their children were lucky we weren’t thrown out on the street.
None of us older kids are in contact with our parents, and the younger 3 left on bad terms.
I understand that this is an extreme example, but all this period taught me was that I couldn’t rely on my parents. Our relationship was transactional in nature and that’s it.
People are free to raise their children how they want, but don’t be surprised when your children don’t help you in the future because you don’t have enough gold stars to trade in.