I did not get an allowance as a kid. Ever.
I was told that if I wanted money, I should figure out how to earn it. And I eventually did.

You know the old saying: Give a kid a fish, and he eats for one meal. Teach the kid about leveraged buyouts and he can acquire a whole fishing fleet and hire qualified employees.

Thom is just plain spoiled. I would have been grateful for some sulfuric acid to quench my thirst. Kill me and dance on my grave? HA! That is just a rest break.

I do remember my parents gave us an allowance but I don't remember how much it was. It was the era that admission to a Saturday matinee and enough coke and candy to fill up a boy was 50 cents.

My dad was an Air Force officer. My brother & I had a buzz cut hairstyle as long as he paid for it. The day I could earn enough money mowing lawns to pay for my own haircuts I got to pick the style as long as the hair never touched my collar. :) As soon as I was mowing yards (with his lawn mower) the allowance stopped.

He made me pay for 100% of the cost of my car. He only paid for the insurance for the first two years. I pad for everything else for the car.

I did not ever drive my parents cars until I was probably 25. I needed to borrow a car with a real trunk and I brought it back with a full tank of gas.

Funny how two kids can be so different. We have an 8 year old and a 12 year old. Each has a USAA debit card. They deposit Christmas/birthday money and whatever they earn around the house. One keeps about 90% of what he deposits while the other one spends about 90%.

My 7 year old (with a little help) makes ~$120/month delivering papers (2 times a week), but only in the warm months.

Everyone says, 'concept of money', but really it's a very difficult concept to convey to kids. I'm old now and I still don't get the concept. :)

matt; I'm curious to know who is the saver and who's the spender? I was the older sibling and I'm the spender.

My dad just promised to stop the beatings if I did what I was "supposed" to do :). I keed....
Never received an allowance, but dad provided me with the equipment and assistance on some bigger (church) lawns beginning when I was 12. I knew even at that age that if I "wanted" a car when I turned 16, I had to "earn" it...purchased a new Jeep CJ5 when I was 17. Sister was brought up the same way, and she doesn't have a "lick of $en$e"...find something that works...

Porsche, Our younger boy is the spender. He is also the outgoing athletic type. The older boy is a book worm, in gifted classes and has not an athletic bone is his body (no lack of desire though). When he spends it's after carefull consideration and research. I would say that his purchases are evenly split between models and books. I am still amazed at how different they are.

In our case the older daughter was the spender and the younger son the saver. They are both outgoing and athletic.

She has changed her ways. She had to work in during summers in HS and during the school year in college to pay for any "extras" (as did I) and she now is a terror about finding bargains, elimination of budget waste, etc.

Or you play the guitar on the MTV.

I'm in a situation that drives me nuts. Her 13yr old has no chores, but wants the newest x-box game when released. I'm not having it. His father is a drag, pays no child support, but damn sure bought him that game he wanted.

I guess I fudged up, told the boy he would get his game when he scored a touch down. I didn't know he'd be a lineman on both sides of the ball.

I worked for it, the gifting is beyond me. I built up enough money to have a CD, along with a savings account, before I went to high school.

Lazyness.

Just yesterday a man came by, out of the blue, pulled up in a truck and mowed the neighbors yard. Aforementioned boy didn't respond when I asked if he might consider doing it for spare change. I did it for free for the neighbor the last time it was mowed. Easy money, he won't do it.

My dad used to joke that I could put more money in my passbook savings account (remember those?) than I actually earned :D.

My daughter is 13. Since we started giving her an allowance, she gets $1/week X her age. So, she's getting $13/week automatically deposited in her Quicken accounts. The $13 is automatically split between four accounts: Spending, Long Term Savings, Sharing, and Pet Money.

Each week, $4.50 goes to spending. She's free to do with that as she pleases.
$4.50 goes into long term savings. She's not supposed to touch this money - Will someday apply to a car, college, etc.
$1.00 goes to sharing. When she runs across a cause she feels strongly about, she can donate the money built up there.
$2/week is for pet expenses. It's her contribution to the expense of owning a snake, Guinea pigs and a cockatiel.

All of the Quicken accounts are virtual, or, as we say, they're held at the Bank of Dad. Any time she wants something from a store, we usually pay, then she deducts the amount from the spending account. She also has several hundred in cash earned from pet sitting. Even though the money is in cash in her room, she tracks the income and expenses in Quicken and generally can look at the account balance and know that's what's really in the piggy bank.

Best part about this set up is that if she wants to buy anything other than clothes, we just ask if she has enough money. She really thinks differently about money knowing it's hers that she's spending. When the school sent home a memo about bringing in fast food lunches, she got excited and wanted to place an order. We told her that was fine, but she had to pay. WHAT??? I have to buy my own lunch?!? No, we'll be happy to keep you stocked in sandwiches and baby carrots. If you want Pizza Hut, then it's on you! :)

We decided to let our kids eat the school lunch this year, the wife and I got extra busy at work and we thought that she was going to deploy again... Anyway, the school does it all online. We load up both accounts for a month and figure we are good. two weeks later we get e-mail notifications that the accounts are at zero balance. The e-mail also had a spreadsheet showing all of the charges. Little did we know that the school offers all sort of extras. Both kids had been buying ice cream every darn day. So, butt chewings followed and they are both back to PB&J.

we do $15 a week for our 14yr old. we take off he does not do the chores completely.

he has no value of money. we adopted him at 12. his mother lived off the state and did well with 3 kids. so he has never really seen his mother work. money always just came in the mail.
what was so ironic about the whole thing is that when DSS took him from his mother, she told him DSS was just making money off him buy taking him. after hearing him repeat this a few times, we had a talk at let him know who was really making money off him.

Paul, a good friend of mine seemed to always have help on the farm. Young strapping high school boys would volunteer to come stack hay in the middle of summer and were happy with just getting lunch out of it. I think the two very attractive daughters had something to do with it.

We give our kids money for chores that are not part of normal housekeeping. No money for room cleaning but cash for lawn work for example.

That was "Dirty Farm Girls 6" wasn't it?

My son's gotten a dollar/week/year of age for as long as I remember. He's 19 now and in college but he still gets it (plus actual living expenses.) I was terrible at remembering to pay him every week which would result in him telling me I missed so many weeks and owed him so much. This all got fixed when he got a checking account and debit card in high school. Then his allowance was automatically put into his account every Friday. I think the checking account helps them learn to handle money better AND I can see what he spends money on.

Fitting article.

How to keep your kids from becoming money abusers - Jonathan Burton's Life Savings - MarketWatch