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Comment by rqebmm | Hacker News Reader

My girlfriend and I have tried multiple variations of "relationship currency" as I like to call it, but since I'm a shrewd bargainer and she has a tendency to be short sighted (i.e. "I'm tired and don't feel like cooking, I'll give you 500 chore-dollars to go pick up dinner") she eventually ends up with a massive debt and is forced to declare "relationship bankruptcy".

That said, I'm fully intent on doing something like this with my children. Instead of an allowance of some kind, I think kids would learn a lot about the real world if you paid them for doing chores and performing well at school, then docked them accordingly for food, board, rent and expenses.

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We do something like that for our kids. Each has a set of age appropriate chores they must perform each week to get their "allowance." If they don't do all those chores they get a prorated amount that week. We also deduct from it if they do stuff to get into trouble. Then on payday, each is required to put a certain amount into each of three bins: Spend, Save & Share. The remainder they can divide between those bins how ever they see fit. Spend is for all the random crap they want to buy (stuffed animals, candy, Jamba Juice, etc). Save is for larger, future items and we must approve it. Share is used for charity type stuff (like buying Christmas presents for strangers, etc.) We do make them pay for a portion of their school clothes and stuff like toothpaste to let them see what it is like to not have any spending money after they buy things they need. It has really helped them understand that maybe they don't need another stuff animal if that means they can't buy something else. I think kids lack the perspective of what it takes to earn money. A lot of times (for more expensive requests) we break it down for them by how many weeks of doing ALL their chores would it take to get enough money for it. Suddenly things don't seem as important to them if they realize that it might take 3 or 4 months of not buying anything before they could get it.

How does that work when you want to buy them an expensive item like a bicycle, segway, computer etc. that would take them too long to save up for?

We don't buy them stuff like that just because they ask for it. Bikes, Kindle, DS, iPod, etc are birthday and Christmas presents. We don't charge them for presents. For the most part, if there is something we think they need, you provide it. It is a loose system. It has been pretty effective in shutting down the classic "child begging endlessly to get something at the store" problem. There is usually one of two responses: "Save up for it" or "Did you bring your money?"

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