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support child labor
While kids may not be contributing to the family’s purse, letting them earn money helps them learn how to make smart decisions. Beyond allowances and birthday and holiday checks from grandparents, your kids can earn extra cash by assisting an elderly neighbor with things like setting up a DVD player, or watering another family’s plants when they’re away. Kids can hold stoop sales, or virtual garage sales on eBay. Because the idea is to earn a little spending money and not to amass a great fortune, they won’t have to forgo soccer practice or math homework to fit small money-making opportunities into their schedule.
One East Village mom says her daughter “learned quickly that working was the way to get cash, but there wasn’t much work out there for an eight-year-old , except for cat-sitting, which she did and continues to do. She started out at $1 a day and is now up to $2 a day per cat.”
An enterprising West Village family gave a farmers’ market twist to the classic lemonade-stand concept: “Last summer, Izzy and Jack, who were nine and six, had the most amazing garden growing on their windowsill,” says their mom, Elissa Stein. “When their tomato plants were getting too big to be inside anymore, they decided to set up a table in front of the building and sell them. They spent a morning with their dad repotting plants into individual cups; then they made a great sign and set up for business, selling each plant for $2. They made $10 that day, and were completely thrilled that they’d found a way to make money themselves and that their tomato plants were being added to five different gardens.”
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