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>We’ve told them we will not pay for their college. so they will have to make choices about getting the best bang for your buck I've read this before from Amer

>We’ve told them we will not pay for their college. so they will have to make choices about getting the best bang for your buck I've read this before from Americans, and I don't get it. In my culture if parents can pay for their kids' education, they do it. There's a time and a place to teach them financial responsability, I feel distracting them with financial concerns during their most challenging years of schooling is not it. When I went to college (paid for by my parents), I had friends who had to work on the side to pay for rent and groceries. They barely hung by, very few had great grades since they had to split their time between work and study. One of my close friends ended up dropping out because he was burned out. Of course this doesn't mean you should pay 50k for a degree in feminist dance therapy, you make sure you only pay for something with ROI (That's another thing I don't understand about Americans. In a country with tuition so high, how can so many pursue degrees with such awful job prospects?)

atonse 3y ago
You raise interesting points. We’ve actually discussed that a bit. We will never let them get to the point where they have to worry about eating meals, or worry that their academics have to suffer to make ends meet. We even considered for example giving them a living allowance so they have more flexibility in picking jobs, but aren’t desperate. But it’s important to me that they understand and intelligently approach the first large financial decision of their lives. It’s also important (to me) that my kids work during college, whether it’s waiting tables in a restaurant, or a retail job, and understand the value of money and the value of serving lots of customers (including angry customers). Those experiences never leave you. You have more empathy for someone waiting tables or taking longer or making mistakes when you’ve done it yourself. We are pretty well off right now and our kids have a very nice life. It’s important that they learn that it isn’t the default, and that it is a result of working hard. They’re already good kids. You’re right, our job parents is not to let them hit a point of desperation. But at the same time we also want them to learn the value of hard work, juggling priorities, and having the pride of having paid your own way through college. These are all the additional lessons outside the classroom.

atonse 3y ago

You raise interesting points. We’ve actually discussed that a bit. We will never let them get to the point where they have to worry about eating meals, or worry that their academics have to suffer to make ends meet. We even considered for example giving them a living allowance so they have more flexibility in picking jobs, but aren’t desperate. But it’s important to me that they understand and intelligently approach the first large financial decision of their lives. It’s also important (to me) that my kids work during college, whether it’s waiting tables in a restaurant, or a retail job, and understand the value of money and the value of serving lots of customers (including angry customers). Those experiences never leave you. You have more empathy for someone waiting tables or taking longer or making mistakes when you’ve done it yourself. We are pretty well off right now and our kids have a very nice life. It’s important that they learn that it isn’t the default, and that it is a result of working hard. They’re already good kids. You’re right, our job parents is not to let them hit a point of desperation. But at the same time we also want them to learn the value of hard work, juggling priorities, and having the pride of having paid your own way through college. These are all the additional lessons outside the classroom.