Handling money, both public and private

Imagine for a moment that you are an old-fashioned parent who provides an old-fashioned monetary allowance each week to your children.

And let’s also imagine that you are old-fashioned enough to expect your children to be wise and responsible with how they handle money.

For the sake of argument, let’s also say that the amount of the allowance is $50 each week. As a parent, you want your children to learn responsibility, so you have required that out of that $50 they are to pay for their own school breakfasts and lunches.

Because school meals are not very expensive, that means that your child has about $30 each week to use as he or she wants.

You also encourage your children to save and to give. You expect them to consider giving at least a small amount when the offering plate is passed in church.

As the weeks go by, you begin to see some alarming trends.

First, when the offering plate comes by your family in church, you notice that your child usually doesn’t put anything in. At other times, he may place a dollar in the plate, but no more.

After more days go by, you learn that your child owes money to several of his friends. He owes $10 to at least three individuals, $20 to another and $25 to another.

At about the same time, you get a statement from the school that says he has been charging lunches and that a balance has accumulated for more than $40.

As a parent, you don’t want to lose your composure, but you have a family meeting and you demand to know: “Where are you spending your allowance money?”

The conversation doesn’t go altogether smoothly, but when the dust settles you learn that your child is usually not paying for school meals, has purchased a video game almost every five or six days and is borrowing an extra 10-20 dollars every week.

Being an old-fashioned parent, you lay down the law.

First, you stipulate that your child will pay back all of the money that he has borrowed. Second, you will take care of the bill in the school cafeteria, but that must also be paid back.

Next, you state that in the future you will pay the cafeteria bill yourself, rather than letting the money flow through your child’s irresponsible hands.

And finally, drastic measures must take place. You state that future allowances will only be $20 each week “until you begin to show you can handle money responsibly.”

At that point, the wailing begins.

The irresponsible child says that you aren’t fair, that you are being too stingy and that you don’t care.

You show great restraint as a parent until that is, you hear this: “You can’t cut my allowance. Not until you show me how you’re going to pay for the cuts.” What?!

“That’s right,” your child continues. “If you cut back on my allowance, you have to make up for it some other way. You have to pay for my trips to the store, for my pizza and for admission to the movies.”

As ludicrous as that sounds, we have politicians in Washington who conduct themselves in a manner that is worse than any wayward child.

We literally have a government that spends more than it takes in, and if any taxpayer suggests that perhaps it’s time to cut off the funding or cut back on what the government takes in, then we hear from our own elected officials about how we are being greedy or

that we lack compassion.

When a tax cut is proposed and a politician says, “We can’t have a tax cut unless we can figure out how to pay for it,” at that point we know we are dealing with someone who is more irresponsible than an out-of-control teenager.

Common sense tells us that when the teenager in any home blows through money like it grows on

trees, it’s time to force him or her to get by with far less.

And the same is true for government. When a political leader says we can’t have a tax cut unless we “can pay for it,” it simply means that he or she has forgotten that it’s not the government’s money.

Just like a parent who provides an allowance, American workers should have a say in the amount that is given to the government and how it is used.

And the taxpayers — just like parents who provide an allowance — feel much better if the money is being used in a responsible manner, and that an attempt is made to live within one’s means.

We need simple common-sense parenting and simple common-sense citizenship. There’s not much difference.

David Wilson, Ed.D., of Springdale, is a writer and teacher at heart. His book, Learning Every Day, includes several of his columns and is now available on Amazon. You may email him at dwnotes@hotmail.com. The opinions expressed are those of the author.