May 5, 2011
Financial Success Begins at Age 3
Professionals trying to improve Americans’ financial literacy pour time and energy into developing school curricula that will help create a generation of financially competent adults.
But something else we can instill in our children may have a greater influence than education on their financial success later in life: self-control.
A recent study, led by researchers at Duke University and King’s College London and published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that the self-control children develop as early as age 3 – before formal schooling begins – is a powerful predictor of whether they will save more as adults or will be hooked on credit cards.
“Poor self-control in childhood was a stronger predictor of these financial difficulties than study members’ social class origins and IQ,” the authors concluded. …Learn More
May 5, 2011
Whoopee! The Kids Are Gone
Many parents feel the tension between competing priorities: saving for their children’s college education and saving for their own retirement. Once the kids graduate and move out, the parents rationalize, we’ll really start socking money away.
But do they?
They do not, according to a recent report from Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research, which is affiliated with Squared Away. The report found that parents, suddenly feeling rich after the children leave the nest, indulge by spending 50 percent more on eating out, going to the movies, or buying new clothes.
There are two risks in doing so. …Learn More
About Squared Away
Learn more about our blog and its writer, Kimberly Blanton, a former Boston Globe reporter.
