Editor's note: In the coming days, members of the Consumer Reports Money staff will be sharing family lessons about money, both positive and negative. You're welcome to share your experiences, as well. Here, the eighth in the series:
Household finances were a secret in my family. Throughout my childhood (and, come to
think of it, a good part of my adulthood) I had no idea how much my parents
made, how much the rent was, or how much, or little, was in the bank. My siblings and I can play some very
competitive Monopoly, but that was the extent of our in-house financial
education.
I doubt we were alone. Although we start to learn about money from the moment we first go grocery shopping with our parents, many parents don’t explicitly have discussions with their children–much like that “other thing” my editor asked me not to mention.
If I did learn one thing, it was a sense of skepticism and realism from my father. (He was a Navy man, so he had a more colorful way of expressing it.) Sadly, it seems we need that skepticism more than ever, with the decade’s exploding adjustable rate mortgages and incomprehensible credit card agreements. And according to the Jumpstart Coalition's biennial survey of high school and college students, financial literacy of high school students is lower than it was ten years ago.–Chris Horymski, associate editor
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