The Opposite of Spoiled: Raising Kids Who Are Grounded, Generous, and Smart About Money

by Ron Lieber

Overview

We may not realize it, but children are hyperaware of money. They have scores of questions about its nuances that parents often don't answer, or know how to answer well. But for Ron Lieber, a personal finance columnist and father, good parenting means talking about money with our kids much more often. When parents avoid these conversations, they lose a tremendous opportunity—not just to model important financial behaviors, but also to imprint lessons about what their family cares about most.

Written in a warm, accessible voice, grounded in real-world stories from families with a range of incomes, The Opposite of Spoiled is a practical guidebook for parents that is rooted in timeless values. Lieber covers all the basics: the best ways to handle the tooth fairy, allowance, chores, charity, savings, birthdays, holidays, cell phones, splurging, clothing, cars, part-time jobs, and college tuition. But he also identifies a set of traits and virtues—like modesty, patience, generosity, and perspective—that parents hope their young adults will carry with them out into the world.

In The Opposite of Spoiled, Ron Lieber delivers a taboo-shattering manifesto that will help every parent embrace the connection between money and values to help them raise young adults who are grounded, unmaterialistic, and financially wise beyond their years.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781481532952
Publisher:	Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Publication date:	02/03/2015
Edition description:	Unabridged
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 5.70(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Ron Lieber is the "Your Money" columnist for The New York Times. Before joining The Times in 2008, he wrote The Wall Street Journal's "Green Thumb" personal finance column, was part of the start-up team at the paper's "Personal Journal" section, and worked at Fortune and Fast Company magazines. He is the author or coauthor of three books, including The New York Times bestseller Taking Time Off. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, fellow New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor, and their daughter.

Ron Lieber is the "Your Money" columnist for The New York Times. Before joining The Times in 2008, he wrote The Wall Street Journal's "Green Thumb" personal finance column, was part of the start-up team at the paper's "Personal Journal" section, and worked at Fortune and Fast Company magazines. He is the author or coauthor of three books, including The New York Times bestseller Taking Time Off. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, fellow New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor, and their daughter.

Table of Contents

Author's Note xi

1 Why We Need to Talk About Money 1

The responsibilities we never faced at their age and the power of real conversations

2 How to Start the Money Conversations 15

Curiosity, lies, and the single best reply to every hard question about money (and sex and drugs)

3 The Allowance Debates 45

Three jars, unpaid chores, and a whole lot of patience

4 The Smartest Ways for Kids to Spend 71

The hours-of-fun-per-dollar test, Grandma Dana's shopping ritual, and the importance of record-store pit stops

5 Are We Raising Materialistic Kids? 89

The tooth fairy, the travel-team dilemma, and the making of a more modest school

6 How to Talk About Giving 117

Narrating your way through gifts of $1, $1,000, and $1 million

7 Why Kids Should Work 147

Lessons from farm work, mandatory tuition payments, and a unified theory of tin can redemption

8 The Luckiest 169

Instilling gratitude, grace, and perspective in our sons and daughters

9 How Much Is Enough? 199

All about trade-offs

Acknowledgments 209

Notes 215

Bibliography 223

Index 231

Editorial Reviews

[Lieber] doesn't offer a grand philosophy…His book is intensely pragmatic, relentlessly anecdotal—and that's why I loved it. Lieber wants to solve the problems middle-class parents face every day: allowances, the tooth fairy, summer jobs, indulgent grandparents, North Face fleeces, car insurance. Mammon is in the details. Keeping his eye on specifics, Lieber covers all the biggies: earning, saving, giving, buying. He has an instinct for addressing the nitty-gritty…He has written a book that will start important conversations in a lot of households…

The New York Times Book Review - Claire Dederer

11/17/2014
Despite a smattering of practical advice, there’s more of the philosophical than the methodological to this primer from New York Times columnist Lieber (coauthor of Taking Time Off) on helping children, especially those in the upper middle class, to approach financial matters with responsibility, generosity, and gratitude. Lieber makes a strong argument that money is something that children notice and talk about. He believes modern American parents’ reticence on the subject bypasses the opportunity to instill both good values and important skills. Lieber advises giving honest responses to children’s questions about family finances and encouraging even affluent kids to take after-school jobs. More specific and fun suggestions include divvying up allowances between Give/Save/Spend jars, establishing the “fun per dollar” test, and making the Tooth Fairy’s arrival less of a cash grab. Assorted motivational stories touch on both the mundane (collecting bottles for deposit) and the dramatic (parents who downsized their home, at their young daughter’s urging, to free up $800,000 for charity). Lieber’s easygoing style will encourage parents to raise a new generation that’s both confident and compassionate. Agent: Christy Fletcher, Fletcher & Company. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

Lieber guides parents in conveying the value and significance of money and how to use it wisely, how to spend and save, how to give and invest. Parents will appreciate the sound advice and broad perspective Lieber offers on this important subject.

Booklist

An astute book filled with interesting anecdotes and wise lessons.

Forbes

We all want to raise children with good values, yet we often neglect to talk to our children about money. This engaging and important book breaks new ground by suggesting that the next generation deserves to be better at money than we are. A must-read for parents.

Gretchen Rubin

All of us worry about how to give our kids a proper dose of perspective and gratitude. Ron Lieber’s explanation of how money conversations imprint these good values (and so much more) is just the thing parents need to read right now.

Madeline Levine

The Opposite of Spoiled is a thoughtful, and often inspiring, book that also delivers dozens of smart, practical tips for turning conversations about money into lessons about living. If you’ve got kids, want kids — or heck, have been a kid — read this book.

Daniel H. Pink

Ron Lieber’s tips are practical, accessible and, best of all, rooted in the desire to foster an honest dialogue with our children.

Heather Stevens

Lieber’s book is intensely pragmatic, relentlessly anecdotal — and that’s why I loved it. . . . A book that will start important conversations in lots of households.

Claire Dederer

Finally, an honest, modern, comprehensive and nuanced book about kids and money. Parents report that conversations about money fill them with so much dread and confusion that they change the subject rather than dive in. The Opposite of Spoiled comes to the rescue.

Wendy Mogel

The Opposite of Spoiled is flush with practical ways to incorporate money lessons into family life. . . . Lieber’s style is conversational and frank, with a sense of humor. . . . It’s rare to find a book about finance with so much heart.

Associated Press

In the course of profiling dozens of savvy families, Lieber gives tips on how to talk about money with kids in a calm way. . . . He makes a convincing case that the tendency to avoid the topic is a missed opportunity.

The Wall Street Journal

I started reading this book and cannot put it down. . . . I don’t know anyone who doesn’t want to raise their kids to have curiosity, patience, thrift, modesty, generosity, perseverance, and perspective. A godsend of a book.

Jessica Seinfeld

The Opposite of Spoiled is flush with practical ways to incorporate money lessons into family life. . . . Lieber’s style is conversational and frank, with a sense of humor. . . . It’s rare to find a book about finance with so much heart.

Associated Press Staff

I take a lot of pleasure in a good, practical book about how you raise your family. . . . The Opposite of Spoiled is good enough that I’ve been reading bits aloud to my husband and initiating conversations with our children.

KJ Dell'Antonia

We want the best for our kids but worry about spoiling them. The solution is to teach them to use money and talk about it ourselves in a rational way. There is no one better at this than Ron Lieber and no better manual for doing it than this book.

Carl Richards

2014-11-20
Talking big bucks with the smallest members of your household will make the world a better place argues New York Times personal finance columnist Lieber (co-author: Taking Time Off, 2003, etc.).Do you know the going rate for a visit from the tooth fairy in your neighborhood? If you have children, you're probably all too aware of the playground rumors that range from $5 up to $50 for the prized first tooth. So what do you put under your child's pillow? Does it matter? Yes, these seemingly small family financial decisions matter a lot, according to Lieber. In his third book, the author addresses affluence, its effect on child-rearing and the lessons most of us are not teaching our children about managing wealth. As practical as the first half of the book is—it's packed with suggestions on everything from allowance to college tuition—Lieber's advice skews toward the upper-class family, leaving out the many families who make less than the $75,000 annual income he acknowledges as his base line. For instance, when he counsels that an appropriate clothing budget be calibrated on Land's End prices, he largely ignores the fact that many families are struggling to afford even a wardrobe from Wal-Mart or Target. Later chapters get into tougher territory, and Lieber makes a good case for using early money management training to help children eventually tackle society's bigger problems, such as homelessness and hunger. Humble stories of kids raising money for Down syndrome research or creating kit bags to give to people living on the street offer inspiration for those who do have money to spend it wisely in the world and to teach their children to do the same. Sound advice on managing family finances but only if you have sufficient finances to manage.

Kirkus Reviews

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