Latest / Not Right Now / That's $15 Worth of Raspberries

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That's $15 Worth of Raspberries · Not Right Now

• 0:00
  [upbeat music] Hey, I have three kids. They eat so much. We try to eat real food. We try to cook when we can.
• 0:10
  We try not to waste too much, 'cause it drives me nuts, and it's expensive, and also, for obvious climate reasons, which is why the Mill Food Recycler changed our lives a couple years ago.
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  Plus, there's a little app where you can control it if you want and set a schedule, and it shows you how much food your family keeps out of landfills. A delight.
• 1:15
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  It is mill.com/lp/important-not-important. That is [laughs] mill.com/lp/important-not-important. I couldn't remember that, so we put it in the show notes.
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  It's right there for you. Check it out. Huge thanks to Mill for sponsoring our work and doing the right thing, and thanks to all of you listeners for supporting our partners.
• 1:54
  [upbeat music] Do you remember when your kids would put their hands in your water, and you would just feel this sense of dying inside- [laughs]...
• 2:02
  'cause you're like, "You couldn't pay me any amount of money to drink that water now"? [upbeat music] Welcome to Not Right Now, the podcast about parenting through all of this.
• 2:16
  We'll be talking about/crashing out over topics like... Lost Chromebook chargers and lost democracy. Crying over spilled milk, and also, are we drinking dairy anymore? It's not an advice show.
• 2:29
  It's a you're-not-alone, and-you're-also-not-crazy-for-screaming-in-the-shower kinda show. I'm Claire Zulkey from Evil Witches. And I'm Quinn Emmett from Important Not Important.
• 2:39
  You can find details on anything we talk about in the show notes or at our website, notrightnow.show..show.
• 2:46
  And if you like what you hear today, please share it with a parent who needs it or who might laugh and tell their kids to be quiet, and then drop us a nice little five-star review.
• 2:54
  And reminder, you can send questions or feedback to questions@notrightnow.show.
• 3:00
  [upbeat music] This week, we're excited to have a guest, 'cause it should not just be Quinn and me talking- No... into the void.
• 3:15
  And one of the friends I've made via Substack is Lindsey Stanberry, who is a freelance writer, editor, content strategist, and founder of The Purse, which is a site dedicated to women and personal finance.
• 3:26
  And we have spent some fun time between the two of us at our newsletters talking about kids and money in the 21st century, and we wanted to talk a little bit more about what it's like to raise kids in a not-right-now world and money issues.
• 3:40
  Yeah, what do you do when your kid's like, "I would like you to make a meme coin of me, for me, by me"? That's possibly illegal. As far as I understand, that's what money is now.
• 3:50
  And even though Lindsey was an executive editor at Fortune, and she served as co-chair of Fortune's Impact Initiative and Most Powerful Women Next Gen conferences, and she has been all over CNBC, and Refinery29, and Money Diaries, she, just like you, hates Christmas, and hates birthday parties, and doesn't know what to do with it, which is kind of reassuring to us.
• 4:13
  It really is. Again, like, o- our goal with guests is really try to talk to them as parents first and bring their fullest selves to them.
• 4:20
  And I love the last line of her bio, where she says she lives in Brooklyn with her frugal husband and expensive kid, and I'm like, th- there's a lot going on there that we dig into with her, and it's really great.
• 4:30
  She's so candid about the whole thing and about her work, the struggle to
• 4:36
  w- when everybody's, much less if you have a family or in-laws, whatever it might be, their money stuff is complicated, and this and that, and everything's expensive, and she's w- just a wonderful person to have on the show.
• 4:46
  I'm sure she regrets it.
• 4:47
  [laughs] But paradoxically, if you do not have your shit together with your kids' finances, or if you have not figured out a chore chart or an allowance that makes sense to you, don't worry, 'cause Lindsey does not have advice for you- Mm-hmm...
• 5:00
  which I think might be reassuring. So dig into it. We hope you like it. Yep, absolutely.
• 5:05
  If you have ideas for any other guests we should have or try to do this semi-often, again, people who you think can give it to us real, but actually have an informed opinion, even if that opinion is, "I don't fucking know, man."
• 5:16
  So please enjoy our first guest, Lindsey Stanberry.
• 5:20
  [upbeat music] So Lindsey, tomorrow is our kid's birthday, and I know you don't have one coming up now for about a, a season, but, like, I would love to dive in with knowing about how, especially 'cause you have an only, like, how you, from the perspective of The Purse, what's your present philosophy- At all...
• 5:40
  for birthdays? God, I hate presents. I hate presents. I'm not a good gift giver, and my kid, he's an only child, and my husband's an only child, so he's also an only grandchild on one side, and so he is- Ooh...
• 5:51
  so spoiled. And what's your background? Do you have siblings, et cetera, et cetera? Yes, I have a brother, and he has one kid, so- Okay... and just had. It's a new one kid.
• 6:01
  And my parents, my parents spend a lot of time with my kid, so yeah, he's just, he's spoiled. He doesn't need anything else. We have a hard time when... birthdays come around because grandparents buy at all seasons.
• 6:14
  So what do you get when you already have everything? And then we throw this outrageous birthday party every year. We started during the pandemic, where we do a block party.
• 6:25
  We shut down the street and invite the whole class and it's nice 'cause we br- make parents come and hang out, and it's a good party, but then everybody brings gifts.
• 6:37
  [laughs] So on top of the grandparent onslaught, there are all the gifts.
• 6:41
  But I negotiated last year and got my kid to agree to put, "No gifts," on the invite, knowing that some people would still bring gifts, and then I agreed to buy him something that he really wanted within a certain price range- Mm...
• 6:56
  in order to cut down just the amount of stuff that came into our house. That actually worked out pretty well. We did the no gifts thing when my oldest was, I don't know, two or three, something like that.
• 7:08
  And, you know, we were like, "Look, if you gotta bring something, bring like a piece of plastic out of your recycling bin. That's all he gives a shit about." Right.
• 7:15
  [laughs] And one of my wife's good friends, our good friends, she basically wrote a card to my child that said, "Your parents can go fuck themselves. Here's a bunch of Star Wars toys." [laughs] Which
• 7:24
  I should have expected. So I get it. The stuff is so hard. It's so much. So hard. And I think that the, like the mental load of then trying to fit it into your house is a nightmare. Yeah.
• 7:35
  I mean, it's funny 'cause I think Emily Gould did a thing a couple months ago about whether or not to say, "No gifts," and I feel no apologies about saying, "No gifts," and not even- Yeah... not remotely.
• 7:46
  Like, part of it is that we are a thank you note family, 'cause I sort of have- Mm-hmm... this like Catholic background that's no gain, no pain, basically. If you want Christmas presents- Right... you have to go to mass.
• 7:57
  And if you want an Easter basket- Yeah... you have to go to mass. And if you're gonna get birthday presents, you have to write a thank you note. And so he gets all the presents.
• 8:05
  My parents buy him every single thing he wants from his wishlist, which I think is insane. Mm-hmm. Shout out to my husband for coaching my 76-year-old dad on how to buy Roblox online. Mm. [laughs] Uh, Robux online.
• 8:18
  I know. Like, a normal person would have said, "I'm not doing this," but my dad is such a slave- Yeah... to my son, my unworthy son. Mm. And then my brother and his husband get him whatever.
• 8:29
  My aunt gives him a big Amazon gift card. There's just literally nothing he could ever want. So a- and part of it is that- Yeah...
• 8:34
  I just don't wanna make him sit down and write more thank you notes, so therefore his friends don't need to buy him anything. I'm sure there'll be a few, you know, rebels and renegades who sneak by- Yeah...
• 8:43
  and, you know, don't obey the rules. Our, our caveat is always, if you're gonna do it, just please bring a book. We try to go to that. And then we actually, we're usually pretty
• 8:53
  liberal about books, like our house is filled with them.
• 8:55
  But we also, we go to the library every week to know, like you can't fucking buy everything, but also every six months we move the books down to the youngest kid, and then they're out of here.
• 9:03
  So, but I don't know, that makes me feel less bad than just more stuff. I try to give them too. Yeah. If I have to do a gift. Yeah.
• 9:11
  Although it gets harder as the kids get older, and you don't know what they like or what they already have. Yeah.
• 9:16
  You know, like for us, we get every, oh my God, what is he called, wimpy kid book, like the second it comes out, and our kids are so spoiled. They're like the kids in The Devil Wears Prada, where I just buy two copies.
• 9:26
  [laughs] 'Cause I'm like, well, I'm supporting the local bookstore. I am mean in other ways, I promise you. But you know, you do find your days where you're like, these fucking books.
• 9:34
  If I just let my kids have a phone, I would be picking up books like s- you know, face down on the kitchen counter so much less frequently than I currently am. But we had...
• 9:43
  Lindsay, I would love to know your take on how you would've, uh, solved this problem. We went a couple w- months ago to a fundraiser for a c- a children's choir that my kid was in at PS.
• 9:52
  We've quit the choir because it, it had involved so much fundraising and volunteering that I was like, this is not worth it for me.
• 9:58
  I would rather just pay more money and pay for people who can't afford to do it than to do additional fundraising and volunteer work.
• 10:05
  Anyway, they had this fundraiser, and well, I guess, you know, it was jokes on us for not paying attention to it, but they had a silent auction. It was during the day, and my kids were running around.
• 10:15
  My older son spent his own money on like a gift card for, I think Dick's Sporting Goods.
• 10:19
  My younger kid didn't really know how silent auctions worked, and long story short, he put the winning bid on a signed Chicago Cubs photo, and it was for $80.
• 10:30
  We didn't find out until after the fact when it turned out he'd won the auction. First of all, we're not Chicago Cubs fans, so that was already- Perfect... like signing. I don't even know who this player is.
• 10:41
  He thought he had $80 back in his little, you know, toy robot bank at home. Oh. He did not. He had about $20. It's the tax man coming to get some of his shit. Yeah.
• 10:52
  Well, I mean, what would you do if you found out your child had inadvertently put himself/you in the hole $80? I really like the idea of repoing. [laughs] Right?
• 11:01
  No, it's, we're big fans of fuck around and find out around here. Yeah. Sorry, kids. Real world's not fun. [laughs] Oh, man, I'd probably like put together like a payment plan, right?
• 11:10
  Like, you're paying this off over time, the money. But you wouldn't make him effectively return it or cancel it? Uh, can you return it? I mean, it's for charity, and it's for this group- Yeah...
• 11:20
  and he's already a part of. Yeah. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. There's no returning. You know whoever acquired that photo put in w- probably more time and effort than was worth it, you know? But- Totally. Yeah. Payment plan's smart.
• 11:32
  And would you stick him for every dollar? No. I'd probably do 50/50. Mm-hmm. 'Cause 80 bucks is a lot. But you also have to consider like how much cash is coming in.
• 11:41
  My mother-in-law, like stashes money aside for my son, and then we'll just like, we'll be visiting and she'll be like, "Here's $20." You already gave him X, Y, Z toys on this visit. Mm-hmm.
• 11:53
  But okay, give him more money so he's not cash poor. So I might be like, "Dude, cough it up." I absolutely, oh my God, what is the word? Con- not constipated, confiscated.
• 12:03
  My son has like extra little relatives who will put in $2 in an Easter card for him for no reason. Mm-hmm. Again, what? And I would just take that. I was like, that's mine now, not for you.
• 12:12
  Well, that's because Easter has, apparently, it's fucking Christmas spring now. My daughter definitely handed Dana a list and was like, "Here's the thing I want for Easter." And we were like-Quick question.
• 12:23
  [laughs] Who told you this is, first of all, it's just blanket no. Like, it's not happening. But second of all, like, where... I don't understand. Like, what happened? I really messed up Easter this year.
• 12:34
  I think I, like, self-sabotaged. I think there was, like, a place of me that was like, "I'm just not doing it."
• 12:38
  We were on vacation, and then we came back, and it was the next day, and my mom, God bless her, went and bought all the candy, but I wasn't really paying attention to the fact that it was all...
• 12:49
  It all had price tags on it, so I just threw it in the Easter basket. And then
• 12:53
  a few weeks later, my son was like, "So I don't really believe in the Easter Bunny anymore because all that candy had price tags from Cape Cod." Yeah.
• 13:01
  I feel like we're keeping things going for us more than anything, but at the same time, I mean, my youngest, he's nine. They wanna believe in that kind of thing, for sure. We definitely try to keep it going.
• 13:10
  But for Easter, I feel like I heard my wife having a conversation with them, which is, "Mom and Dad put some shit in there and the bunny puts in the rest."
• 13:17
  I, I think it's a good lesson for a kid to learn, maybe by accident in this loving way, that perhaps the magical aspect is not there, but I still feel the love and I get the stuff, and I suppose- Yeah... I'm willing to
• 13:31
  live through the heartbreak of the magic if it means I am still getting the shit. Mm-hmm. And, you know- Right...
• 13:36
  it's sort of the old, are you hiding the wrapping paper at Christmastime so that, you know, they don't realize that Santa and you are using the same... Like, how long are you gonna do that for? You know, like- Yes...
• 13:45
  at a certain point, you're like... Oh, I grew up in a house where Santa didn't wrap gifts, so Santa- Ah. Mm... gifts in our house too, so that takes care of that problem. I love that. That does.
• 13:54
  I think my wife had the same thing. I'm so, at this point,
• 14:00
  fucking tired that I give up on most things, but then there's certain things, for instance, we got one of those, basically pushed our Tesla into the ocean and got one of those new VW buses.
• 14:11
  We call it the Magic School Bus. It's great. And I told my kids I was gonna get various stickers and flames on the side, all this different stuff.
• 14:19
  Somehow we got to the point, the, and they're definitely in the we're increasingly embarrassed by you, which makes me wanna double down- Yeah... of course.
• 14:29
  And so somehow along the way I got the nickname from them and their friends of, it's a combination of Riz and Zaddy. It's the Rizaddy. Ah.
• 14:39
  And the whole name, and I joked, "Oh, I'm gonna get it on the license plate of the VW Bus." And they're like, "You won't do that." And I looked at them really serious and I just said, "How long have we known each other?
• 14:51
  Do you think that I won't take off of work today, cancel recording with Claire to go to the DMV and apply for this?"
• 14:57
  So I feel like vis-a-vis wrapping paper, like now that I think about it, I'll probably just do that till they're 40 and- Mm-hmm... sell it with a straight face because- Mm... what else do I have going on? You know? Yeah.
• 15:08
  Yeah, that's true. When in doubt, troll your kids more than anything else. [laughs] That's the whole point of parenthood, right? Right. Yeah. Yep.
• 15:15
  Lindsay, may I ask you, like, a very practical, like, money question since you are on this call and I might as well since you're here? Sure. 'Cause my- Yeah...
• 15:23
  older son, he's 12, and many of his friends now have debit cards, either like an actual physical debit card or some other- Yeah... magical system. Yeah.
• 15:31
  And based on your, I know your son is a little bit younger, but based on your reporting, like, what are the payment options that kids are actually using these days that are not going to steal all their information or all their interest?
• 15:42
  Like, what are people doing instead of giving their kids cash? 'Cause like most places- Yeah... but not are cashless anymore, so how are kids spending their money that you think makes sense?
• 15:51
  Yeah, that's a good question, 'cause I've been playing around with those apps and debit cards too to try to figure out, like, what I like and what I wanna do. I see everything.
• 15:59
  I was out with a friend, like we were all hanging out. There's a place c- by us called Industry City, which is, uh, it's hard to explain, like a outdoor mall essentially.
• 16:09
  And so all the kids were, like, hanging out and the parents, and one of the daughters wanted to buy some really ugly flowers, as children like to buy, right?
• 16:18
  And the mom pulled out one of those apps and was like, "Okay, I'm transferring the $20 out of your account." And I was like, "Oh, that's nifty." 'Cause I so fall into, like, the IOUs.
• 16:29
  "Yeah, five bucks there," and I'm always- Yeah... stealing cash out of my kid's sock drawer and, I don't know, I feel like there's gotta be a better way. We did the cash thing forever. Yeah.
• 16:37
  And our whole policy was, like, at first it was, like, three bucks a week or whatever and a dollar to spend, dollar to save, can't touch, and a dollar to donate at the end of the year. Right. We clear it out.
• 16:47
  [upbeat music] Hey, it's Quinn. So as you might be aware, this whole thing started as a simple, "Hey, here's what you missed" newsletter.
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• 17:49
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• 18:01
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• 18:42
  I got so tired of dealing with ones that last year, on the recommendation of a couple friends, and it's imperfect, I have screenshots that I yell at them about their UX.
• 18:49
  We switched to the Greenlight thing, which is kind of- Uh-huh... a version of what you're describing. And again- Yeah... pros and cons, but that's our journey. Have you settled on anything, Claire? No, not yet.
• 19:02
  I mean, so he doesn't have a smartphone yet, and he's a seventh grader. We're trying to hang on till high school, and I guess that's maybe part of it.
• 19:09
  His issue is that he doesn't live close to his school, so it might be different- Mm... if he kind of was walking around and had more autonomy. His main places to go spend money are Walgreens and the gas station.
• 19:21
  What are those fucking things my kids won't stop eating? They're definitely made of, like, fossil fuels. Is it the nerd gummy clusters and Pokemon cards? I mean, just pop and candy, basically. Pop, right. Yeah.
• 19:32
  Like, yeah. Like, you know, like, a... There's some kind of candy that's sold in the tiny baby bottle, and the candy is basically colored sugar. It's like- Ugh... RFK Jr.'s worst nightmare.
• 19:41
  And on the one hand, there's part of me that's, this is so stupid. On the other hand, your child, like, I don't... I mean, baby's gonna buy baby things. But we did have an issue. We've had a couple little things come up.
• 19:51
  Once where he was trying to buy Robux or something like that, something on Roblox. Mm-hmm. And he fucked up the transaction, or something happened, but he was doing it, like, right before he was getting picked up.
• 20:02
  And so we don't see him cry very often, but he was weepy because something happened where his money went away, and we ha- still to this day have no idea what happened.
• 20:12
  And I was like, "Well, maybe you learned a lesson about not conducting transactions online when you are in a hurry and not double-checking, like it happens to the best of us."
• 20:21
  But he also recently, my husband told him that if he wanted to, my son could spend his own money on an electric scooter. And then when I got wind of that, I said, "Absolutely not."
• 20:29
  And there, there was a big, you know, showdown in terms of who sucks and who doesn't in the house, and obviously- Mm... the one who sucks is me. I have no regrets, by the way.
• 20:39
  I just learned our teacher broke her foot on an e-scooter, and another- Oh, shoot... a neighborhood kid had to get stitches 'cause of an e-scooter.
• 20:45
  I don't think those should be al- allowed, but no one ever checks with me. But anyway, if he had had his own money, you know, or he had...
• 20:52
  Is, he wants, you know, like, a, an Amazon Alexa, but he doesn't have his own account, so we're kind of in this nice place- Yeah... where we still kind of control him financially, more or less. So I don't know.
• 21:01
  Like, I'm really- Yeah... also don't wanna learn a new system. That's part of it- Mm-hmm... is, like, whenever I have time to figure out what is the app, what are people calling it? The one we settled on is Greenlight.
• 21:13
  Again- Okay... seems to steal the least amount of information. It's all fucking relative. It's pretty easy to use. It's pretty easy to set up.
• 21:22
  They're constantly upselling you, which as a business, I get it, but also please stop. And again, we don't do phones either, Lindsay.
• 21:29
  Our kids have iPads that basically are not allowed to leave the house, and they can text each other, but I put the kid app on there just so they can keep track 'cause again, I was like- Right...
• 21:39
  with my dollar bills every Sunday. They're like, "Did you print up the new list of our allowance?" I was like, "I... It's gotta stop." Yeah. "I- it's too much." Yeah. "It's too much." So at least that's there.
• 21:48
  I automated their allowance to it, but I also set up, now that they're getting older, you can set it up and it's kind of janky. If they don't do this chore, they don't get their allowance. They don't get paid.
• 21:59
  And for us it's, you gotta bring me your laundry, and a couple other things, but it's useful. And again, they got the little debit cards, and then they were furious- Yeah...
• 22:06
  that I didn't get the ones with their pictures on them. And I was like- [laughs] Right... "Motherfucker, guess what? They're mine now." Yeah. "They... Fuck you." Yeah, I- But, you know, I keep the debit cards.
• 22:14
  I was under the impression, which I understand now would be a technical logistical m- m- mess, I was under the impression, like, I would get kinda, like, screen time, an alert if they tried to buy something. Mm-hmm.
• 22:26
  But I realized that would be such a pain in the ass for stores and such, so now I just get an alert after they have bought something. So we made it- Right... so they can't do it online, so they just use the card.
• 22:35
  We keep the card. We give it to them. The question I would love to hear about is, we still do the thirds, and it automatically goes there. And for the spend anywhere, they're... Again, they hate me.
• 22:47
  How many times they've been like, "I'm sorry, you said this was my money to spend?" And I'm like, "Yeah, but fucking not on that." Yeah. And they're like- [laughs]... "This whole thing is a scam." Yeah. So anyways, yes.
• 22:56
  We're doing the Greenlight thing. It's fine. Yeah. And a friend told me a story about when she was a kid, and you, there's always those stories, like, stick with you, right?
• 23:04
  Her and her brother were at the zoo, and her brother wanted to buy, like, a really dumb stuffed animal, and he had the money for it, and his dad was like, "No," like, "Can't buy it, man." Mm.
• 23:12
  He's like, "It's my money," and dad was like, "No." And I think that sent the sister, n- now adult, like, down a spiral of, you know, this is a scam. So I kinda think you have to let your kids...
• 23:24
  If you tell 'em it's their money, then they, even if you don't agree- Yeah... as long as it's not, like, cigarettes and beer.
• 23:30
  I'm such an, like, a crazy person about ch- I think it was, like, again, those, like, nerd gummy things or some- Yeah... something fucking terrible and- Yeah... yeah, I think you're right though. I mean, what is worse?
• 23:40
  Because then you, like, make it forbidden fruit. Yeah. You know, just let them buy that crap and- Mm-hmm... they can only eat so much of it before it makes them throw up, and that's a lesson in itself, right? It's true.
• 23:49
  They're definitely nearing the, "Boy, that don't feel good," like- Yeah... cause and effect thing, and I'm like, "Whoops." No. Yeah. Yeah.
• 23:55
  No, my system is let them buy candy, and then forget they have it, and then you throw it away secretly. Yeah. And that seems to work out.
• 24:01
  At least it doesn't make it forbidden fruit, which was definitely my thing, but I think the more we talk about this, the more I'm like, I don't wanna be a banker, and I don't want a system or more systems.
• 24:11
  So much of parenting is setting up a system and a chart. So many charts. And we don't do a chore chart or allowance- Mm-hmm... because I just can't keep up with it.
• 24:19
  So there's certain things that you have to do to live in this house, and they're pretty minimal. Mm-hmm. They're mainly take your dish to the sink when you're done eating, push in your chairs.
• 24:28
  Those are, like, the most bare minimum things. We don't make them make their beds because I just cannot oversee it.The older one is in charge of his laundry. He requires some prompts. And so- Mm...
• 24:39
  on the one hand, my kids do a lot less probably for themselves and, or earn less, but I truly just, I cannot manage all this and be like, "Well, you get 50 cents less because you like, didn't make your bed good," you know?
• 24:51
  I- That's why we tried to automate it. Yeah. Like, I was about to break- Yeah, mm-hmm... and I just said, "It's preprogrammed. The only thing I have to do is it sends me an alert if like my account is out of money."
• 25:00
  So yeah, same thing. It's like I can't do another thing. I don't know. Like, I don't get paid to do chores around the house. Like, nobody [laughs] nobody's giving me cash- Right... to make my bed.
• 25:09
  So I don't like tying the two. And then, you know, some people will pay their kids to read or, like, practice the piano, and I'm like- Mm-hmm... "No, you just have to do those things- Mm-hmm...
• 25:17
  because they make you a better person." I don't like tying cash rewards to just everyday tasks. People do, though. Yeah. And, like, some people are really motivated by that. I also am, like, not
• 25:28
  personally motivated by those things. I remember, like, when I used to work corporate jobs, and they'd be like, "Get a bonus if you hit this goal." And I'm like, "Okay. Tell me I'm pretty and I'll hit that goal."
• 25:37
  [laughs] But I don't really care about your cash bonus. You're right. Right. I got all these other problems, but not that one. Yeah. [laughs] Yeah.
• 25:42
  No, we're definitely, again, m- more like real talk, it's like you guys kind of carry a lot of weight.
• 25:47
  And we definitely are trying, as they get older and understand it more, to delineate between, "No, this is so you get to live here. And this is- Yeah...
• 25:54
  you're taking on some big kid stuff, and this is helpful- Some extra... and things like that. Yeah.
• 25:57
  And that's kind of what it comes to, especially since we're putting, f- frankly, they don't get two-thirds, but I mean, two-thirds of it goes into save and donate, so I don't know. Yeah.
• 26:06
  Like, the question of then, like, if you give them an allowance, what don't you pay for on a regular basis? Mm-hmm. Like, it started with us, like we were talking about ice cream.
• 26:17
  Will I pick up the tab for ice cream, or if I pay you an allowance, do you have to buy the ice cream? I don't know. That's like a moral quandary I haven't figured out the answer to.
• 26:26
  I think we try to make those things, again, like I'm the jerk. When we do that and make it clear, it's like, "Special occasion, we're going to do this and this. Right. That's on Mom and Dad." Right.
• 26:35
  But if it's a fucking Thursday, and you're like, "Can I get ice cream?" Yeah. It's like, "Sure, you can. Here is your card." [laughs] Yeah. "Best wishes." I think that's right, 'cause I'm so cheap.
• 26:44
  We'll be out, and he'll be like, "Can we get a treat?" And I was like, "No. Yeah. "We got treats at home." Lindsay, do you... We talked about this for evil witches. I'm just curious, what is your...
• 26:52
  When your kid, let's say his grandma gives him a $25 gift card for, like, Barnes & Noble or whatever for his birthday, what is your system for storing these gift cards and, like, whether he can use them whenever the hell you want, or you're like, "We're gonna make a special trip.
• 27:07
  Today is the day you're gonna spend your gift card." You know, do you kind of secretly donate them? Just tell me how you manage that. Yeah. Now that you're saying this, I'm like, "Where are the gift cards?"
• 27:16
  [laughs] It's so hard, 'cause we get a lot of Amazon gift cards, and I don't personally like shopping on Amazon. We'll pick a day like months later. I'll be like, "Okay, like, you just got a bunch of stuff."
• 27:27
  'Cause I don't know if you guys find this, but, like, my kid gets into such a, like, gimme stage- Mm-hmm...
• 27:33
  when we have, like, birthdays and Christmas where he's just, "I want more and more," and it's, "Whoa, like, you need a detox. It's like a shopping detox. Mm-hmm.
• 27:40
  So let's put a pause on this and revisit it in March when there's nothing fun going on." So that's what I usually try to do. We set them aside.
• 27:49
  They're typically lost, and then they'll be found, and then it's, "Oh, this is a good Saturday to go to Barnes & Noble." And sometimes I'll trade him. Like, I often... I'm such a re-gifter. Apologies to all our friends.
• 28:02
  I will probably give your gift [laughs] to somebody else, and I usually have a mental tab going in my head about who gave what- Mm...
• 28:09
  making sure they aren't at that next birthday party, so they're not seeing that I've re-gifted the LEGO set- Innocent... that I know my kid does not really want, and I'll do the same with gift cards.
• 28:17
  And I'll just tell my kid, like, "Why don't we give Henry the $25 Amazon gift card, and next time we're at Barnes & Noble, I'll buy you some books." Yeah.
• 28:25
  Not usually dollar for dollar, though, 'cause he's not smart enough to keep. He's too, he's not- Perfect. No... not keeping track that closely. No. I mean, you're the banker.
• 28:34
  You deserve to take, like, your teller fees and things like that. Yeah, and it's not like he sits down when he gets all that, like, onslaught of gift cards, right, and is, "I got four $25 Amazon gift cards.
• 28:45
  You owe me, you know- Yeah... you got to cash this in for the right amount." But I also, like, I don't know. He got something recently.
• 28:51
  He bought some game, and he used his money to pay for it, and then of course there's tax, and he was like, "Oh, I didn't think about the tax." And I was like, "I'll cover the tax. It's fine."
• 28:59
  I do feel like, to a certain extent, I'm not nickel and diming him, so it's a two-way street. I will bring up the tax thing and acknowledge it like you did, but I will also make them feel shit about it.
• 29:10
  I'm like, "Well, you better hope the house doesn't burn down, 'cause I paid for the firefighters." [laughs] And then I'll give them the money.
• 29:14
  Something that's funny about being a parent is realizing that the need to teach kids how to shop on Amazon, and it makes you realize that you had these own systems that you didn't even realize that you set up in your head.
• 29:25
  Like, for instance, my son was looking for a specific Pokemon card, and of course you can't just buy one card. Like, you have to go and buy a pack.
• 29:32
  And then on Amazon, there's a million vendors selling these packs, and you have these weird little ways of sorting out who seems legit, and reading the reviews, and sorting, like, the legit-ness versus the review system, and you don't even realize you have these.
• 29:45
  Yeah.
• 29:45
  And I'm curious whether you've been through something like that with your kid, where like he's, "Oh, I wanna buy these, you know, Crocs that are being sold by this vendor that seems possibly shady and not real, and maybe it'll just be a picture of a Croc," you know?
• 29:56
  Have you gone through that kind of, like, online shopping literacy with him yet? No. That's why I don't shop on Amazon. I don't know if your kids are into it, but he is obsessed with LEGO Minifigs, with Star Wars.
• 30:07
  Oh, yeah. And that is the biggest scam ever, and I just, I don't know. The toy collection market and the markups on that stuff, I'm- Oh, yeah... going crazy. No.
• 30:19
  I've had to just let go and let God, basically, and just choose my battles, and be like, "Well, no electric scooters, but yes, 3,000 LEGO Minifigures." You know? Like, you can only do so much.
• 30:30
  The choosing your battles really is a big part of it.
• 30:33
  I hate it so mu- I just find it so scammy, and-Then we'll gift him, like, fancy Pokemon cards, and then get upset that they're, like, buried in the pile of Pokemon cards. Like, he's- Ugh... eight or he's six.
• 30:45
  He doesn't understand collectibles, and also, like, collectibles are stupid. [laughs] There, I said it. I'm sure the nerds will come for me.
• 30:52
  I'm ashamed to admit that there was a while where my son was, I think, earning Pokemon cards as... I was trying that out as a form of currency. Mm-hmm, yeah.
• 31:00
  So it was like if you did five jobs, you would earn five Pokemon cards. Then God help you if you, like, gave him five shitty Pokemon cards, and- Right... he felt like he had done all of that work for nothing, you know?
• 31:12
  And then you're like, "What the hell am I doing here? I have a master's degree. Like, what's happened to my life?" [laughs] Yep, yep. We're trying to move more, just in general... Again, that's the allowance thing.
• 31:22
  I'm not gonna change it again. I'm gonna go with Greenlight until they sell everybody's information and they can't get an abortion anywhere.
• 31:28
  We're gonna stick with that, but as far as gifts and stuff like that, we're really trying to push towards, like, experiences, which I know- Mm... is, like, the cliche annoying thing, but we try to follow through on it.
• 31:38
  Like, kids are big enough, COVID is where it is, that we're trying to do some travel stuff and things like that. We're going to do a Alaska trip in a month and a half, which is pretty exciting, and a huge trip, and just
• 31:49
  monstrously expensive. And we're like, "That's the thing. That is the thing, like, for the year-" Yeah... "plus.
• 31:54
  But, you know, if you want books about it before we go, or you wanna buy this while we're there, whatever, that's different to me." Yeah.
• 32:01
  You know, we're not bringing home a bunch of shit, but I don't know, trying to make it slightly more meaningful. It's the old battle.
• 32:09
  What you want to kind of convey to the world with your values versus the fact that- Yeah... ki- kids are horrible and are not evol- Like, we want them to be a certain kind of level of person, and they're not, you know?
• 32:19
  So Claire, how are you modeling spending money for your children, both consciously and not consciously? God, [laughs] that is- Like, how often do boxes show up- God... that aren't cleaning supplies and shit like that?
• 32:32
  [laughs] 'Cause I got a lot of shit for a long time 'cause boxes kept showing up, and I was like, "We have three children under three years old. It's just diapers and wipes.
• 32:39
  I know this seems crazy 'cause it's got my name on it" [laughs] Yeah. "But it's just on auto subscribe."
• 32:44
  I mean, I don't think I do too bad, although I did buy myself, like, a $400, like, LED face mask thing for my birthday because I had a big Nordstrom gift card, and- Where is that? Let's see it.
• 32:56
  It's right here on my face. Can't you see how good my face looks? Like, I'm... It's for everyone who's- I need it... watching the video. Yeah.
• 33:03
  I, I am gonna let my son see a picture of me wearing the mask as part of his birthday tomorrow. He really wants to see me wearing it. I'm like, "I'll let you see." Oh, my God. That's amazing. [laughs] It's so creepy.
• 33:11
  It's so fucked up. By the way, he noticed that my older son, when he turned 10, his main birthday was a later bedtime, and my younger son- Mm... is mad that's not his gift.
• 33:21
  And I was like, "Well, Paul chose the bedtime over presents, so you can either have the later bedtime or present." You know, again, you get into these, like, Byzantine- That's a good one, though. That's a really- Yeah...
• 33:31
  good one. [upbeat music] So we're on a big cleaning streak right now. As you can imagine, I'm very annoying about it to my children, but we're trying to dial it down to the essentials at home.
• 33:44
  So whether you're an appliance, a piece of furniture or clothing, whatever, you gotta earn your spot. Everything's got a place.
• 33:53
  Everything has utility, which is hard with kids who constantly bring things into the house and all their stuff, and it's really hard when you're trying to feed them constantly.
• 34:03
  And there are various appliances that are advertised to you that can literally do one thing that honestly can't justify the counter space. But I'll tell you what does.
• 34:15
  It's the Mill Food Recycler, and holy cow, does it ever. It doesn't even go on the counter, by the way. It goes on the floor like a sexy trash can. It plugs into a standard outlet, and voila, no more food waste.
• 34:29
  Got peels, bones, stalks, whatever, leftovers? Put them in there, and then while you sleep, the Mill automatically turns on, dries, and grinds them, and it doesn't smell at all. It's crazy. Again, let's rehash.
• 34:42
  Not only does it not stink up the house, or two, cause leaky trash bags which are disgusting, and three, send leftover food to the landfill to turn into waste, and then methane, and then rising oceans.
• 34:56
  It actually makes you feel good because it grinds up all of your food waste into these adorable grounds you can use in the garden, you can give to a local farm. You can put them right in the green bin.
• 35:07
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• 35:20
  I'm gonna read it to you, but you should know the link is right in the show notes, and you can just smash your finger against it. It's mill.com/lp/important-not-important. Can I remember that? No.
• 35:34
  That's why we put the link right in the show notes.
• 35:36
  So anyways, huge thanks to Mill for doing the right thing and trying to cut down on food waste, most of which comes from our homes, for sponsoring our work, and of course, thanks to you listeners for always supporting our partners.
• 35:50
  How late is bedtime? Well, back then it was, like, 9:00 because we were so regimented back then that we could control things, that we were like, "We will give you another half an hour."
• 36:00
  But now we are in a whole other reality with, like, sports schedules and people often may not come home until after 9:00, and the younger kid is going to bed later than the older one did at his age anyway.
• 36:10
  So it doesn't make any sense. On a non-activities night, doesn't have to be sports, everyone's home, not a weekend, what's bedtime? What time are you going upstairs or to the bedroom or wherever?
• 36:20
  It's a non-activity night, wh- which I know doesn't fucking happen, but think about this winter when you didn't sign your kids up for shit. Like, what time?
• 36:28
  8:00 for the younger one, and then the older one, you know, he makes his moves and he goes up there, but he doesn't have to turn his light off until 9:30 or when I go to bed, basically.
• 36:38
  So there's a difference between going, in bed, lights out, and then bedtime. But- Totally... yeah, 8:30, just 'cause, like, the younger one needs it. What's he, what's he doing in there? What's he got access to?
• 36:46
  What's he doing?A little of this, a little of that. You know, he's a- [laughs] But he just, he has like projects that he works on. So sometimes he's reading- Are there screens? No. Okay.
• 36:57
  So well then, who fucking cares, right? He's- At that point. Yeah, I don't give a fuck... he might be making action card...
• 37:02
  There was a while where he was making his own, like, trading cards with his friends, and I did let him use an Amazon gift card 'cause he wanted to buy himself a laminating machine. His excitement- Oh, wow...
• 37:12
  over this laminating machine coming- Great... was so cute. I, like, can't describe it. Lindsay, non-activity night, not a weekend. About the same. Going to bed, in the bedroom reading books by 8:00, 8:15.
• 37:25
  Lights out by 8:45. And he's pretty good about it. I'm really not looking forward to the, like, the him being up late. I'm not. Yeah. I'm dreading that.
• 37:33
  And we have a small apartment, so like it- we're all here in it together. Yeah, there's no hiding. My older kid yesterday, and maybe this is...
• 37:42
  You could look at this as being sad, kind of sad I guess, and like wall-y, but I just thought it was sweet. Like, he is into coding right now, the older one. And so he- Yeah... was doing some coding.
• 37:51
  He's like, "Can I sit next to you and work next to you?" Like, last night. And we did that.
• 37:55
  Like, we sat in from the baseball game with our laptops out and we did our thing, and it could've been better, we could've been playing cards, we could've been throwing the ball around.
• 38:02
  But also, he chose to be next to me in physical space and, you know, and that was... I'll take it. I think as long as that's not the fucking rule, then great. You know? It's family time.
• 38:12
  Well, and I could see him, see what he was doing, and I saw that he was coding and he wasn't, you know, on 4chan or whatever the hell I'm just to be worried about at this moment in time, you know.
• 38:21
  But Lindsay, I have a question for you, 'cause you said your husband is an only child. Yeah. Okay, mine has two.
• 38:28
  And I'm curious, I mean, this is not only subject to only children, but I'm curious whether you and your husband have had to kind of come to terms in regards to how much your kid gets at any given holiday or Christmas, and which one of you is more the hard ass and which one of you is more, "It's not Christmas if the tree isn't, you know, groaning, you know, with the, you know, holding up all of these gifts" and things like that, or standing on top of these gifts, I guess.
• 38:51
  But like, did you guys have to kind of negotiate on that, or you had similar philosophies the whole time? No. Do we have similar philosophies? I don't think we have similar philosophies.
• 39:01
  I think he likes to make everybody happy. Mm. So he's not gonna create any controversy at the holidays. And I do not like the holidays because it is an influx of toys and expectations, and
• 39:15
  everybody else's happiness and not mine. Yeah. So the toys come and we have not, we've not figured it out. I've thought of a million things. Right.
• 39:24
  I've proposed a million things, and then I feel like COVID happened, and all sort of negotiating I tried to do with family went out the window. I just keep- Yeah...
• 39:32
  telling myself that the toy stage will not last forever. I gotta tell ya- Right... because ours are so close in age, it went on for a long time, I thought.
• 39:44
  But it was because, like, we didn't have a kid who was 12 and a kid who was 2. We didn't have a big s- gap, you know? Right. Where we were like- Right... "Oh, someone has clearly moved out of this."
• 39:52
  They were all just in it. And then about six months ago- Yeah... and again, how old are my kids, Claire? 10, 10, 11, 12? Something like that. Sure.
• 39:59
  We looked, we've got this little finished basement, and that's where our, kinda always been our rule, and we've been in this house for three years, whatever, that's where your shit is, right? Your rooms are- Right...
• 40:08
  basically books and colored pencils and stuff. We went from, "Okay, let's move the baby stuff out" to, "Let's move the toddler stuff out" to, "Let's move this." Yeah.
• 40:17
  We finally looked around about six months ago and we were like, "Oh, you guys don't use any of this shit." And of course I'm just obnoxiously sentimental and have to fight it at every turn.
• 40:28
  So they were like, "Burn it all." [laughs] And I was like, "Well, we could save these 22 things," and tried to cull it down and this and that. But I'm also, like, increasingly wanna get rid of shit.
• 40:37
  But I was really surprised. Like, I was really surprised. Yeah. I looked around and I was like, "Oh, they just want, like,
• 40:43
  musical instruments and like a fucking trapeze bar," and there's still some Legos, but even that is starting to go away, which is crazy. It's sad. So the point is, you'll get there, and it's kind of unexpected. Yeah.
• 40:53
  Yeah, it's funny though, because we're about to... My parents are moving furniture around in their house.
• 41:00
  They're giving us a double bed that they have in an extra bedroom, and that means we're getting rid of my son's twin bed, and I think we should do, like, a big toy clean-out.
• 41:09
  And we were, we cuddle in bed in the evenings after he reads for a while, and we were laying in bed and I was talking to him about getting the bigger bed and that we'll both be able to fit in the bed again.
• 41:19
  And I was like, "And I think it'll be a good opportunity to get rid of some toys." And all of a sudden he starts crying and he's like- Oh... "My childhood is disappearing." [laughs] Oh, no. [laughs] Oh, man.
• 41:36
  And I was like, "I don't know whether to laugh or cry." Oh. 'Cause yeah, dude, it is. That's so funny. Oh. You have to do both.
• 41:42
  I mean, again, if you're like a sentimental monster, I've wanted to be a dad since I was five.
• 41:46
  And now, like, my kids are like, "Well, you never know, I'm gonna be driving and then in college you're never gonna see me again." I'm like, "Well, don't talk to me for a week 'cause now I'm really upset." Yeah.
• 41:54
  [laughs] I don't handle it well at all, but that's- No... amazing. Like, the self-awareness- That-... to just- Yeah That is so bedtime, though. That is so bedtime. I bet- Mm-hmm... like where are those emotions? Right?
• 42:03
  Isn't it? Like, right after school, for instance. That is not when, you know- Yeah... you're, when you're like- No... "How was your day?" And they're like, "Why are you talking to me?"
• 42:10
  Or it comes when you're like, "I'm exhausted and don't wanna talk to you anymore. Can you please go to bed?" And they tell you everything. Yeah. Yeah. And they're like, "What happens when you die?"
• 42:18
  Like, my son asked me the other night, "If you die while you're having a dream, does the dream end, like, when you die?" [laughs] It's like... I was like, I was like, "I don't know.
• 42:30
  Like, maybe that's, like, the best ending." I was like, "That's a good one." Were you like- Yeah... "I kinda wanna go that way now? That sounds amazing." Like, it depends on- Yeah... the dream, I guess, right? Yeah.
• 42:38
  If it's one of the fucking college I missed an exam dream, I wanna go that way. Yeah. That's like- [laughs]
• 42:43
  My elderly aunt told me the other day, "I hope you die in your sleep," and she meant that as like a compliment, like a fond wish, and not... [laughs] And I was like, "Thank you. I hope so, too."
• 42:54
  Anyway, but like, my older son is like that as well in terms of the sentimentality. So when he was nine- Yeah... about to turn 10, he said that he did not wanna turn 10.
• 43:03
  He was gonna choose not to turn 10, and he was gonna stick with nine, you know, for a long time. But, you know, he seems like he's been able to roll with it. But yeah, I remember, like, feeling this way as an adult.
• 43:14
  Like, I would feel this sense of guilt about growing up, and I would not wanna do that to my kids and be like, "I can't believe you're so big," you know?
• 43:21
  And of course I do that to my older son all the time 'cause he's almost my height, and I love it. I'm like very excited by him being my height almost, 'cause I'm not... I don't have a green thumb.
• 43:30
  I think I'm not a very nurturing person, but I'm like, "Look what I did." Like, he was real small when he was born, and he- He made it... you know, I kept... Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But I also am like, "You little baby.
• 43:39
  You little tiny baby." But he doesn't seem to mind it too much. But yeah, don't ever ask them if it's okay to get rid of their stuff, 'cause they're never gonna be like, "Let me help you with that.
• 43:48
  I'm gonna feel so fulfilled by donating my own things and thinking about the next life they're gonna have." That's not how they often roll, in my opinion.
• 43:56
  I have a friend whose kid set up a toy, like a toy stand, and sold all their toys at the local playground one day. Great. And then everybody, like, all these parents were like, "Are they donating the money?"
• 44:05
  And she's, "No, they're not donating the money." [laughs] This is America. They're toys. They're keeping their money. Yeah. He's putting it into derivatives. Are you fucking kidding me? I mean, can I say like a hot take?
• 44:16
  Whenever a kid is donating money, that's about the parent. That's about the parent trying their hardest to- Thanks, Claire. [laughs] Sorry, Quinn. It's all right. [laughs] It's fine.
• 44:25
  I mean, I know when you want the kid then to f- start up a method of... I mean, I've done that as well. Like, if you're gonna donate, please donate to the World Wildlife Fund, 'cause, you know, and we've done that.
• 44:34
  But, you know, my kid, the other day he was at a volleyball game and he found a brand-new football, like, at the park, and he said, "Can I take this home?"
• 44:42
  And I said, "What would you do," knowing that this had been him, "What would you do if you lost your brand-new favorite football, and you went back to try to find it, and someone had taken it home instead of left it for you?"
• 44:52
  And he said, "I would be sad 'cause that happened to me." And I was like, "Right." And I was patting myself on the back for being like, great job, Claire, with teaching your kid empathy and perspective-taking.
• 45:02
  And then two days later, I realized that football was in my car. Like, he, he thought about it, and he thought it over. Motherfucker. What? Yeah. I mean, it was like, if it happened to me, it's gonna happen to this kid.
• 45:12
  Jesus. So I mean, maybe you guys are just better parents or have better kids than I do, but like- No.
• 45:17
  No, fully caught my nine-year-old going through my 12-year-old's wallet the other day, and he was like, "I'm just counting it." I was like, "Yeah, I'm sure you're just fucking counting it."
• 45:24
  [laughs] Just lying straight to my face. Jesus, that's incredible. That's outstanding. That, that's like Usual Suspects level shit. Let me ask you guys some sort of real world-ish questions, if that's okay.
• 45:37
  Lindsay, I'm not sure if you're too familiar with m- my actual job, my other stuff I do, but you know, the cost of living right now is a lot. And all of our kids, Lindsay, you know, one at eight is a little
• 45:52
  n- not ready for this, not appropriate, w- however you wanna phrase it. But when and how much,
• 45:58
  as everything is very expensive, we're all obviously doing okay, housing, if you get a car, if you switch a job, if you are buying food, like in the store, how much do you talk to them about what it costs and how hard it is to get that money?
• 46:16
  And trying to put in their perspective, 'cause I'll often do the dickish thing- Yeah... where they're like, you know, my daughter's such a good sport, she'll come and watch the boys' baseball...
• 46:24
  It's baseball season right now. Mm-hmm. Five hours straight of games, and she'll sit there, and we got into this little...
• 46:28
  It's kinda like a fun habit of, you know, we'll get there, sometimes games are e- eight in the morning, and we'll just be like, "Okay, we'll, we'll order a little DoorDash, like, breakfast, and we'll get coffee for the other parents real quick."
• 46:38
  And then two hours later she's like, "Can we order something else?" And we're like, "Well, hold on a fucking minute. To be clear, that was the one thing, but that was like 20 bucks." Right.
• 46:44
  "And to be clear, that's like a month of your allowance." And she's like, "Fuck, right." Yeah. That's one way to do it, I guess. But constructively, trying to help them understand without being a downer of- Yeah...
• 46:55
  it is a lot, you know? How- Yeah. And I guess, uh, the further example is, like, w- we have some things that other folks might not have access to, like these vegetables and fruits in the car or whatever it might be.
• 47:08
  Yeah. I'm curious, Lindsay, how much do you see that in your work, but also have you started- Yeah... to work that in?
• 47:13
  I- it's funny you say that, 'cause my kid this week was like, "I have, don't really have any concept of what things cost and what's expensive." And then he was like, "$7 doesn't seem like a lot for eggs."
• 47:22
  And I was like, "I don't even know how to like-" Yeah, where do you start? "... but like, where do I start here?"
• 47:27
  So she asks so many questions, and I am always very confused on how to answer them and, like, how much to share, and there was like a whole point where he, like, wanted to know how much we had in our, like, checking and savings.
• 47:40
  And I was like, "Dude, like, I'm not telling you that." Yeah. "You're gonna go and tell all your friends, and also you have no concept of what it means." And I talked to somebody,
• 47:52
  I think it was Bobby Rebel, who is a financial journalist, and she has much older kids, and I was telling her sort of some of his stories about the crazy questions he asks.
• 48:01
  And she was like, "You should reply with a question." And I really liked that. I think Ron Lieber does the same thing, where he's like, you just, just ask, "Why do you wanna know?"
• 48:11
  And I did that with my kid, and it came down to this, like, feeling for him that he just wanted to know that we were, like, financially secure enough, because I had left my job and, you know, like I have said, "We're not spending on this right now 'cause we don't have as much money coming in, and we're trying to be thoughtful."
• 48:27
  Sure. And like, without me realizing it, like, he was feeling sort of insecure.
• 48:31
  So these days I try to, like, respond to a question with a question, which is hard, and you have to pause and remind yourself, not be like, "What is this insane question you're asking?" Mm-hmm.
• 48:40
  And it's funny for me because so much of the point of the work that I do is, like, encouraging people to talk about money, but then when your kid starts asking questions, you're like, "I don't really wanna answer that."I really wanna share with you But they're sharing your stuff and, like, kind of giving them a general context for it.
• 48:55
  Yeah. And then there's contextualizing just the world a little bit. The world. If you're checking out at groceries or the bodega or whatever, like, you don't have to
• 49:04
  specifically talk about what's in your 401[k]- Right... if they see the register and see, okay, that's $35 for these things, and now that's a little more than it used to be. And I don't know.
• 49:13
  Ag- again, like, trying to position that. Just honestly, part of it is just 'cause it truly, among everything, like, we've now entered, as we teamed it last week, escape velocity.
• 49:24
  Like, they feel like they're getting older quicker, and I'm like- Yeah... "Oh, we gotta start doing a little bit of this," you know, beyond allowance and more just educational on how things go. This is why you need it.
• 49:35
  Yeah, I don't know. I'm curious. It's a lot. You know, that's a whole other phase of questions. We have... It's not fair for us, I'll just say, we have it... I'm kind of being facetious, but, like, when our parents...
• 49:47
  I feel like money hadn't changed in generations, like, when our parents were kids and when they had us, like, cash is cash. And I remember learning how to write a check in high school.
• 49:55
  I remember my mom used to pay for her groceries with checks. Sure. Yeah. And I wonder if my kids will ever learn how to write a check. Like, then there's the internet, there's buying things online.
• 50:05
  I don't think debit cards were even a thing, actually, when we were kids. No. And then crypto, forget it.
• 50:09
  And then, I mean, my son was rolling his eyes at me last night 'cause we were watching the baseball game, and I said, "Please don't ever use your phone," which he doesn't even have one yet, to gamble.
• 50:18
  And he was like- Oh... "Why are you talking like this?" You know. Nothing makes me happier than your drive-by. [laughs] Like, yelling at them. It makes me so happy. But they're like, "Guess what?
• 50:26
  You ruined this now too." Yeah, exactly. Should we talk about fentanyl? There was this commercial. Right.
• 50:31
  [laughs] There's this other commercial about, like, playing the Illinois Lotto on the phone, and it just, it drives me crazy. But, like, I feel completely unequipped to talk to them about that. And I mean- Yeah...
• 50:40
  the only money conversation that we had yesterday was that I treated myself this week to trying to make myself eat healthier, and I d- bought some raspberries.
• 50:49
  And which I probably already shouldn't have done, like, guilt trip number one. But my son was rinsing out the citrus squeezer, and I was like, "What were you doing with that?"
• 50:59
  And he told me he took one of my raspberries and squeezed it in the orange squeezer to try to make raspberry juice. And I was like, "Okay, just so you know, that was $5, like, that container of raspberries."
• 51:09
  And he's like, "You bought three of those." I was like, "That's $15 worth of raspberries. I know," you know.
• 51:13
  And I think for the first time he kind of thought about groceries, and again, that was on me for buying a very extravagant grocery. But yeah, don't play with my food and...
• 51:23
  But in his defense, apparently he ate the squished raspberry, so all's well that ends well, but... Do you remember when your kids would put their hands in your water, and you would just feel this sense of dying inside?
• 51:33
  [laughs] 'Cause you're like, "You couldn't pay me any amount of money to drink that water now. Why did you do that?" Yeah.
• 51:39
  Yeah, I bought a book when my kids were younger called, like, How to Make Your Kids a Money Genius Even If You're Not. Do you know her? Lindsey Beth Kubler, I think is her name. I, or- Or Kubler.
• 51:48
  I know of her, and I've had friends who've worked with her, but I've never met her. And I... She had a lot of great ideas, especially for- Yes, she did...
• 51:54
  littler kids, like, about talking to your kid ahead of time about how we're gonna go in the store, we're not buying something for you, and practicing- Yeah... the difficulty of saying no to buying things.
• 52:04
  But I was like, I promised myself, I'm like, with every stage, I'm gonna review this book and refresh myself with what my kids need to know. And that goal went out the window, 'cause I...
• 52:12
  Who has time to remember to return to a book that you bought 10 years ago? Yeah. But also, it's kind of outdated already, you know. And the book only- Yeah...
• 52:20
  concerns, it only imagines that you have nothing else to think about besides talking to your kid about money, let alone, you know, all of these other things.
• 52:28
  Let's say your kid at school, they're like, "If your kid brings in $2 tomorrow, they can get a popsicle," 'cause they're raising money for whatever bullshit thing, you know. And j- Yeah...
• 52:36
  you are like, "Well, first of all, do I have $2? And do they need a popsicle? But also, I guess this is fundraising." You know, it all goes out the window. Yeah. And so, you know- Yeah...
• 52:46
  I think the thing that I think about is trying to talk to them about generational wealth, you know.
• 52:50
  Because my parents help out a lot, you know, and it's not just the finances, but then the cultural decisions, for instance. Right.
• 52:56
  I don't believe w- our kids would w- necessarily be as into Catholic school, perhaps, if my parents were not, you know, had input and ways to support that. But I don't know.
• 53:07
  You then, you risk, run the risk of telling your kids, like, "Well, my grandparents are actually in charge," or, "My grandparents are rich," or, you know, something like that, and that's not easy- Yeah... to apply.
• 53:16
  Do you know anyone, aside from yourself, obviously, who seems like they have found some kind of philosophy that works?
• 53:22
  Or are we all just making it up as we go along, and it's pointless to hope to have a kid who'll be a financial genius? I think most people are making it up as they go along. That makes me feel better.
• 53:32
  I mean, it's sometimes just, like, parenting in general. Clearly. Have you listened to the other episodes of this show? [laughs] It's a train wreck. I'm, like, a laissez-faire parent.
• 53:41
  I don't read the books, and I don't do as much research as maybe I'm supposed to. And, like, I kind of wait until there's, like, a crisis to be like, "Oh- Perfect... I should probably see how other people handle this."
• 53:54
  I mean, that's what Reddit's for. Yeah. We're increasingly, again, like, the system we set up, it became too much, moved to this one. You know, we do a fair amount of
• 54:05
  giving, not just the children's donating, but my wife and I do, and, and they're not aware of a lot of that. But we're trying to kinda, I guess, hit these, like, fundamental...
• 54:17
  Again, like, everything, like you said, cash is out. Now your kids are gonna want their own meme coin. Like, all this different shit. There's certain things, right, that aren't gonna change.
• 54:26
  Just, you know, a lot of my job is not necessarily about the new climate tech, it's like why people keep making the same decisions for 10,000 years. Like, how interest works isn't gonna change, right? Yeah.
• 54:37
  Literally how it's calculated, you know. So when they see a commercial that says, like, "Switch to this bank," or whatever, "You get 4%," it's like you're gonna understand how that works, right?
• 54:46
  In Greenlight you can actually offer, this is not a commercial, like, you can set, like, parent interest, right? And you can say- Yeah... "They get this much for keeping it in save." And I told them that.
• 54:54
  I said-I know you're annoyed, like what is the saving for? And I'm like, "You don't know yet, but the longer you keep it in there, we'll give you," whatever. I think, I don't know what we said, 5%, 10%, whatever.
• 55:04
  You know, then you get it once a month. Yeah. And it's automatic. I'm like, "Look, you did that." That is something that's not going anywhere. Giving is- Yeah, that's not changing... not going in there.
• 55:12
  You know, again, vis-a-vis my work, 'cause they understand a little more, like we've tried to talk about the decisions that have been made on the macro level with things like USAID and stuff like that, and go, "That's not just money in a vacuum.
• 55:21
  That's people's lives, and we're gonna think about like how can we help that, because this is how much it costs."
• 55:26
  The most effective NGO on the entire planet is called Against Malaria, and they have it down to a science how much it costs to save a life with a treated bed net.
• 55:35
  And I'm like, "Guys, this is, of your allowance, that is what you could do. That is what people do. And when you scale it up, this is this." So
• 55:42
  we're really trying to just look at those basics as much as we can and do those things.
• 55:46
  It's, you know, all the crazy shit about moving it around online [laughs] and all that stuff and, I don't know, it's just gonna change by the time I get a handle on it, like you said- Yeah... looking out after.
• 55:56
  But I feel like there's some fundamentals of, you know, how it can be useful. Will the IRS exist tomorrow? Probably not. But, you know, th- I feel like that's what we have bandwidth for.
• 56:07
  Claire, I feel like I'm kinda like you, and I do those like drive-by parenting. There's this thing happening in the moment with gambling online, and I'm just like- Mm-hmm... "Don't do that." Mm-hmm. And I do.
• 56:18
  I kinda believe it sticks, even though I sometimes feel like a Peanuts grown-up. You know, like- [laughs]... "Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah," right?
• 56:25
  Every once in a while he'll come back and he'll say it, something I've said, and I'm like, "Oh, you were listening." So. Yeah. We've started this new thing where we let our children mock us.
• 56:33
  We'll take a minute at the dinner table and be like, "Okay, impersonate someone at this table." [laughs] And holy shit, it's, you better be ready. [laughs] But they fuck with my wife so hard.
• 56:42
  Y- her favorite thing now, again, the drive-by thing. I guess, she doesn't start it this way every time, but they were like, "Oh, who am I? Who am I?" I go, "Studies show this plastic water bottle's terrible for you."
• 56:51
  [laughs] And she's like, "Motherfucker" And they're like, "That's all you say, is, 'We're just trying to have a good time.'" And you're just like, "That peanut butter will kill you." And they're like- [laughs]...
• 56:58
  "Never mind" Lindsey, I don't know if you saw, I presume you saw a couple months ago, Emily Gould did another piece in The Cut about FOMO in New York, about- Yeah... she brings her kids around some like- Yeah...
• 57:09
  crazy wealth. And I'm curious what the scene is for you, and if there's been anything that your son has seen that you're like, "Holy shit," like, "He needs to know that." I'm, like super lucky.
• 57:18
  We live in not a fancy neighborhood, and he goes to not a fancy school. And I, like, have purposely picked out friends who all seem to have similar income.
• 57:29
  The big thing is that we have a few friends with houses, and even in Brooklyn, and we do not. And so every once in a while he'll be like, "I wish," you know,
• 57:39
  "My friend has a upstairs and a backyard, and his house is more fun for sleepovers." Well, that's fine. I get to go to the movies- It's great for them... when you go to a sleepover, so- Yeah...
• 57:48
  bringing things and things for me. Yes. Everybody wins. Yeah. But yeah, I thought that article was really interesting. Part of me was like, "You should just move," which is- Mm... rude.
• 57:59
  And I really like Emily's work a lot, so I don't wanna be, like, so dismissive, but.
• 58:05
  I did have some friends whose kids go to school in, like, proper Park Slope, and she was like, "Man, these parents, they, like, they're too cool."
• 58:13
  I think Emily's piece is sometimes be- serve as like the opposite of a commercial for raising a family in New York. Yeah. In Manhattan. Yes. Where you're like, "Oh, my God." No, I like it.
• 58:23
  I mean, at least our kids go to school, they used to go to school that was more economically mixed, and- Mm-hmm... the downside is that their current school is not, but I think it's good.
• 58:31
  It makes me happy when they notice kids have more than they do, 'cause I'm like, "What are you lacking?" And explain our philosophy.
• 58:37
  Like, my son was like, "A lot of my kids, a lot of my friends are going skiing for break." And I'm like, "Yeah, I used to go skiing when I was a kid."
• 58:43
  And I was like, "And it's really expensive, and I don't feel like dealing with you, you know? And it's fun, and I'm glad your friends are having fun, but this is why we don't do it," you know?
• 58:51
  And so I'm thankful for these fancy parents. [laughs] And it could be so much worse. I have a friend whose son is jealous, and they go to a different school.
• 58:58
  He, and he's embarrassed because they don't have an indoor basketball court in their house, which is- Oh, God... I guess a thing a lot of his friends have at his school. Wow.
• 59:06
  Yeah, so, you know, our kids embarrassingly- What?... have a, they have a, my husband bought them a basketball hoop for the b- our driveway, not to flex, but we do have a driveway. Oh.
• 59:15
  And that hoop was one of the best mileage per buck gifts we could ever have. And- I bet it is. But yeah, they do have to wait for it to not rain to use it. That is the- Yeah... you know, the old-fashioned downside to it.
• 59:26
  Oh, that's really hard. I grew up at a school like that, like, with kids who were really wealthy. Like, I remember one kid went up in his dad's private plane for his, like, science fair experiment. [laughs] Okay.
• 59:38
  Quinn, what do your kids have FOMO about? I mean, on a day-to-day basis, you know that I'm around at all, and that it's not just their mom in charge, because she's more fun. I think that's it. Oh.
• 59:51
  Their fear of missing out of not having me. [laughs] No, it's a hard one. So Lindsey, when my kids were born in LA, and we were there for just about first full eight years of my oldest's life. Mm.
• 1:00:04
  And then we came back for COVID, stayed here for a couple years, did remote school. Decided we were gonna move here. We're, so our cheat code, Lindsey, is we have two grandmas down the street. We made it that way.
• 1:00:16
  That was the biggest reason for doing it. They weren't both here. My mom was here. We got my wife's mom to move here. Anyways, we moved, and, you know, I think we were just...
• 1:00:24
  And look, we've got wonderful friends still back in Los Angeles. I was there for 15 years. My wife was there for 25 years. I'm glad that they are not exposed to a lot of the trappings there.
• 1:00:36
  Again, arguably the most diverse place on the planet. It's incredible. The food, the arts, it's incredible. It's incredible. You can't trade that. So we really do, we do try to take them back.
• 1:00:45
  We try to go to DC, all these different things, expose them to things that we took them out of. But on a day-to-day basis, it just
• 1:00:54
  felt like to me, not even as a 10-year-old or a 12-year-old, that-It's hard to miss some of that stuff. I think the short answer is I feel like I've beat so much of that out of them at this point, metaphorically.
• 1:01:07
  Just saying, like, all we say is, "Sorry, we don't do it that way," whether it's phones or money or trips or whatever it might be. We'll, we'll do them, and we make it clear, this is a lot, this is what it's gonna be.
• 1:01:18
  Mom and Dad worked really hard for this. But that day-to-day stuff, I don't know. This is a long, rambling answer to...
• 1:01:24
  I'd be curious what they feel FOMO about at this point, because we kind of took them out of that, and because, you know, we've just tried to make a really clear, probably very frustrating to them at times, line of what we're doing and what we're not.
• 1:01:39
  So I don't know. It's a really good question. I'll ask them. I'll report back. They'll tell me. That line about, you know, that's what our family does, not what other families do. That's what their family does.
• 1:01:49
  That's not what we do. It's... I don't know. It's a line I'm gonna die on. Yeah. And I feel like it's definitely my version of because I said so, in some ways. But I'm also like, that is the deal.
• 1:02:00
  So Lindsay, we put in a landline phone. It is pink. It is wired to the fucking wall. And we put a chair there, and we said, "You can make a phone book of all your aunts' and uncles' phone numbers, your friends.
• 1:02:08
  They can call you whenever you want. You can call them." They literally will get on the phone, call my mom next door, and just talk shit about me, and I'm like, "Great. Don't care." But I'm like, "That's it.
• 1:02:18
  I told you we're not getting a phone," and like- Yeah... Mom and I, like we don't...
• 1:02:22
  Well, when we say things, like at some point, I, again, and this is what I mean, like I think at this point they're like, "Oh, they were telling the truth." Like they're- Yeah...
• 1:02:28
  actually not gonna move on some of this shit. Do their friends have phones? I'm scared of the phone thing. A lot of friends have phones.
• 1:02:34
  We're really trying to be the house that their friends wanna come to, but we're also trying to be the house that when their friends come over, we're like, "Dump the screens in the bowls, kids." Like, we're not doing it.
• 1:02:44
  And sometimes they're annoyed, and then they kind of forget about them for a little bit- Yeah... which is nice. But yeah, a lot of them do, which is frustrating.
• 1:02:52
  I have a new plan, which all, my son shot it down immediately, but I was like, I wish there was a course that, where you give a kid a phone, and there's a course that shows them how to use their phone, but also like phone safety.
• 1:03:03
  I mean, I don't know how to use my phone, you know- Yeah... to all its capability. I don't want to, honestly. But I also am not equipped to teach my kid how to use a phone.
• 1:03:10
  And I was thinking about this like out loud, and my kid was like, "I would not do that. I would be mortified to do something like that."
• 1:03:16
  And I have faith that the almighty iPhone designers have done this to make people catch up really quickly. That's how they designed it.
• 1:03:23
  But I do wish there was like some, you know, like a driver's test, but for your phone. And- Yeah... also, you know. Yeah. I like that idea. But he did not like that idea.
• 1:03:32
  I remember when I was a kid, getting kind of blindsided by these, these moments that seemed to be sort of arbitrary, like explosions of, at me for my ingratitude or selfishness, and I could never quite tell what caused it.
• 1:03:45
  And, but now as a parent, I feel that, and I appreciate that. Yeah. And I think it is your right.
• 1:03:51
  Like for instance, I ordered my kid two pairs of shoes online the other day, 'cause he, it was a thing at church and school, and they needed nice shoes, and I was like all stressed out about it.
• 1:04:00
  And he doesn't know like how much I spent on these shoes, which probably rounded up to $200 including the shipping, and how much he benefits from me just ordering his shoes and guessing his size online, and not dragging his ass to the store to measure his feet and do the whole shebang.
• 1:04:17
  And, and he is not currently in trouble. Like I'm not mad at him for anything.
• 1:04:21
  But I reserve the right to get mad at him later on and be like, "You got two new pairs of shoes and you don't even know, and you don't even realize," you know. And I'm not doing it on purpose, but...
• 1:04:31
  We're trying really hard, and I do a terrible job in the moment, and h- honestly, I wrestle with this all the time, of helping them, of empathizing with them. And I mean, we love therapy.
• 1:04:40
  We got a family full of mental health therapists, like all this different stuff. Like it's hard being a kid. Of explaining, "Hey guys, like many things can be true at once. Many feelings can be true at once." Yeah.
• 1:04:48
  "You can feel all those. Like I'm sure you are grateful for what we're doing right now, but you also do want the next thing that you could have had-" Yeah. "... or that your friends are staying around to do this."
• 1:04:59
  And then I'll ruin it by being like, "Just be grateful. We're going home." And it's, can you just do the thing, you know, acknowledge it. But- Yeah... I don't know.
• 1:05:07
  So again, I don't know if they've learned the lesson or they just have given up on a lot of that stuff. Yeah. No, somewhere in between all of that, I would say. Lindsay, do you like go off on your kid?
• 1:05:17
  And does he ever try to mansplain- Yeah. Doesn't everybody go off on their kid? Yes. Well, like does he try to mansplain money and savings and value to you, and then you're like, "This is my goddamn job.
• 1:05:25
  Like I have thousands of people who like look to me as an expert," and does that go over well? Is he, is he like, "Oh, mother." No. I... [laughs] No. I'm sure he will.
• 1:05:34
  I feel like maybe he's a little too small to, too young to be mansplaining. But he does mansplain plenty of things. And you know, they think they're so smart. Yeah. Like there's nobody smarter than he is.
• 1:05:44
  The big fight we've been over, and that I've lost and I'm not happy about, was Roblox, whether or not he was allowed to get an account and all of that. Well, you know, that's okay. It's good to know.
• 1:05:57
  You get to let your kid bully you a little bit sometimes. Like again, you can get it back at him, you know, for when... Or- Yes... you can leverage that Roblox when you have to. You know, you can take it away.
• 1:06:06
  Yes, right. Like that means other things he doesn't get, right? Something like that. There was like a New York Times or something article recently. It was like, taking away things your kids love isn't the way to do it.
• 1:06:16
  And I was like, clearly, no. But sorry. What else have you got? Now, I remember interviewing a guy once who talked about how timeouts were a form of emotional abuse, you know. Mm-hmm.
• 1:06:28
  And I was like, well, what have you got? What can you do? Are you talking to a three-year-old and like really trying to explain to him, you know?
• 1:06:34
  And that was one of my first times being like, maybe experts don't always know what's best for me. They, they don't. What works for your family might not work for my family. Lindsay, what are you like monitoring?
• 1:06:46
  What are people bringing to you or asking you, or what's coming up, do you feel is, I don't wanna say a trend, but things that you've been noticing that people are more concerned about with regards to teaching their kids about financial literacy, or like how they're preparing for their kids' futures?
• 1:06:59
  I don't know if there's anything, like new catchphrases or...Or also, because we cover this as well, it's just like purely just the parenting side, like any specific p- parenting financial stuff that's coming up and trendy.
• 1:07:11
  I think the struggle with all of it is always like how do you know what's, what's age appropriate, and then how do you not dump your baggage on them? Yeah.
• 1:07:18
  Like- I can only imagine, especially I'm imagining g- like girls, I mean, not only girls, but like girls who are on TikTok and like doing the beauty things and things like that. The beauty thing is so crazy. Yeah.
• 1:07:30
  We have a friend who has a 10-year-old daughter, and m- my friend is not into beauty products at all, and her daughter is obsessed. I mean, talk about like controlling what your kid spends money on.
• 1:07:42
  It's like you do not need Drunk Elephant. I do not buy a Drunk El- like, you know, it's just like shopping at Sephora. It's wild. So I- Yeah... I don't know, I feel a little spoiled that I have a
• 1:07:52
  boy, and like the big fight we're having is over Roblox. I'd rather... I'll take that over, you know, what to buy at Sephora any day. Yeah.
• 1:08:00
  Like not, my kids are not buying things to make themselves look prettier or nicer or cooler. No. You know, may- maybe I wouldn't even mind if they did a tiny bit, to be honest, but...
• 1:08:09
  Funny, I was on vacation, and this kid, this little boy, he must've been five or six, was in the pool with his mom, and he was explaining to her how he needed this particular Nike sweatshirt, and she was like, "But you already have a Nike sweatshirt."
• 1:08:20
  And he was like, "No, that Nike sweatshirt has a hood, and this one is gray-" Mm-hmm. "... and it's crew neck."
• 1:08:24
  And I was like, who is this small little boy, which, like, not to be all gendered, but truly he's like a small fashion, you know, shopaholic. It was adorable, but also I was like, man, I'm glad I'm not a product.
• 1:08:37
  The way- Yeah... my dad would've handled that, I mean, I can't even imagine. It almost probably would've been like quiet, just like stonewalled. What are you talk- I mean, I think I've told Claire this story.
• 1:08:50
  When I was like 14, 13, 14, it was either not a lot of money, we were good, or, uh, you know, we were, it was tight. And my dad was a part owner of this seafood restaurant downtown. It's 100 yards from here.
• 1:09:03
  And I remember 13, 14, and if we needed something for school or extracurriculars, like needed, qual- qualified needed, they helped us with that. If we wanted something, whole different ballgame. And I remember- Yeah...
• 1:09:18
  so specifically being like, "Listen, parents, here's the deal. These Ken Griffey Jr. cleats are, they're it. They are..." What was the word we all used? "They're phat," P-H-A-T. Wow. Like this, this was it.
• 1:09:32
  High top, the jam. And they were like, "That's so great. Get on your fucking bike, and I just called. You can go wash dishes. Best wishes."
• 1:09:40
  Like, "You're gonna make," whatever it was, "$4 an hour," or something like that. And I remember- Yeah... earning those cleats. But that was it.
• 1:09:46
  I can't imagine like complaining in the pool that I wanted a different Nike sweatshirt. The needs and wants thing is really important, and I feel like my kid's still too small, but we're getting there.
• 1:09:58
  Random, not really so much about the, th- giving your kids money, but the, in the pursuit of spending money to take care of our kids, I'm just curious where you live, what is the going rate for a babysitter these days?
• 1:10:09
  Well, I spend a lot 'cause I like my babysitter, but she's $25 an hour. Oh, wow, okay. All right, interesting. Yeah. And she, is she an adult, or is she a school age person? Yeah.
• 1:10:19
  She hi- she was his twos program teacher, so like- Interesting... I learned that pretty early on in Brooklyn. Find the daycare teachers and preschool teachers and hire them. Yeah.
• 1:10:32
  And she actually does stuff with him, and I've learned that I like to have her come early and come home early because then she, like, gets out of the house and has to actually earn that $25 an hour, and is not,
• 1:10:47
  you know, sitting on my couch on her computer.
• 1:10:51
  We have this other babysitter that requires that we send home in a car because she lives so far away, but Ubers have gotten so expensive in New York that it's like an additional like $60, and I'm like, I just- Geez...
• 1:11:02
  I can't hire you. I can't hire you anymore. Yeah. I think she's only 20 bucks an hour, but still the maths doesn't math.
• 1:11:09
  Quinn, I, how about, I know you guys have grandparents around, and your kids are a little bit older, so I don't know how much you're hiring babysitters, but if you do, like, what's the rate?
• 1:11:16
  Yeah, so we don't really that much. We're so lucky with that. And also we really, one, for reasons I kind of described earlier, we don't really have too much of a nighttime social life.
• 1:11:25
  We don't do a lot, which is mostly fine by me. I'm regular tired and an introvert. This is my social interaction for the week.
• 1:11:32
  But we also, two, drag all the kids everywhere, and we tell them all the time, "Your guys are gonna get busy enough. You won't be able to go to each other's shit, so we're doing it."
• 1:11:41
  And then three, yes, we got the grandmas. But we were extremely privileged, lucky, however you wanna put it.
• 1:11:48
  We had the kids when we were in Los Angeles, and then part of the time when they were here, 'cause she came here, we, the kids had the same nanny, daytime nanny, one of the greatest people alive.
• 1:11:59
  She's now in her mid-50s, late 50s, from the time my oldest was three months old until about a year ago. And we both worked full time, and it was
• 1:12:11
  otherwise impossible, and it made affording to live in Los Angeles extremely difficult. But either one of us wouldn't... Uh, it's the trade-off that everyone in America is making right now. Yeah.
• 1:12:22
  Whether it's a nanny, which very few people can have, or childcare, which also very few fucking people can have right now, which is do you stay home with the kid and not make the money, or do you make the money and the entire paycheck goes to a version of childcare?
• 1:12:37
  Keeping in mind, those childcare personnel are also underpaid, which is why they're hiring themselves out as babysitters after a day with three-year-olds, which is, the whole thing makes flames come out of my face.
• 1:12:48
  But we were very lucky, and we chose a number of times to raise her pay, one, 'cause she deserved it, and she was, same thing.
• 1:12:56
  I mean, not a phone in sight, always going somewhere, always doing something, always active, always, you know, music and, uh, all that different stuff, and we were very lucky in that respect.
• 1:13:07
  Gladly and definitely did, like at times go, "Well, we're not paying for this thing 'cause we can'tLet her go on that front. But now they're definitely old enough that they can, again, bounce around to the grandmas.
• 1:13:19
  They're in an easier place to live. They, you know, most of their childcare is literally just driving them to stuff.
• 1:13:26
  And frankly, again, sentimental, and they don't wanna have conversations with me, I like to drive them places because I trap them in my car for 20 minutes with me to talk about things. So I'll just keep doing that.
• 1:13:37
  I don't want someone else to do that, and I'm lucky enough to be flexible to do it. So the answer is we used to pay a lot. We really did, and there's times that was very questionable if you just did the math.
• 1:13:49
  But if you factored everything else in, like we, we had to. I couldn't have imagined making a different choice.
• 1:13:54
  We had friends who, you know, where it sounds like, you know, you've got a couple babysitters you, you rely on and swear by.
• 1:14:01
  You know, they would become really dependent on some young 22-year-old who was great and full of energy, who didn't wanna be a babysitter or a nanny forever. And every six months- Yeah... they had to find someone new.
• 1:14:13
  Yep. And pros and cons to everything, certainly, but I was like, "I don't have time." And also, it's so competitive out there for anything. Yeah.
• 1:14:20
  I mean, I remember touring preschools and them being like, "Well, this is how we set them up for college." And I was like, "He's two." And they were like, "Well, you're not gonna get in anyways." And so- Mm-hmm...
• 1:14:30
  it was both the easiest decision for us to make, and a hard one at times. But I couldn't be more truly thankful for almost anything in our life than this person, so we paid a lot, and now we don't.
• 1:14:40
  And that's a little different, and it's 'cause of age and grandmas, but that's where we are. How much the going rate in Chicago, Claire? We only have one reliable w- lady that we use.
• 1:14:52
  We're verging on the s- edge of being able to leave them home alone- Yeah... depending on where we go. But there's- Yeah... a lady that they have a crush on. I think we all have a crush on her.
• 1:14:59
  Lady is not the right word. She's a high school student. She just is very composed, and so I referred to her as a lady. But she gets $15 an hour, and she drives herself, which is huge. Mm.
• 1:15:10
  She brings games, which is great, 'cause there are sitters who do, just do screens with them. And key is that she takes Venmo and Zelle, which is great, 'cause, like, you either- Dream...
• 1:15:20
  you end up doing, like, the 50% tip, which of course sitters deserve, but you're, you know, sometimes you just don't feel like making change.
• 1:15:26
  I have found myself, like, giving sitters, especially female sitters, a little pep talk, because you'll get, like, a young lady who will sit, and you're like, "What's your rate?" And they're like, "Oh, whatever."
• 1:15:37
  And I'm like, "No." That's my wife's biggest thing. She's like, "Well, guess what? Now we're gonna sit down for 20 minutes, and fucking- Yeah, exactly... I'm gonna make you fight for your money." Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
• 1:15:44
  Give them a rate, you know? And even if it's, like, aggressive- Yeah... say it, 'cause that means you deserve it. But yeah, it's kinda weird, 'cause my parents are like, "Are we fired as babysitters?"
• 1:15:52
  And you're like, "Yeah, kinda." Like, you asked too many times what time their bedtime is, and n- now you're fired. Yeah, it's getting nice to have them be a little bit older.
• 1:16:00
  And again, the no phone thing is its own thing. But yeah, we used to have these fun boy sitters who would come, and they would play hard with the boys, but also lacked the common sense.
• 1:16:10
  So I'd have to say things like, "Please make sure you throw away the Jimmy John's wrappers, like, when we come home," or, "Have the kids in bed when we come home," 'cause that really sucks- Yeah...
• 1:16:18
  to come home and pay a sitter, and then put them to bed. You're like, "You pay me now." Yeah. He [laughs] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, you, you, we dock your pay if he's not asleep when we come home. Yeah. Right?
• 1:16:29
  I mean, I think every day about how my life might be different if we had l- full-time childcare, 'cause, uh, we had the kids in daycare and then school, and then we never had a, like, a long-term nanny- Yeah...
• 1:16:39
  or babysitter. And
• 1:16:41
  another thing my kid did not wanna hear yesterday, 'cause my husband and I both work for ourselves, and we both are super slammed right now, and, like, taking our computer to the baseball game, and working after bedtime, and- Mm...
• 1:16:51
  you know, all this, like, boring, tedious stuff. And, and I told my kid, I was like, "Believe it or not, even though Dad and I complain about our work all the time, like, we have it the best case scenario.
• 1:17:00
  Like, we work from home, and we work for ourselves." And I'm like, "So just imagine," I was kind of trying to say, "Work sucks, just so you know." Yeah. "Like, no matter what happens, if you're earning money, it's hard."
• 1:17:10
  But he, you know, he's like, "I'm 12." Like, he's thinking about his own thing. Like, he didn't wanna hear that. [upbeat music] That's it for this week.
• 1:17:27
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• 1:17:39
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• 1:17:45
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• 1:17:54
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• 1:18:04
  [upbeat music]