A jar on the kitchen shelf and a passbook from the corner bank used to teach American children what every grown-up needed to know about money. We taught the next generation to borrow instead.
Saving for a Rainy Day Used to Be the First Lesson, Not the Last. |
A jar on the kitchen shelf and a passbook from the corner bank used to teach American children what every grown-up needed to know about money. We taught the next generation to borrow instead. |
|
|
News for the America we remember |
The first dollar I ever earned came from raking the leaves off Mr. Holloway's front yard one Saturday in October when I was nine years old. He paid me in four crisp quarters out of a leather coin purse. I ran the whole way home with the change jingling in my pocket. My mother met me at the door, took the quarters out of my hand, and walked me straight back out to the sidewalk. |
We walked four blocks to the First National Bank on the corner of Elm. She lifted me up so I could push the quarters across the counter to the lady in the cage, and the lady stamped a little blue passbook with the date and the amount. One dollar. My mother walked me back home with the passbook in my hand and told me that the money in there belonged to me, but I was not to touch it. It was for a rainy day. |
The Lesson Inside the Passbook
I did not understand what a rainy day was. I asked. My mother said it was the day when something broke and you didn't have the money to fix it. The day when you lost your job and you still had to feed your children. The day when a tire blew out on the way to work. She said you didn't know when the rainy day was coming, but it always came, and the people who lived well were the people who had been quietly putting quarters into a jar for years before it did. |
That little blue passbook taught me more about money in one afternoon than any class I ever took. |
|
|
|
|
|
He predicted Black Monday. |
He foresaw the fall of the Berlin Wall. |
He pinpointed the 2009 market bottom. |
Now Mark Skousen says another historic financial event may be approaching — tied to SpaceX. |
He’s sharing a free Pick for a limited time. |
Click here to learn more. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment