It's Time for That Talk (About Money)
My 15-year-old daughter has mastered the multiplication tables and she's got a reasonable grip on the periodic table. But if it weren't for some coaching from her father, she wouldn't know a thing about the stock-market tables.
I find this a little frightening.
Got kids? Here's why you need to teach your children about money, plus a few thoughts on what you ought to tell them.
No Kidding
Both my parents are comfortably retired, enjoying a check every month from their company pensions. My retirement, unfortunately, won't be nearly so secure.
I don't have a traditional company pension and I fully expect Social Security to be cut back. That means my retirement dreams hinge on how I manage my savings, especially the money in my 401(k) plan. Still, I figure I have it easy compared with my two children. With job security waning and the possibility that Social Security will be privatized, my son and daughter will have to live with far greater financial uncertainty.
Indeed, to amass a decent-size retirement nest egg, they will need top-notch money-management skills. But will they have them?
Left alone, children's ideas about money tend to be molded by Wall Street advertising, Uncle Bob's wrongheaded ramblings, the financial media's relentless focus on short-term investment performance and almost everybody's obsession with instant gratification.
Save money? It is a virtue that almost nobody preaches. Invest wisely? If kids learn anything about the stock market in school, it is probably from one of those idiotic investment games, where the goal is to earn outrageously high short-run returns by taking absurd amounts of risk. In other words, kids head into the adult world with a view of saving and investing that pretty much guarantees they will fail financially.
Know Nothing
If you don't believe me, try talking to folks in their 20s. Odds are, they are saving little or no money and certainly nowhere near the 10% of income that experts typically recommend. In fact, they are likely carrying hefty credit-card balances costing obscene amounts of interest.
Meanwhile, if you ask about investing, these twentysomethings will often talk about beating the market and how you can achieve this with hard work, advice from hotshot brokers and insights from Wall Street's analysts and strategists. Chat a little longer, and the under-30 crowd will probably also tell you that stocks are pretty much guaranteed to deliver 10% a year, just like they have historically.
This unswerving belief in history spills over into their mutual-fund strategy. To find stock funds that will beat the market, they will no doubt offer the standard advice, which is to look for managers with dazzling track records.
But all this, of course, is garbage. Past mutual-fund performance means extraordinarily little. Over the long haul, very few investors -- professional or amateur -- manage to beat the market averages. Stocks aren't guaranteed to deliver 10% a year and, given current valuations, almost certainly won't.
In any case, investing isn't about beating the market or earning the highest possible return. Rather, the overriding goal is to amass enough money for your financial dreams, whether it's a new house, a comfortable retirement or a college education for the kids. And the best way to achieve these goals isn't necessarily with hard work and help from strategists, analysts and brokers.
The fact is, working hard at investing and listening to the experts is often counterproductive. The reason: There is a good chance you will rack up hefty investment expenses as you trade too much and bet on high-cost actively managed stock funds. Instead, if you really want to amass good money over time, your best bet is to sit quietly with a handful of low-expense funds, while simultaneously saving like crazy.
Knowing Better
But kids aren't going to learn this stuff from Wall Street advertising or from talking to their peers, and they probably won't learn it at school. That means it is up to you, the parents.
You have to teach your children how to manage money. But don't just waffle on about general investment principles. If you really want to get your children's attention, talk about your own finances, including both your successes and your failures.
Along the way, try to impart two key lessons. First, and most important, your children need to learn to delay gratification. We all assume that the wealthy are those who take lavish vacations and drive fancy cars. But in truth, spending money like this is the surest way not to get rich.
If your kids are going to accumulate a decent amount of wealth, they need to become prodigious savers, socking away 10% or 15% of every paycheck.
To save that sort of money, they may have to skip the lavish vacations and do without the fancy cars.
This, of course, is the lesson of that best-selling book, "The Millionaire Next Door." Often, America's millionaires are the quiet couples in the modest houses, frugally living beneath their means and socking away every spare dime.
Which brings us to the second lesson: Your children need to learn to take risk, but to take it prudently.
That means venturing beyond the safety of savings accounts and certificates of deposit. You want your kids to be comfortable with the stock and bond markets, so that as adults they will be ready to tap into the higher returns that these markets offer.
But you also need to teach your kids how to invest. You don't want your children to grow up to be speculators, making massive bets on individual stocks or on single market sectors. Instead, you should teach your children the importance of spreading their bets widely, so they improve their chances of earning decent long-run gains.
Seem reasonable?
My hunch is, your kids won't be the only beneficiaries of these family chats.
As you talk to your children about saving diligently and investing prudently, you will be forced to look harder at your own financial habits -- and you may find that you, too, have a little to learn.
教子女理财
我15岁的女儿已经熟练掌握了乘法运算表，对元素周期表也掌握的不错。但是，如果她的父亲没有给她一些教诲的话，她对'股市周期表'将一无所知。
我发现这有点令人感到惶恐不安。
你有孩子吗？以下是你需要教给孩子理财知识的原因，以及一些你应该传授给他们的观念。
我的父母都已经舒舒服服地退休了，每月享受著公司养老金提供的支票。但我的退休生活，很不幸，就不会这么有保障了。
我不享受传统的公司养老金，而且我笃信社会保障金(Social Security)也肯定会减少。这意味著我的退休生活取决于我怎样管理自己的储蓄，特别是401(k)退休金计划中的钱。我估计，和我的两个孩子相比，我的退休生活还是更轻松的。随著职业竞争压力的增大，加上社会保障金可能走向私有化，我的儿女将会面临更加不确定的财务处境。
的确，要想为退休生活积攒足够多的资金，下一代人需要一流的资金管理技巧。但他们能掌握这些技巧吗？
如果放任不管，孩子们对于理财的看法将会受到种种外部环境的影响，包括华尔街的广告、金融媒体对短期投资过份集中的报导以及人人对一夜暴富的痴迷等。
存钱？这已经是没有人再赞赏的美德了。理智地投资？即便下一代的人在学校里学了点关于股市的知识，他们所学也很可能仅来自于那些白痴般的投资游戏，其目的就是很荒唐地冒著巨大风险，去获取较高的短期收益。换句话说，孩子们踏入成人世界的时候，其对于储蓄和投资的认识却仅限于那些极有可能导致他们出现财务危机的东西。
如果你不相信我，不妨尝试一下与20多岁的年轻人聊天。你很可能了解到的结果是：他们很少或几乎不存钱，根本无从达到专家通常建议的10%的储蓄率。实际上，他们很可能正背负著巨额的信用卡亏空，需要支付大量的利息。
同时，如果你问有关投资的事情，这些20多岁的年轻人通常会大谈特谈如何跑赢大市，如何通过个人努力以及研究热门经纪商的建议和华尔街分析师及策略师的观点来达到跑赢大市的目标。再聊一会，这些不到30岁的年轻人很可能会告诉你，每年股票能够带来10%的回报率，正如历史上曾经出现的趋势一样。
这种对历史走势的迷信影响到他们的共同基金投资策略。为了能找到跑赢大市的股票基金，他们毫无疑问将遵循一个标准的建议，那就是：寻找历史记录优异的基金经理。
当然，所有这些都是胡扯。共同基金过去的表现如何对现在毫无意义。从长期来看，投资者中──不管是职业投资者还是业余投资者──能跑赢大市的人寥寥无几。股票不能保证每年10%的回报率。考虑到目前的市场状况，这几乎是痴人说梦。
事实上，投资并不是为了跑赢大市或者最大可能地赚取回报，相反，最重要的目的是积攒足够多的钱来实现自己的愿望，比如购买一座新房子、安逸的退休生活以及子女的大学教育等等。实现这些目标的最佳途径不一定与个人努力，或者策略师、分析师和经纪商的帮助相关。
实际情况是，在投资方面过于勤奋或者过于听信专家的意见通常是欲速而不达。原因在于：如果你交易太频繁，并且把希望寄托于高成本的交投活跃的股票基金上，你的累积投资成本很可能就会非常高。相反，如果你真想在一段时间内积攒大笔的钱，你最好的做法是：投资于一些低成本的基金，然后耐心等待，同时疯狂地存钱。
但是，孩子们将无法从华尔街的广告或者与同龄人的交谈中学习这些知识，他们很可能也无法在学校里学习这些。这就是说，他们得指望你──他们的父母。
你必须教会孩子如何管理钱财。但是，千万不要浪费唇舌，喋喋不休地大讲常见的投资理论。如果你真想引起孩子们的注意，你就和他们谈谈你自己的理财经验，包括你的成功与失败。
在这个过程中，试著告诉他们两条重要的经验：第一，也是最重要的一点，你的子女需要学会延缓自己的物欲追求。我们都认为富人是那些开名车、享受奢侈假日的人，但实际上，这样大手大脚地花钱绝对是最'不能变富'的途径。
如果你的孩子想积攒大笔的财富，他们需要变成疯狂的储蓄者，在每笔收入中节省下10%到15%。
为了存下钱，他们可能不得不放弃奢华假期，习惯没有名车的日子。
是的，这也是目前的畅销书《隔壁的百万富翁》(The Millionaire Next Door)中阐明的道理。一般说来，美国的百万富翁是那些默默地住在不显眼的房子中，过著量入为出的节俭生活和存下每一分余钱的人。
第二个教训是：你的孩子需要学会冒险，但要谨慎地冒险。
冒险意味著要在储蓄帐户和大额存单的安全界限以外去进行投资。你要让你的孩子在股市和债券市场上感到游刃有余，这样等到成年后，他们将能够为在这些市场上获得更高的回报做好准备。
同时，你也需要教自己的孩子如何投资。你不希望自己的孩子长大后成为投机者，在几只个股或者某一类股上孤注一掷。相反，你应该教给他们分散投资的重要性，这样，他们就有更大的机会获得可观的长期收益。
我的直觉是：你的孩子们决不是这类家庭谈话中唯一的受益者。
当你告诉自己的孩子要坚持不懈地存钱和谨慎地投资的时候，也会迫使你去审视自己的理财习惯──那么，你就会发现你也有些东西需要学习。
