If you’re of my vintage, our childhoods may have been similar.  I well remember the days when I would hop on my bike to ride from out in the country into the nearby village of Petawawa, Ontario to play baseball.  My dad was a small business owner, and Mom worked at a food wholesaler, so they weren’t around to supervise and oversee my every move on those warm summer days; neither were they terribly concerned about my safety.  I was old enough and had proven myself responsible enough to make the trip solo.

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Now, as a parent of sons who are on the back end of their teenage years, I think back with some regret on how the world has changed.  The condition of our society has degraded dramatically and whether we want to admit it or not, fear is a much more influential motivator now.  We take very deliberate measures to ensure that our children are not exposed or left vulnerable to the many risks that exist in our world – real or perceived.

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While as parents we are conditioned to be vigilant toward the physical safety of our kids, how are we doing on the financial front?  Are we aware of the Financial Predators that intentionally target our children?  Consider this:  I’ve heard it said – and I think it’s true – that if we are the generation that grew up with a silver spoon in our mouths, the spoon we’ve given our children is platinum.  And while it satisfies our natural longing to provide a better life for our kids than we enjoyed, I fear the price they will pay down the road.  Studies continually suggest that the vehicle of our choosing as we take this family trip to greater affluence is called credit.

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I don’t know whether my parents even had a credit card when I was growing up, but I remember that as soon as I got to university, the on-campus bank branch presented an alluring invitation to sign up for my very own VISA card.  Arming me with my first credit card and a $500 spending limit, the credit industry claimed another willing victim of the “have it all and have it now” generation.  OK, $500 wouldn’t necessarily let me have it all and have it now, but for a university freshman in 1981 I felt I could get darn close!

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Fast-forward 30 years and the child/teen marketing machine is running with the efficiency of a well-oiled machine.  Our children – from the moment they have figured out how to turn on Saturday morning cartoons – are assaulted with marketing messages that have successfully convinced them that owning a ________ (you can fill in the blank… I know you can!) is an absolute necessity and, well, life just isn’t worth living without one.  Fashion and technology lead the way (IMO) in cementing the entitlement mindset, but even as adults we face unrelenting bombardment.  Think of how often the marketing messages include the phrase, “… that you deserve!”  Whether it’s the car, house, furnishings, physique, hair, home theatre system… again, you can pretty well fill in the blank with anything and we’ve heard it.

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[quote]Lifestyle is the greatest competition to financial freedom.[/quote]
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Back to my point:  our next generation is being positioned for a life of enslavement (or at least indentured servitude) to the credit culture… working today to earn money to fund yesterday’s lifestyle.  As a financial planner, I’m occasionally asked to identify my greatest competition.  While the expected answer is some bank or financial planning firm, the real answer is lifestyle… lifestyle is the greatest competition that financial advisors face as they try to help clients navigate toward their future goals.

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In his book, Money Assassins, author and financial advisor Chad Viminitz pulls back the curtain on our current economic systems that “have worked hard to destroy the art of saving, have tarnished the pearls of financial wisdom and have made good financial sense a relic of the past.”  This book is a very worthwhile read.  I’ve presented it as a gift to a number of my clients, particularly those with children who have shown an appetite for establishing within them sound financial principles.  Check it out at http://www.moneyassassins.com/

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So, what’s the action step to avoid this calamity for our future generations?  I think it starts with us as parents.  My wife and I have discovered the power in saying “no” to ourselves.  As we model financial decision-making, and our sons see us considering a possible purchase and weighing out what we will have to do without in order to finance this new gadget, it eventually sinks in that money is not an infinite resource and saying “yes” in one situation may force us to say “no” in another.  A simple concept, but not easy… I hate saying no to myself!

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Try this approach if you think it would be helpful:  treat your paycheque as though there is a war being waged to take possession of it.  Marketers want you to give it (and more!) to them; your “future self” will be grateful each time you decide to take a dollar out of play for today, and pass it forward to yourself in the future.  The value of this transferrable discipline is immeasurable in protecting yourself and the ones you love from the Financial Predators!
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