Comment by graeme 4 days ago
If you start investing a small amount at age 17 you can build the habit and increase totals later.
Saying "I'll do it later when it is rational" often translates to "I won't do it (for a long time)". Which is not rational
"My mom taught me the same thing about giving."
care to share what you learn???
They mean don't wait till you're rich to start giving charity. Just give what you can when you can. Many people tell themselves they are great people because of all the money they'd give away just as soon as they are rich enough to do it but die without giving anything.
More or less: yup.
The great thing about saying "give 10%" is how well it scales.
Probably something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ayPuijerjQ tldr; have your kids split their money into three separate "jars": Spend (can be freely spent), Save (this jar generates interest from the money in it, they also have to wait some time to access the money if they want to spend them) and Give (for charity).
Yes. You can make it a 2% contribution at 17 then add another 2% each year, until you hit say 24% at 29 then keep it there.
Then the habit is set up and you just log in to whatever and up the number.
This is true of most money behaviors! My mom taught me the same thing about giving.
And even today, knowing way more about personal finance than I did at the start of my working life, I'm still amazed at how blocking out money in the budget astronomically increases your chances that that money actually goes to the thing you want.