Talking about things like salaries, debt, spending, and saving is one of the last taboos. It used to be topics like politics, religion, and bedroom habits (in addition to money) were off limits in polite society. In the world we now inhabit, it seems like everyone is falling all over themselves to opine on politics, tell you about their faith journey, drone on about their medical procedures, or unashamedly share their outré sexual practices. But I have noticed that people are still reluctant to talk about money. I love to talk about money (not so much the other stuff, though), and I think people should do more of it.
Why are people so reluctant to talk about the one thing that everyone has in common? All of us are engaged in some sort of economic life – getting money, spending it, and hopefully growing it. Why the reluctance to talk about common challenges we all face? To be clear, money in the abstract is spoken about all the time. There are cable networks that have 24-hour programming devoted to financial news. Without fail, you will hear on any news broadcast what the stock market did that day, despite the fact that some 47% of Americans have no exposure to stocks in any form.
There’s no shortage of financial infotainment or descriptive statistics of financial markets. Much less common are frank discussions (sometimes even between spouses!) centered on questions like: “How much do you earn?” “How much debt do you have? “How much did you pay for your house/car/boat?” “How did you afford that?” “Do you have family money?” “Why don’t you earn more?”
In the United States, a far greater percentage of people consider themselves to be middle class than actually are. Perhaps our reluctance to talk about money is a way for us to preserve the illusion of a broadly middle class society. It enables people who earn multiples of the $78,000 median family income to be members of the same class as people who earn half the median family income. Frank discussions about money, with actual dollar figures cited, might shatter the illusion.
When I became a father, I thought a lot about how I would teach my son about money. I want him to understand it, and for him to have a healthy attitude about it. In order to achieve this, I think it’s necessary to dispel the aura of mystery that surrounds money in so many ways. When he is old enough, I want him to know exactly what our household income is and what our expenses are. I also want him to know how those figures compare with society as a whole. As he grows up, I want him to make responsible decisions about saving and spending, investing a debt. Doing that is hard if all you see is displays of wealth in the form of houses, cars, clothes, etc., but without the knowledge of what all those things really cost and where the money came from.