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The
Ultimate Return on Your Childrens Investment.
The ultimate return on your investment. I have seen repeatedly the
breakdown of the cost of raising a child, but this is the first
time I have seen the rewards listed this way.
The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from
birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a
middle income family. Talk about sticker shock! That doesn't even
touch college tuition. For those with kids, that
figure leads to wild fantasies about all the money we could have
banked if not for (insert your child's name here). For
others, that number might confirm the decision to remain
childless.
But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down. It translates into
$8,896.66 a year, $741.38 a month, or $171.08 a week.
That's a mere $24.44 a day! Just over a dollar an hour. Still, you
might think the best financial advice says don't have
children if you want to be "rich." It is just the opposite.
What do your get
for your $160,140?
* Naming rights. First, middle, and last!
* Glimpses of God every day.
* Giggles under the covers every night.
* More love than your heart can hold.
* Butterfly kisses
and Velcro hugs.
* Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm cookies.
* A hand to hold, usually covered with jam.
* A partner for blowing bubbles, flying kites, building sand
castles, and skipping down the sidewalk in the pouring rain.
* Someone to laugh yourself silly with no matter what the boss said
or how your stocks performed that day.
* Seeing the light go on when they finally "get" multiplication,how
to balance on a two wheeler, and that Santa *is not* the True meaning
of Christmas.
For $160,140, you never have to grow up. You get to
finger-paint, carve pumpkins, play hide-and-seek, catch
lightning bugs, and never stop believing in miracles.
You have an excuse to keep reading the Adventures of Piglet and Pooh,
watching Saturday morning cartoons, going to Disney movies, and wishing
on stars. You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under refrigerator
magnets and collect spray painted noodle wreaths for
Christmas, hand prints set in clay for Mother's Day, and cards with
backward letters for Father's Day.
For $160,140, there is no greater bang for your buck. You get to be
a hero just for retrieving a Frisbee off the garage
roof, taking the training wheels off the bike, removing a
splinter, filling the wading pool, coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs,
and coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated
to icecream regardless.
You get a front row seat to history to witness the first step,
first word, first tooth, first date, first prayer, and first time behind
thewheel.
You get to be immortal. You get another branch added to your family
tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called
grandchildren.
You get education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice,
communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.
In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there with God. You
have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the
monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party,
ground them forever, and love them without
limits, so one day they will, like you, love without counting
the cost.
Author Unknown
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