The WSJ Health blog reports that Johnson & Johnson's Vistakon division thinks the best way to increase sales is to decrease the age, from 15 to 8, as the time kids should start wearing contacts. A J&J sponsored study says it's safe, and that kids can better enjoy sports and have improved self-esteem, but an ophthalmologist expressed concern that somewhere in between the frog-catching and BB guns (you'll poke your eye out!) there's a real risk of infection. What do you think?
Latest by n/a: First, the lasik issue is because they won't do the surgery if your prescription is still changing. At 23, I STILL can't be considered because my eyes are still getting worse. Not because I'm not old enough to take care more »
CNN asks some money experts for tips on how to teach kids about personal finance. Laura Levine, the executive director of Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy, says she uses a special piggy bank for her 3-year-old son—it has four chambers, "one for saving, one for spending, one for donating and one for investing," and helps teach him that money is not just for "one thing."
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Unusual Ways To Teach Kids About Money
It seems like there are a million different ways to teach kids about money. And of all the ideas available, Wall Street Journal personal finance writer Jonathan Clements often has some good, albeit unexpected thoughts:
Here's a question where money meets ethics: should kids be paid for good results in school? No, we're not talking about parents dishing out the occasional $5 or $10 bill to junior for getting an "A". Instead, there's a new sheriff in town. Now schools and teachers are doing the giving and are handing out much more than most moms and dads. The details:
The fourth graders squirmed in their seats, waiting for their prizes. In a few minutes, they would learn how much money they had earned for their scores on recent reading and math exams. Some would receive nearly $50 for acing the standardized tests, a small fortune for many at this school, P.S. 188 on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
And it's not only the kids making money off the scores...
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Latest by n/a: The time has come to look our entire educational model. The problem is that there are no immediate consequences for doing poorly. Teachers do not want to flunk children and schools do not want to keep children back a grade more »
Here's a perfect example of the power of the written word in advertising: Jane Hambleton's splashy classified ad to sell her son's car worked so well that now everyone knows she caught him with liquor in his car and sold it as punishment.
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In the list of most popular regrets, the "if only my parents had taught me that" one usually ranks pretty high, which is why we're glad to have found this post titled "How to talk to your teenager about personal finance." It offers ten steps to help you pass along the basics of investing and saving, so your kid's better prepared for the decades to come. More »
Keeping up with the Jones may seem hard, but here's an easy way to be better than 73 % of rich parents: talk to your kids about money. A survey by PNC Wealth Management found that only 27% wealthy parents had discussed family budget with their children.
So the CPSC is always recalling all sorts of crap, like the surprising candles which could lead to fire, or the snowboards which could lead to falling, but as a concerned parent, all you care about is the toys. The freakin' toys. The ones with the lead and the chokey parts. Well, even though their website coder probably doubles as the meatloaf server at lunchtime, they've got a catchall page that is your go-to spot for all the toy hazard related recalls. Just memorize the simple URL: http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/category/toy.html.
This company shows off the tools parents can use to spy on their children. You can get a keylogger that looks like just an extension to the USB keyboard. You can take their SIM card, transfer all the data to your computer, and then browse through all their calls and text messages using special software. You can install GPS in their shoes. You can use a handy little kit that easily and quickly detects the presence of semen on a surface.
They're all less cost-effective than talking to your kids and listening to what's going on, but we guess that's too hard to package and sell that.
Latest by rhombopteryx: @mac-phisto: So we obviously disagree on whether your exceptions swallow my general rule ;) My point is that it is illegal, including under the federal law, with some exceptions. I think you are over-focusing on the exceptions, and I'm sure more »
Despite all the hand-wringing on our part, we consumers don't actually participate in recalls at a very high level. This leaves both manufacturers and the CPSC in the dark about whether their warnings are reaching the right people—which is why the House approved a bill this Tuesday that would require manufacturers of certain infant and toddler products to keep registration info on their customers.
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Fashion Fever Shopping Boutique, the correctly named Barbie toy, features a built-in credit card swiper and a life-size credit card for young children to use when buying outfits for their dolls. According to the Amazon website, "Once the balance hits zero, it will reset so you can continue to shop."
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From 1985 to 2005, crib bumpers—the soft padded things parents use to protect their little bundles of dna from injury—have caused 27 deaths and 25 injuries in babies 2-years-old or younger, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Two universities are now cautioning that crib bumpers may not be worth the risk.
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The federal government is spending over $1 billion on nutrition education this year, and it's probably a waste of money, according to the AP.
"Any person looking at the published literature about these programs would have to conclude that they are generally not working," said Dr. Tom Baranowski, a pediatrics professor at Houston's Baylor College of Medicine who studies behavioral nutrition.
Jennifer's letter is perfectly ordinary. It's the tale of one day in the life of a consumer, a mother, trying to run some errands. Her ToDo list reads: Send letter at post office, return grandma gifts at Walmart, shots at Kaiser. Of course, it's not as easy as that, because nobody knows how to do their jobs anymore and the dang sauce pitchers exploding off the shelves and whatnot.
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