Pocket Money
The ins and outs of pocket money
The majority (60%) of parents giving their children pocket money do so once a week, while one in six (12%) give their children pocket money every day. The average value of pocket money that parents give their children on a weekly basis is £11.Almost two thirds (63%) of parents expect pocket money to be spent on sweets and chocolate, however, half (49%) expect their children to buy DVDs and CDs with their pocket money, 45% expect tickets (for the cinema, theatre or concert) to be bought and 44% expect their children to buy video games.Pocket money and gender: a gender pay gap?Unsurprisingly, factors such the age of a child has an effect on how much pocket money they are given. However, findings also suggest that this is also the case for gender. For boys, the average amount of pocket money given on a weekly basis is £11.47. For girls, this is £10.67, a reduction of 80p.Controlling and determining the amount of pocket money givenAlthough the majority of parents give pocket money to their children, there are different parenting styles with regards to how this is managed. A quarter (23%) of parents say they always control what their children spend their pocket money on. A fifth (18%) never interfere with how their children use theirs, and a fifth (21%) encourage their children to save all the pocket money they are given.For seven in ten (70%) parents, the amount of pocket money given is dependent on chores that their children do. Helping tidy the house (35%), washing the car (29%) and taking out the rubbish (27%) top the list of chores that are rewarded with pocket money. On average, parents tend to reward their children £3.45 for chores.Other factors that influence how much pocket money parents give to their children are:- The cost of items their children want (39%)- Recent behaviour (37%)- School grades (30%)Although there are different parenting styles to teaching children the value of money, over three in five (65%) of all parents surveyed agree that pocket money teaches children this value. Other top skills that parents think giving pocket money enables are the ability to budget and plan their spending (60% agree) and the ability to save money (59%).
Opinium Research carried out an online survey of 1,057 UK parents of children aged 11 to 18 years old from the 20th to 23rd October 2015. The value for pocket money given was derived from online surveys (also amongst parents aged 11 to 18 years old), which were carried out throughout November 2015.
