Monthly living expenses with a child

I also think your parents did the right thing @ Samtpfote. I come from a household on social welfare (single parent with severe disability) and my childhood was not only extremely poor but also pretty bad in other ways. At some point, I had a way too big bike from the junkyard, no bed, no desk, and for Christmas and birthdays, I got 100 DM. By the way, I still get the same amount, now in euros (50). A driver’s license or car were therefore unthinkable and unaffordable.
At some point, I switched to care provided by the youth welfare office, which I had applied for myself as a child. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much money there either... Working on the side was pointless because any income was directly deducted from the youth welfare benefits.
I did get pocket money, but too little. Specifically, it was recently (with my mom) from age 13, 250 DM. I had to buy my own food and drink from that; nothing was left for anything else.
Therefore, I absolutely cannot understand parents who have enough money but still make their children work. For example, my husband worked in gastronomy on weekends and sometimes even during the week late into the night, “on the side” while attending school full-time. When is there time to recover? I just have no understanding for that. Children cost money, and if you don’t want to spend it, then you shouldn’t have children. You become independent soon enough, but school is a full-time job and not a joke.
I can sincerely wish everyone a childhood and parents like @ Samtpfote’s, even though mine was the exact opposite. I get angry when wealthy parents push their schoolchildren to work.

Get completely the wrong idea - no one pushes a child to do something and - as I see it with ours - it certainly does not have to be working late into the night or on weekends.

It's about a healthy balance and the lesson of saving the money you have earned yourself or just blowing it - with all the consequences.

It's then about additional luxury items that you are supposed to (possibly only partially) work for.

Exactly this ability to handle money and above all the respect for the hard-earned wages is, in my opinion, missing for many teens nowadays...

And I didn’t mean the additional luxury goods but going to work for (normal!) clothes, the bus ticket that you urgently need to get to school, a new bed because the old one broke... that’s simply a no-go. Of course, if a child absolutely needs the 2000 euro stereo system, as a parent you can say, work for it - but school must not suffer because of it. If the child is lying with their head on the desk and sleeping in class because they had to (or wanted to) work until 2 a.m., then something is wrong. Voluntarily delivering newspapers on Saturday afternoons for pure luxury goods is okay. But not for the bus ticket. By the way, I didn’t read the previous posts, so I didn’t misunderstand anything but only referred to Samtpfote’s post.

One should read everything if one wants to participate in such a discussion.

No one has ever demanded such things here from their children....

I never claimed that either. I only wrote how it was for me compared to my husband. And read everything - no thanks, that is by no means necessary. Most of the content on the last pages is just polemics, and my time is too precious for that.

Arrogant attitude