What was your biggest misconception about money when you were a child?

alicef

I have to echo previous sentiments - I was given 3d pocket money.  I remember keeping all my pennies in a box for what seemed like forever.  I presented my box to my dad who counted it up, and then presented me with a half crown.  I took one look at the single coin and decided I'd keep my box of pennies.  Ahh, the innocence of youth.

Malthusian

breaking_free said:

When I was aged 5 I used to love reading Disney's Scrooge McDuck comics, especially images of him diving into his money pit. I genuinely believed that I could save a big pile of paper and coin and dive into it like a porpoise. I'm still woebegone that this is a physical impossibility as it wouldn't be a soft landing...

If you filled a large pit with something soft / pliable and then filled it with coins on top, it could still be a soft landing as your body would displace the coins which would displace the material below. It would still be a very painful experience, but I don't think you'd smash straight into the mass of solid metal as you would if you filled a pit with nothing but coins and then dived into it.

I am not a physicist so this might be one for MythBusters. I am also not sure whether you'd be able to extract yourself if you dived into a big pile of coins and ended up submerged in it.

A big pile of paper notes and coins would also be a relatively soft landing as long as the paper-to-coins ratio was high enough. But as I recall Scrooge McDuck's swimming pool only held gold coins, so I think jumping into a swimming pool of mainly paper notes would be cheating.

Teapot55

I assumed when young that I’d be good at managing money because my Mum was.

Not true, but like in one of the previous posts I soon learned to budget when my outgoings were potentially going to exceed my income. 

Exodi

Maybe closer to being an adult that a child but I remember being suprised that you have to pay for water, gas and electricity... it's funny to think that I assumed it was free.

Moving out was a rude awakening as I think that is the first time young adults learn of things like council tax, tv license, etc.

Also converting everything into equivelant measures - I think mine was tubs of ice cream...

E.g.-
"how much do you get paid a day?"
"about £50"
"that doesn't sound like a lot, how many tubs of ice cream is that"
"about 50 tubs"
"WOW, you can buy 50 tubs of ice cream every day?!?!?!! I can't wait till I'm older and I can buy 50 tubs of ice cream a day"

Siebrie

That money was in short supply and I could never ask my parents for financial support, and had to figure it all out on my own with my pocket money and dress allowance (pitifully low).

I denied myself so much instead of asking for a payrise; on the other hand, I had babysitting jobs and newspaper rounds starting at age 13, and I did manage.

I'm still good at budgetting, but sometimes have a 'barrier' to spending for something non-essential. I have now budgeted a 'fun' category and aim to spend it every month

My daughter's (13) misconception is that once she will have a bankcard, she will have money

MaryNB

Exodi said:

Maybe closer to being an adult that a child but I remember being suprised that you have to pay for water, gas and electricity... it's funny to think that I assumed it was free.

Moving out was a rude awakening as I think that is the first time young adults learn of things like council tax, tv license, etc.

Also converting everything into equivelant measures - I think mine was tubs of ice cream...

E.g.-
"how much do you get paid a day?"
"about £50"
"that doesn't sound like a lot, how many tubs of ice cream is that"
"about 50 tubs"
"WOW, you can buy 50 tubs of ice cream every day?!?!?!! I can't wait till I'm older and I can buy 50 tubs of ice cream a day"

My brother lived at home with my parents in Ireland rent and bills free til he was about 25.
At the time they had just started billing people for water (major uproar, didn't last long) and I was living in the UK, already paying for it and all my other bills. He was on his soap box, ranting and raving about Irish Water, trying to elicit some sympathy from me "Did you know they're gonna charge us money before we even use anything?!!!", me - "You mean like the standing charge that I pay on all my utilities?". 
Standing charges apply to Irish energy bills as well, he just never had to pay them before.

MalMonroe

My biggest misconception was that my family was rich. We never wanted for anything, never struggled, were always warm and well fed. Most of my friends were the same and we all thought we had wealthy families. Who knew that we all had hard working parents who knew how to budget?!  Come to think of it, I don't remember ever having any pocket money. Nor does my brother. We never seemed to need it somehow, we never went without though. 

SadieO

MalMonroe said:

My biggest misconception was that my family was rich. We never wanted for anything, never struggled, were always warm and well fed. Most of my friends were the same and we all thought we had wealthy families. Who knew that we all had hard working parents who knew how to budget?!  Come to think of it, I don't remember ever having any pocket money. Nor does my brother. We never seemed to need it somehow, we never went without though. 

Same here. I only came to realise as an adult that my parents scrimped and saved throughout the year to enable us to have a holiday every summer as they felt it was important to have something to look forward to and a reward for working all year. My friends thought we were posh as we went "abroad". It was a week or two camping in France. My dad travelled as part of his job and had a certain amount of paid-for petrol. He was used to doing long drives because of work, and it was almost as cheap for us to drive to France and camp than it was to stay at home! Weather was nicer and we were happy playing on the beach all day - no entertainment costs needed. The food and drink was cheaper than at home. And we felt like we were getting a huge treat! I am so grateful to my parents for that (and have told them); I have such happy childhood memories. As we got older they taught us about money - I remember my dad showing me his wage slip and explaining to me about tax and NI etc. But they never let on until we were much older how skint they were when we were little, and we certainly never wanted for anything. 

Like others, I thought your money sat in the bank with your name on it. I visualised a bank vault as rows and rows of shelves with names on the shelf edges, and your own little pile of money above your name 

GaleSF63

alicef said:

I have to echo previous sentiments - I was given 3d pocket money.  I remember keeping all my pennies in a box for what seemed like forever.  I presented my box to my dad who counted it up, and then presented me with a half crown.  I took one look at the single coin and decided I'd keep my box of pennies.  Ahh, the innocence of youth.

A few years ago I showed a friend's young children the equivalent of our present small 5p piece in pre-decimal pennies and ha'pennies. They weren't sure whether to believe me. 

Naomim

Not a misconception  but realising that we were poor. I remember my Mum having one night a month when she would be budgeting. We had three holidays when I was growing up, a week at a Warners camp somewhere,  a week at the isle of Wight and two weeks in Bournemouth. But we had a lovely council flat, were clean, clothed, warm and fed well.