And why there’s no shame in having more or having less, as long as you’re grateful for what you have, share it generously with others, and spend it wisely on the things that make you happiest. It’s true for our kids, but it’s true for us, too.

What our kids can learn from paid employment is a work ethic, that loose phrase that captures the ability to listen, exert ourselves, cooperate with others, do our best, and stick to a task until we’ve done it, and done it right. Or we could just call it “grit,” a term that University of Pennsylvania professor Angela Duckworth has helped popularize

People who are poor don’t have everything they need, like food and clothing and medicine. We have those things, so we’re not poor.

In my years of research on the topic, I’ve determined that there is one answer that works best for any and every money question. The response is itself a question: Why do you ask?

But because we’re in the business of cultivating grown-ups here, giving, like everything else that we do with money, shouldn’t simply happen without comment.

When parents tie allowance to the completion of chores, they make work the primary focus, not money. But children have many places to pick up a good work ethic.

One good reason for kids to hang out with people who are different from them is to realize that nobody has a monopoly on happiness and that it’s often great fun to slip into a world that is not like your own.

Values should drive behavior. And you’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what makes you whole as a human being. That’s worth teaching.

Kids often operate under a completely different set of evaluative standards when it comes to relative wealth. Dewey’s older daughter has a no-name fleece, while many kids at school wear North Face jackets. A classmate recently asked her if she was poor, given that her coat had no fancy logo.