AUTHORS’ NOTE: This research was supported in part by a UCLA Academic Senate Grant awarded to the first author and the UCLA Social Psychology Area Program. We would like to express our appreciation to Pamela Durant for her excellent work in preparing this manuscript. Requests for reprints should be addressed to Professor Jerome Rabow, Sociology Department, University of California. Los Angeles. 405 Hilgard Avenue. Los Angeles. CA 90024-1551.
Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Science, Vol. 15 No. 3, August 1993 324-341 © 1993 Sage Publications. Inc,
Socialization Toward Money in Latino Families: An Exploratory Study of Gender Differences
Jerome Rabow
Kathleen A. Rodriguez
University of California, Los Angeles
Members of a convenience sample of first-generation Latino brothers and sisters, all attending college, were interviewed about their childhood and contemporary experiences with money. The interviews focused on the ways in which the parents, all born in Mexico, approached money and how the subjects were influenced. In contrast to other research findings, Latinos and Latinas were raised with similar beliefs and practices about money; there were no separate money-gender tracks for these men and women. This equality seems to result from the high frequency of poverty in the sample. Although subjects had realistic attitudes about money, they also reported difficulties with managing money upon entering college. A strong belief in the value of education, acquired from parents, provided subjects with a sense of future that included financial success.
There is very little theoretical or empirical literature about money and socialization. Although successful adult financial functioning requires some degree of fiscal acumen (knowledge of costs, savings, investment opportunities), almost nothing is known about when and how boys and girls are introduced to financial matters. We know almost nothing about how money is used or abused in families, whether teachings are similar for boys and for girls, or how money enters into the evaluation of others and the self. No studies have examined the ways in which monetary issues vary by social class, ethnicity, or racial group.
This shortage of literature is rather surprising in light of the important earlier work on money by Hubert and Manss (1985) and by Simmel (1978), and the nonempirical work by Chesler and Goodman (1976), who observed that women have neither money nor power and argued strongly for the study of money. Perhaps Collins (1979) was correct when he noted that money has been ignored and treated as if it were “sociologically not enough” (p. 190).
When money and gender differences are discussed, it is usually in regard to marriage and problems resulting from differential earnings. Thus Weitzman (1985) showed that divorce had an enormous financial impact upon wives, and Graham (1984) described patterns of income expenditures and decision making among British couples. Blumstein and Schwartz (1983) examined the consequences of equal and unequal earnings among married, cohabiting, and lesbian and gay couples. These three studies ignore initial learning. In traditional marriages, interdependence usually is achieved at the cost of the wife’s autonomy and her equal participation in decision making. Cohabiting and lesbian couples consciously avoid such inequality; while achieving independence, they lose interdependence. Blumstein and Schwartz, like Blood (1960) some 20 years earlier, report that money establishes the balance of power for couples (except lesbian couples). Wives who earn well have greater autonomy: The higher a wife’s income, the more she is able to decide how she wants to spend her money. Among married couples, the greater the belief in a “male provider” philosophy, the more power is assigned to husbands. In the presence of disappointment with the amount of money available to couples, relationships are evaluated as less satisfying, except among lesbian partners. Married couples fight about money management more than other couples in the sample, a finding corroborated by a study of British couples (Dobash & Dobash, 1982; Pahl, 1988). When partners have equal control over how money is spent, all types of couples report a more tranquil relationship. Even women of upper-class status who inherit their family’s money must control this money to enjoy an equal voice in decision making in their marriages (Ostander, 1984).
Because couples use money to “establish the balance of power in relationships” (Blumstein & Schwartz, 1983, p. 53), there are fewer power struggles over money when both members of a couple earn equal amounts (Hertz, 1986). These findings on American couples are corroborated in other work. Among British couples, conflicts over money are identified as a major factor in marital disharmony and marital violence (Dobash & Dobash, 1982; Pahl, 1988). For women, then, money is an especially valuable resource. It is an equalizer, a resource that permits greater autonomy and independence, an objectifier–indeed, the “ultimate objectifier” (Zelizer, 1989). Millman (1991) also concludes that money is the ultimate measure of value. All of this literature about adult functioning and money, however, neglects the early familial experiences that may promote independence and autonomy related to financial matters.
The literature on economic socialization is also sparse. Examinations of how children learn the role of consumer (e.g., McNeal, 1987) do not specify how boys and girls differ with respect to product purchasing or concepts of price, brand, and packaging. Cummings and Taebel (1978), who examined how third-, sixth-, ninth-, and twelfth-grade children felt about aspects of our economy, reported that older students were more negative toward trade unions and government intervention and more favorable toward private ownership. They concluded that children became increasingly favorable toward corporate capitalism. Cummings and Taebel made no effort to measure the salience of money, nor did they report any gender differences. Another dimension of economic socialization is discussed by Lindten (1980), who argues that money is a form of instant power. Because it can be measured precisely, it is different from other types of social power. Money can give children a sense of social power when they begin to see both how to influence others and how to resist influence.
Another body of literature, exemplified by Hoffman and Nye (1974), suggests that maternal employment influences young women’s concepts of money and serves as a positive reinforcement for daughters’ future participation in the paid labor force. Daughters of women who work feel more secure in their own identities. Daughters of working women are more autonomous and have better defined ego boundaries than their counterparts from homes of nonemployed women. Accordingly, we would expect that daughters whose mothers worked would perceive, understand, and approach money differently from daughters whose mothers were not employed.
Two recent qualitative studies on money and socialization by Rabow and his students (Rabow & Charness, 1991; Rabow, Charness, Aguilar, & Toomajian, 1992) probed the retrospective experiences of college women about their socialization experiences with money. Two small convenience samples of college women—one predominantly White and the other Filipina–were interviewed about their childhood and contemporary experiences with money. Interviews focused on the ways in which parents approached money and how these participants were influenced. Their findings emphasized the women’s sense of independence and dependence and how their experiences with money contrasted with that of their brothers. The White women reported that their brothers were told to get jobs and were introduced to savings and checking accounts at a much earlier age than they were. Families used a number of strategies to keep their daughters dependent and uninformed regarding money. This study also noted sharp differences among the college women who had experienced their parents’ divorce: Daughters from divorced families were more conscious about the value, significance, and realities of money. In sharp contrast, Filipinas reported that finances were managed by mothers, not fathers, and were used by their mothers to unite the generations and to increase their daughters’ financial independence and knowledge. Korean women also have been reported to control money in families (Light, Kwnon, & Zhong, 1991).
Given the limited amount of research, we sought to examine further the socialization experiences of young men and women with respect to money. Taken together, the two studies suggest that two money tracks exist within families—-one for sons and another for daughters. Yet we lack studies that examine the socialization regarding money for brothers and sisters in the same family. We lack studies of how children come to construct the social meanings of money, how these are modified in time and influenced by culture.
In this study, we seek to address an aspect of this problem by interviewing brothers and sisters from the same families regarding their experiences with money. We explore whether parents use different tracks to socialize their sons and their daughters in this area, and we do so by studying the experiences of first-generation Latinos. We decided to study first-generation students to control for acculturation and assimilation. In addition, we learned that most of the Latino students at UCLA were first-generation and thus would be the most convenient generation to sample. Because the Filipinas in the earlier study (Rabow, et al., 1992) also were first-generation, we believed that this control would provide some basis for comparing the two populations.
Sample
In the winter of 1991, we made announcements in sociology classes, in Mecha meetings, and at meetings of the Latino Engineering Society to advertise our research. Flyers also were distributed and posted in the AAP tutoring center, in the Chicano Studies Research Center, and at the Community Programs Office. We offered an honorarium to brothers and sisters who were Latinos and whose parents were bom outside the United States. When people responded, we informed them about the purposes of the study and made an appointment for the interview. Both on the phone and at the time of the interview, all volunteer subjects were told that they could discontinue the interview at any time. They also were told that they could edit out any aspect of the taped interview that they wished to remove.
We interviewed ten pairs of brothers and sisters, all of whom were college students. Two of the brothers had graduated in the past year; one was in law school at the time of the interview, and the other was in transition to law school. Most of the subjects were students at a pubic university, but four attended other universities. Because of an interviewer’s error, two pairs of students were second- and third-generation Latinos, but these siblings were included in the study, All the parents of the first-generation Latinos came from Mexico. The age range for the brothers was 19 years old to 23 years old; for the sisters, 18 years old to 23 years old.
Method
We used an interview schedule based on the prior studies with White women and Filipina women. Before beginning the study, we conducted preliminary interviews to ascertain whether the interviews in the study should be conducted separately or with both siblings. We decided to interview brothers and sisters together after we established that this method worked very well in the preliminary interviews.
Before the interview, all of the brother-sister pairs completed an objective survey about money that was part of a larger study (Rabow & Newcomb, 1993). Earlier studies had found that the subjects often were shy about discussing money; thus we administered these surveys to encourage subjects to think about money matters and to make them more comfortable at the interview.
During the interview, we were careful to insure that the interaction was not dominated by either of the siblings. We controlled this situation by alternating our questions between siblings. We felt that the subjects gave honest and accurate responses because when one sibling was talking, the other often nodded his or her head to affirm what the speaker was saying, or confirmed verbally what the speaker had said. At the end of the interview when we asked whether the interview had brought out any surprises or new information, the subjects reported that they had not been surprised by what their siblings had said.
The interview was devised to evoke very specific and detailed evaluations of money by the use of open-ended questions, followed by more specific questions. Interviews lasted 45 minutes to 1 hour and 30 minutes, and were taped with permission of each brother-sister pair. Questions posed during each interview were aimed at gaining greater insight into the participants’ family backgrounds, their childhood, adolescent, and young adult experiences with money, and the significance of money in their present and future aspirations.
Findings
In the study of White college women (Rabow & Charness, 1991), many of the subjects reported extremely unrealistic or uninformed notions about money, particularly the cost of living. Realistic conceptions developed under three circumstances: (a) financial hardships within the family, (b) divorce, and (c) families after divorce.
In the present study, divorce was not a factor because all but one brother-sister pair came from an intact family. The subjects seemed to have realistic expectations and knowledge about money.
Learning About Money
Our male and female Latino subjects learned about money in three ways. First, the scarcity of money was so common that it acted as a teacher. Second, subjects learned about money from the discussions and disagreements about money between their parents. Third, parents actively instructed children about saving money. The subjects learned from lessons provided by their parents.
Scarcity of Money
In many of the first-generation families, children learn the reality of scarcity of money at a very young age. In these families, the children view money as fulfilling basic necessities. They learn not to ask for certain things because they perceive money as scarce. Certain boundaries exist; it is permissible to ask for an ice cream cone or a piece of candy, but more expensive things, such as nicer clothes or more expensive toys, are unattainable and not to he asked for.
One female subject, who was raised by a divorced mother on welfare, spoke of her awareness of money at the age of 5. When asked about her first memory of money, she responded:
I understood that there were certain things I couldn’t have. We were told that there wasn’t enough money so that we couldn’t get things. We took it for granted (female, Pair 2).
When asked about his first memory, the brother responded, “Lack of it.” He continued, “I knew it was a means of being able to do what you want to do” (male, Pair 2).
Because they grew up in a family where there was very little, if any, money, there were many things that Pair 2 could not have. This scarcity molded the behavior of both children. The brother said, “I stopped asking for money and tried to do things that didn’t cost money.” The sister also was aware of the boundaries associated with money: “We got new clothes once a year, and it was financed by my father. I became sensitive and only asked for inexpensive things.”
About half of the sample grew up in a family where money was very scarce. As a result, money revolved around necessities. We asked subjects to assess how this situation affected their lives.
One male subject explained why money management was not an issue for his family: “I think they just earn it and spend it. They are not able to save money. They wouldn’t have money if an emergency arose” (male, Pair 4).
His sister added, “They only spend their money on important things like food and bills, but that’s all they can afford” (female, Pair 4). When asked how she knew that her parents did not have money, she responded:
There’s a lot of lack of communication in our family. They would never come out and say, “We don’t have money.” We would have to ask or else we would never find out.
Although this issue usually applies to poor families, other families from the middle or upper classes can feel the squeeze of budgetary difficulties. “How much money is ‘enough’ clearly does not depend on quantity. It depends, instead, on attitudes, values and patterns of behavior that are remarkably similar from person to person” (Lindten, 1980, p. 7). Lindten points out that families with higher incomes can have as much trouble living within their means as those with lower incomes.
Among these first-generation Latino families, money does not belong to the children. The scarcity of money, and its management by parents, excludes children from making any financial decisions. Money is valued, a sense of value in that it is to be managed by adults.
Arguments and Discussions
Our subjects also learned about money through their parents’ arguments and discussions. One first-generation female stated that although her parents didn’t have many disagreements over money, she learned about money from their discussions:
They would say we need to save money so we can afford to by [whatever]… or to pay the bills. Whenever they misplaced money, like a $20 bill, they would try to figure out what had happened to it… They wouldn’t rest until they figured out whether it had been spent or misplaced (female, Pair 3).
In another first-generation pair, the brother spoke of the discussions his parents had every week:
When my dad would go and buy something, she [Mom] would always want to know which card or account had been used and whether he had entered what he spent hi their records (male, Pair 8).
Both the brother and the sister learned about financing, balancing checkbooks and accounts, and the costs of gas from these weekly discussions and by witnessing their parents’ arguments about financial issues.
Arguments over money were quite commonplace between the parents of Pair 1. Each month, when the bills came in, there were arguments over who would pay the bills. Our dad would tell mom she didn’t know how to budget money. He would be mad at her if he thought she spent too much (male, Pair 1).
The parents of another pair also argued when the bills had to be paid. The brother explained:
When the bills came in, our parents, who both worked, would argue over who would pay them. They argued about who was contributing more, and who was keeping money to themselves (male, Pair 4).
Another brother and sister discussed the impact of their parents’ arguments over how money should be spent. The brother reported:
Our parents have helped to make us aware of the problems.., that arise with the decisions of how money should he spent…. If my mom spends too much money on her mom, my dad will get upset, and vice versa. Because of this, I think that when I am married I will want my wife and I to have a separate account of our own money so we can spend it as we wish (male, Pair 8).
In contrast to the first-generation parents’ arguments that concerned how money was spent and who was paying the bills, the parents of Pair 10 argued about the lack of sharing of financial information. Like the fathers of the middle-class families in our earlier study (Rabow & Charness, 1991), the father of these siblings was not willing to share financial information about his work with his wife and children. Thus he kept them ignorant and dependent on him. The sister stated, “When you ask him about work, he says, ‘You don’t want to know’ “(female, Pair 10). Unlike the first-generation families where the scarcity of money is omnipresent and thus the financial situation is evident to the family, the middle-class families maintain much more secrecy about money.
Direct Instruction
Many of the parents gave their children lessons about saving money. A female subject reported:
My mom taught us how to save, and that it was good not to spend money on… eating out or other wasteful things. She never casually bought things. She took money very seriously. She would say things like “Don’t eat your money” and… “Is what you’re buying worth a whole hour’s work?” I didn’t like it (female, Pair 9).
Most of the subjects reported that their parents encouraged them to save money. A male subject reported, “If we would get monetary gifts, our parents would encourage us to put it in the bank” (male, Pair 6).
All of these lessons were taught to the subjects while they were in elementary school. Seven of the 10 pairs were encouraged to save money; two of the pairs who were not encouraged to save had parents with no money to save.
Although many of the subjects saved money from an early age, 6 of the 10 pairs did not save in banks. Instead, they saved their money at home in socks, cans, or drawers. Most of the subjects did not open a savings account until they entered college. Two of the pairs who had a savings account at an early age were the second- and third-generation subjects from middle-class backgrounds. The parents of the two first-generation pairs who had savings accounts at an early age established the accounts solely for the children’s money. In contrast, the second- and third-generation pairs’ accounts were controlled closely by their parents.
One of the middle-class pairs had two accounts, one of which was for the children’s savings. Both siblings gave their parents money they received as gifts, and later the paychecks they received from work, to deposit into their accounts.
The sister spoke as follows about the money she gave to her parents for the savings account: “In our family, money was put away in an account that you never saw… It was to be saved… It wasn’t yours to do whatever you wanted with it” (female, Pair 9).
The other middle-class pair opened a savings account in elementary school because their father wanted to use the children’s accounts as a tax shelter for his own money. Thus, although they had savings accounts, these accounts were mostly for the parents’ use. Instead of being encouraged by their parents to save money, they were discouraged by the generous allowance they received from their father each week. If they spent all of their allowance before the week was out, they went to their father and he gave them more. As a result, dependency on their father was encouraged.
One middle-class male subject saved almost all the money he made from his college job as a room service waiter. At the end of his sophomore year, he realized he had $10,000 saved. He spoke of his difficulty in deciding what to do with the money:
I was looking at all the investment magazines . . . [but] I couldn’t make a decision. I plopped half of it into a savings account and out of desperation I said, “Dad, can you put the other half somewhere where it will be safe?” I felt really guilty about that, like I failed because I couldn’t make a decision. I felt that I hadn’t taken responsibility for my money (male, Pair 9).
Both of the second- and third-generation brother-sister pairs were kept dependent on their parents financially. The combination of later generation and middle-class status made them different from the first-generation Latinos and more similar to the White middle-class women in the Rabow and Charness (1991) study. In the first-generation pairs, brothers and sisters were given freedom to establish their financial independence, especially when they entered college.
The Legacy of Poverty
In contrast to the White and Filipina college women in our earlier studies, the Latino subjects came mostly from poor backgrounds. Just as the earlier childhood experiences of the White and Filipina women affected their views of money, we found that a background of scarcity influenced our subjects’ lives powerfully.
Although all of our subjects were succeeding financially in college, they were not without problems in regard to managing money. Some of oar subjects found it difficult to control the money they earned in college. Others found it very difficult to spend money. Still others found that money had become an all-consuming passion.
One female subject identified strongly with her mother, who was always in debt; she found that she had difficulty managing her money in college.
When I was younger I didn’t want to be like my mom and the way she manages money. She was always in bad debt. She would buy things for the house even when she didn’t have any money. I see myself doing that now and I am hating myself for it (female, Pair 1 ).
Another female subject found that she was overspending in college. Before entering college she had always spent her money, and had never needed to save. She stated:
When I came to college I got a checking account, and if I saw something I wanted I would just buy it without a second thought. It got me into trouble… Now I am much more careful… If I see a vendor selling earrings or a shop where 1 will be tempted to buy something, I will just keep walking (female, Pair 8).
One male subject, who also liked to spend money, encountered a problem when he wanted to buy a car. “I was supposed to get a car but I had spent the money over the summer” (male, Pair 6).
Because these subjects did not have much financial responsibility earlier in life, they found it difficult to budget money in college. Money became a way to gratify the need for material belongings and trips. They struggled with the problem of saving for necessities such as tuition and rent.
Whereas the legacy of poverty caused some subjects to overspend, it left others unable to spend. One male reported:
It rips me apart to spend a lot of money on going out to eat …. My girlfriend suggested we go out for brunch last Sunday after church, end I said there is no way I want to spend that kind of money on food. (male, Pair 9)
Because many of our subjects had never had much money to spend on themselves, it became a necessity, and often a way of life, not to spend money easily. Another young man described the ritual he went through before he spent money:
I always felt I should have money saved. When I go to buy something I always ask myself “Do I really need this thing’?” I would think about it twice and usually decide that 1 didn’t need it (male, Pair 8).
Another consequence of having very little money while growing up is that money became extremely important. This appeared to be more true for the males than the females, especially because men still are expected to be the primary providers in our society.
One male subject from a family that could afford only the necessities now has a consuming passion for money:
Money is everything to me. 1 love money. I have to have large quantities of money. It’s to the point where I can’t have enough money. It doesn’t make me feel any better than anyone else; it just makes me feel good (male, Pair 3).
Another male considers money the most important thing in life:
To get where you went to go, money is going to take you there. Good heart, good personality, won’t get it done; the bottom line is money. Sad, but tree. It is the most important thing (male, Pair 2).
These subjects were driven to fulfill a need that was not met when they were children, the need to experience money directly through earning, spending, and managing. They struggled with the inner need as they struggled outwardly with spending habits.
Parental Stress on Education
Our subjects’ parents wished for a better life for both their sons and their daughters and viewed a college education as the vehicle for this change. Although the parents were unable to provide a large bank account with savings for college, they did provide a belief in education. Some of the parents even discouraged their children from working in high school because they were afraid it would hurt their academic performance. One subject, who was to enter medical school in the fall of 1991, stated:
[Our parents] were both interested in us going to school first, so neither of them wanted us to work. They wanted us to concentrate on school.., lOur father] would say, “Stay in school so you don’t earn $18,000 a year like I do” (male, Pair 5).
Another male subject stated that his parents didn’t stress a career, but believed “that with an education you can do anything” (male, Pair 4).
Although we do not claim that the support given by our subjects’ parents is generalizable to ail first-generation Latinos, we believe that this support was an important determinant in attendance at college and in subsequent success in college. The children accepted their parents’ belief that education is the key to achieving the American dream.
Entering College
Although our subjects had an understanding and a knowledge of money, they had very little real experience with management and budgeting. Many of these students opened their first savings and checking accounts when they entered college. In addition, most of them had to fill out financial aid forms. For the first time, many found out exactly how much their parents earned. As students, they also had to assimilate a large amount of new information about the costs of tuition, books, housing, food, telephone bills, and social activities.
Although the initial adjustment was difficult, our subjects learned, through these experiences, how to manage financially. This learning process continued throughout their years at college.
The 16 first-generation subjects (8 males and females) were working to help finance their education. Of these, 7 of the 8 male subjects and 6 of the 8 females were covering at least 60% of their current expenses. Among the second- and third-generation pairs, the parents were providing for 60% or more of their children’s expenses.
Parents were equally supportive of their sons and their daughters. In the two exceptional cases, where the brothers received less than the sisters, the difference was a result of the son’s choice rather than parental discrimination.
Of the first-generation subjects, 2 women and 4 men in the study were totally independent financially while in college. A female subject, who never had held a paid job in high school, supported herself completely. She covered most of her college expenses through financial aid and the rest with the money she earned from two jobs.
In contrast to financially independent subjects, 1 first-generation female subject was totally dependent on her parents.
My parents give me $60 to $70 a week to cover everything. That’s food, that’s gas, and extra supplies for school, and for parking. There’s not a whole lot extra for going out. I don’t use any of it for movies and stuff. A lot of it goes for gas (female, Pair 8).
Thus although this subject was dependent on her parents, the fixed budget taught her to manage. Formerly, she went out often with her friends on the weekends, but she could no longer afford to do this when she entered college.
Another female student, who paid for half of her college expenses, discussed how she budgeted her money in order to cover her share:
When I came to college my parents gave me a fixed amount of money that would probably cover two years of college. So I decided to pay for the first year myself [with] the scholarships I had received.., and from the money I earned from working my senior year [in high school]. Each year since then 1 have paid for a third of my college expenses, like a quarter’s worth…. Since I knew I was helping to pay for my education, I was always careful not to spend a lot of money. That’s why I have never joined a sorority or bought expensive clothes or gone on big trips [or] bought myself a car (female, Pair 9).
Many subjects learn as they progress through college. One male subject, who was a freshman and who was not sure whether he would have to work his first year, reported, “I didn’t want to work my first year here; it just turned out that way. I had more expenses than I could handle” (male, Pair 4).
Being unsure about how much financial aid he would need to cover his expenses, be adapted quickly by working 18 hours a week as an office clerk to pay for his housing.
The legacy of poverty continued to touch the lives of the students as they straggled to make ends meet. One young woman learned from her mother’s habits and advice always to buy things on sale:
Our mother would say, if you wait for sales your money will go farther…. 1 always to this day buy things on sale. I’ll wait until something I want goes on sale before I will buy it (female, Pair 5).
Her brother echoed his sister’s thoughts. In addition to shopping wisely, he was careful not to spend money on campus:
I try not to eat on campus. If I cannot get back to the dorm for lunch, I will get a lunch coupon [worth :$1.30] and I’ll buy fruit with it. I’ll eat a big breakfast and dinner at the dorm (male, Pair 5).
Many of the subjects came to college without any real experience with money, but their college experiences changed this situation. They often gained extra confidence in their ability to succeed because they were achieving academically and adjusting financially.
Realism and Goals
The study of White college women revealed that there was a lack of financial realism and future goals among the subjects who came from intact families (Rabow & Charness, 1991). Women reported not knowing how much money they would need to earn in order to be comfortable or what kind of work they wanted to pursue.
In contrast, Filipina college women knew how much money they wanted to make and had definite goals about careers. The Filipina women also expressed a very strong desire to have their own income, independent of a husband.
The Latino brothers and sisters in this study were much more similar to the first-generation Filipina women than to the White women in that they, too, were closely attuned to the realities of the cost of living. These subjects learned about the reality of money when they experienced financial hardship as young children and observed the everyday role of money in their lives. As a result, many of our subjects already had defined goals and a clear understanding of the cost of living.
One female subject felt that the experience of growing up on welfare had a profound impact on her determination to graduate from college and on her goals:
The lack of money has had a positive effect on my goals. I realized that an education could raise my standard of living. I didn’t like the way I lived and I don’t want to continue that way…. Not only are we poor, but we are Mexican. I feel there is a lot of discrimination. Also, being a woman makes things tougher. I had to jump a big barrier because I had been socialized with people on welfare, like my family …. It was a challenge to come to UCLA because you are socialized with different people and different customs. It is a totally different life in the middle class (female, Pair 2).
Despite all of the barriers that might have held her back, this young woman graduated from UCLA in spring 1991. The scarcity of money that always had been present in her life gave her the desire to push forward. She spoke as follows about her plans for the future:
I will probably go back to get my master’s in education or counseling, or maybe urban planning. I will be happy making a minimum of $30,000. Some of my friends.., make that amount. I’ve seen.., where they live, and I could picture myself with that lifestyle. I don’t need the classiest car or anything; as long as I can buy myself a pair of pants when I want to, I’m happy (female, Pair 2).
Her brother, who was in his first year of law school, also was well informed about the cost of living. When asked bow much money he would be comfortable making, he said that minimum survival would be $50,000 to $75,000 a year. Ideally, he would like to earn $100,000 to $125,000. Asked how he came up with these figures, he stated:
Well, you have to take into account buying a home with insurance and property taxes. I will probably want a health insurance policy if 1 don’t get it as part of job benefits. I will also want a decent vehicle and be able to buy the things I never had (male, Pair 2).
This young man is presently attending UCLA Law School to increase his earning capacity. As stated in the interview, “This poor business is getting boring.”
Another male subject told of how he perceived the role of money in his own life:
Money gives you more purchasing power, it gives you more choices, it gives you more freedom. I would feel less free if I had less money. I would feel down, like I can’t do as much (male, Pair 3).
One of the female subjects said she hoped eventually to earn $50,000 a year. She explained:
It’s higher than our parents. I really have no knowledge of how much money is a lot of money and how much is a little bit of money. I use my parents as mid-low, so if I earn more than that I should be doing good, considering I’ve gone to school (female, Pair 5).
Although many of our subjects had definite career goals and salaries in mind, some still were uncertain how much money they wanted to earn in order to be happy. Although they were confident that they would do well financially with an education, they were not always sure how well.
Discussion and Conclusions
Our first finding was that these first-generation Latino sons and daughters had been instructed equally on issues concerning money. This finding challenges the earlier study (Rabow & Charness, 1991) that reported different tracks for sons and for daughters. In the present study, we found no such selective teaching. Education, also, was encouraged equally for sons and for daughters. If the sons and the daughters received an allowance, they received the same amount at the same age. If the parents encouraged saving money, they encouraged both children.
A second finding was that our Latino subjects were more knowledgeable about the importance of money than our White middle-class subjects. An environment in which poverty is real and the consequences of the lack of money are tangible has enormous impact. Although the Latino subjects did not come to college fully prepared to handle all the expenses, they were much more aware of money and much better prepared to work. The Latino children learned about money by observing how their parents handled money. The omnipresence of poverty led to open discussions, arguments, and a wide range of behavior built around finances. These parents, like the newly arrived Filipina immigrants, discussed money openly in front of the children. Whereas Filipina mothers talked exclusively to their daughters about money and left out their sons (Rabow, et al., 1992), Latino parents were equally involved in educating their sons and their daughters on this subject.
In the Latino families, money was not emphasized as overtly as among the Filipinas, but there was an understanding between the parents and the children that money was fight and was to be used to buy the necessities for the family: food, shelter, and clothing. Neither the mother nor the father singled out their sons or their daughters to teach them about money in direct ways.
In contrast to the Filipina women and the Latino brothers and sisters, the White college women (Rabow & Charness, 1991) were kept dependent on their parents through a number of mechanisms; one was that money was not discussed openly.
The families of the White women employed a second mechanism as well. They not only ignored the subject, they also communicated to their children the taboo nature of money. Issues about finances and parents’ salaries were kept secret. Many of the White subjects expressed a sense of embarrassment and discomfort about money.
Although the Filipina respondents felt comfortable in speaking about money with immediate family members, the parents wanted to keep their financial matters within the family. The daughters were encouraged to refrain from discussing money with outsiders. Whereas White middle-class parents felt that informing children about finances would make them vulnerable, Filipina parents felt that this knowledge would make children responsible. In Latino families, money was a pan of their everyday lives and was taken for granted; it was not kept secret or hidden. Most of the first-generation brothers and sisters in this study felt comfortable in asking either of their parents for money if they needed it.
As an interesting contrast, the mothers of the second- and third-generation Latino brother-sister pairs never wanted their children to know how much money their fathers made while they were growing up. They viewed this subject as a secret and not proper for the middle-class children. In this way, these families were similar to the White families described by Rabow and Charness (1991).
Many of the Latino brothers and sisters interviewed did not know their parents’ exact income until they filled out income tax forms and looked at their parents’ form to see how it was done, or until they had to fill out financial aid applications. Only one pair reported that their father told them how much he made. Similarly, the Filipina subjects did not know their parents’ income until age 16 or 17. Most frequently, they discovered how much their parents earned when they filled out financial aid applications, worked with their parents, or saw their parents’ tax returns.
In ail three samples, parents kept their children uninformed about their own actual income.
Our third finding is that although our Latino subjects have entered the middle class by attending college, the legacy of poverty stays with many of them. One evidence of this legacy is the difficulty that many of the subjects encountered in spending money. These subjects do not feel free or comfortable with money and are continually looking to save. Others who try to break from this pattern swing to the extreme of overindulgence: they cannot spend enough money.
On the positive side of the legacy, the Latino subjects tend to have more clearly defined educational and career goals than the White middle-class subjects. A background of scarcity encourages them to clarify their goals earlier than middle-class students. Many of the Latino subjects were pursuing professional careers as physicians, lawyers, and engineers. For this sample, the dream of economic security and success envisioned by their parents is a reality.
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