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Money & How It Works · Lesson 6
Debt: Tool or Trap?
Debt can build wealth or destroy it. The difference lies in whether it’s creating something or consuming it.
Ages13–1718–25Runtime to be confirmed
About this lesson
You met debt across a desk. Your teenager meets it as a pastel button at checkout. When you borrow, you take money out of your future self's pocket, and interest is the fee for the time travel. The skill is telling a tool from a trap before you sign.
What you’ll learn
- Ask two questions: will this still be worth something when the loan is gone, and would I buy it at the real price?
- The advertised price of anything bought on borrowed money is fiction. Find the real one.
- A card paid in full is a convenient way to spend money you already have. Used any other way, it is expensive.
- Debt is an amplifier. It multiplies growing things and fading things with equal enthusiasm.
Skills your family will build
JudgmentSelf-controlDiscernmentFinancial literacy
