It’s hard enough for me to believe that my son is 14, let alone that he has his first job. It’s a few hours a week at the neighborhood pool snack bar – not enough to ruin his last summer before the rigors of high school, but enough to get him used to the basics of making sno-cones, microwaving pizza, and being a responsible employee.
The excitement of receiving his first paycheck was quickly followed by the questions, “Why is it only $13 dollars?” and “Can you just PayPal the money to me, Mom?” As someone who has had Direct Deposit via ACH for 30 years, seeing an actual paycheck took me back to my summer job days. For my iGen son, it must have felt as ancient as if he had just opened an envelope containing the Magna Carta.
There have been a few industry studies addressing payments adoption among this cohort, also known as Gen Z, but as mentioned in this article from Digital Transactions, they tend to look at the habits of those 18 and older. At 14, my son spends his money in two places: on the Steam gaming platform, and on Fandango for movie tickets, both of which accept PayPal. He likes the ease of use offered by the PayPal app on his phone and the feeling of independence. We have been PayPalling him his weekly allowance for a couple of years. Cash has little practical application in his daily life; cash birthday or holiday gifts are handed over to his parents for conversion to his PayPal account.
While the physical check may feel like an anachronism, I will be taking him to the bank to cash the first one so that at least once in his life he will have the experience of going into a brick and mortar branch to make eye contact with a fellow human and verbally communicate that he would like to cash a check – several important life skills, even if he will use them all less frequently than previous generations did. For the rest of this summer’s checks, he’ll learn about Mobile Deposit, another important life skill that I could not even have conceived of at his age. It will also be valuable for him to see the behind-the-scenes steps that are going into his “seamless” PayPal experience!
What payments lessons have you learned from your Millennial or iGen family members? What payments lessons have you taught them?