This is a great time to be a kid with a loose tooth.
The Tooth Fairy has rebounded from her economic dole drums and she’s returned to her free spending ways. So says the data from our most recent survey of 2,000 Americans. The Tooth Fairy’s largess plummeted in 2011, falling to an average of $2.60 left per tooth. But the cusped collector has picked herself up, dusted herself off, and in 2012 is leaving $3.00 – a 15% increase.
And with every first lost tooth comes the parental dilemma of how much money to leave under the pillow. No one wants to be an outlier and leave their child too much or too little. There is also the concern about children comparing notes on the school playground and finding out that the Fairy has been leaving different amounts.
To help answer this perennial question, we’ve developed the free Tooth Fairy Calculator which you can download as an app from iTunes or use on Facebook. The calculator recommends an appropriate amount to leave for each tooth based on what other families are leaving in comparable households.
While the topic of the Tooth Fairy is intentionally light-hearted, it looms incredibly large for a child with a wiggly tooth – especially if it’s your child. So harness the passion and fascination your child has with the Tooth Fairy and the cash she leaves behind and turn it into a conversation starter about money management.
Ask them how they plan to spend it and encourage them to save a portion. Help them understand the rudimentary concepts of budgeting and explain that’s what you do with your money. It’s a life lesson that will last longer than those baby teeth.
Posted by: Jason Alderman, Visa Corporate Relations on September 4, 2012 at 6:39 am
