1) Should the government be doing it at all?
2) If they should, what is the right amount?

You spent a lot of time focused on #2 while #1 is the critical one. No where in the Constitution does it give permission for Congress to enact such a program. Unfortunately the last 100 years have shown that Congress really doesn’t care what the Constitution says and if they can buy enough votes they will do it.

So lets assume that a private company offers to do this for the good will it brings them. It could be a single company or a set of companies. Google could offer a bond payable to the child at age 18 if they sign up for Google Finance and complete classes on financial education. They could allow parents/grandparents to get involved and add money in ways similar to uPromise.

Would $500 be enough to change your mindset about money? Because that is truly the fundamental problem when it comes to personal finance. Most people believe that money should be consumed immediately if not before. That your lifestyle should be upgraded at every turn so your expenses exceed your income.

Look at the history of lottery winners. The majority of them end up squandering their winnings and returning to their previous lifestyle. The few who succeed with it already had the right mindset about money.

Look at the Earned Income Tax Credit (I would say most people reading this have no idea what it is). To see if giving people money changes their life. It comes every year and yet still has no impact.

Money for nothing will never change a person. Change their mindset and money is not the issue any more.

I disagree that we should figure out how to get in on the ‘loot’. I think that only makes the situation worse – we buy into the mindset that this is the way it is, and nothing we can do will stop it. Once we do that, then that really becomes true.

For myself and my children, however, I don’t want a hand-out from anyone. I want to be left alone to reach whatever potential I have and am willing to work hard for. I want my children to grow up feeling the same way so they are well-rounded people – even if they don’t wind up with a lot of money.

That’s the problem — it is good for the people who are taking the money, it is only bad for everyone else. Their gain, is our loss. The rational choice is to figure out how you can get some of the “gain” as well, to offset your losses to others.

JLP won’t like me saying it, but even the ultra-rich play this game where their “income” (dividends & investments make up the majority of their income) is only taxed at 15%, whereas I’m in the 25% bracket. That is their gain, my loss.

If the middle-class can’t stop the distribution of wealth from the middle class to the upper and lower classes, then the middle-class needs to figure out a way to get some of the ‘loot’ too — if only to balance things out somewhat.

So, it’s always necessary to point out the errors in the program. But we can’t really debate a program on true merit when that’s not the actually (though hidden) intent of the program in the first place.

The only way to STOP these kinds of things is to get to the people who are TAKING this money and try to get them to understand why it’s bad for them in the long run.

Hang the studies, though. My financial planning friends tell me that, in their real-life experience with 403b plans, once people put 2 cents together, they look at that money as a stash to be squandered when they’ve spent everything else. Why else would we have other studies that show a substantial number of people spend their 401k money when they change jobs, instead of transferring it to their new job or to a self-directed IRA.

I have found plenty of people who can accurately explain complex financial topics without actually understanding what they are talking about or why it’s even relevant.

But I don’t think this should be done at the federal level — I like leaving curriculum up to individual districts / states, so if anyone cares, they can already push for this class via their local school boards. My high-school had a Home Economy (HomeEc) class that covered budgets, balancing checking accounts, etc, among other things like sewing, cooking…

Also, students receiving student loans are required to attend a session that teaches the basics for those loans before the money is deposited.

I’m beginning to believe this is a non-issue, and the money is just a vote-grab like others are mentioning.

I don’t like the roundabout way of giving $500 at birth, which must be invested to maintain value (keep up with inflation), etc. This “stimulus” would have no affect for 18 years — makes no sense to me.

I’m against government handouts, but using the $2 billion to lower higher education costs is a Good Thing in my opinion. College costs in the US are becoming prohibitively expensive, costs are rising much faster than inflation (and wages). If education of the next generation is our future, then we should invest in that.

#5) what does “financial literacy” have to do with a driver’s license? I hate those tactics even worse than government handouts. Ideas like that lead to corruption.

At #4 Dylan…I was thinking we should tie a financial literacy test to the ability to get a drivers license. Wouldn’t that be interesting.