Parents, hide your plastic: according to a report calculated from the United Kingdom’s Office for National Statistics records on the spending habits of British families, teen girls considerably influence the way household budgets are spent. From the Daily Mail story:

“Researchers led by Professor Bernard Fortin…examined how much money went on services and leisure goods in different kinds of homes. They checked spending on food, restaurant meals, alcohol, tobacco, services, leisure, heating, transport, clothes and sports and entertainment equipment in 2,745 British families.

They found: ‘Teenage girls in the UK typically play an active role in family decisions about the allocation of household resources.”

Interestingly, a girl’s influence appears to disappear by the time she’s 21, even if she’s still living at home; and the data does not seem to indicate that teenage boys have much say over family spending habits.

As a mother of four boys ages 5 – 13 and one two-year-old girl whose influence is still limited to pointing and saying “Me? Me? Pleeease?!” every time we pass the fruit-snacks aisle at the grocery store (her attempt almost always strikes out), I’ll be interested to see whether my daughter Clara is more successful at influencing our family’s purchasing as she gets older…and how hard she’ll try. As for our boys, except for the occasional toy or video game and a very small handful of products they prefer (I should buy stock in Jif), I can honestly say they rarely seem to care how we spend our household money.

It could also be that parents and sons are less likely to shop, cook, or eat in restaurants together as a way to bond than parents and daughters? We’ve all heard that mothers tend to control the majority of a family’s spending budget; perhaps moms unconsciously pass this down to their daughters by discussing purchases with them and taking them shopping more often than they do boys.

Or maybe girls are just more likely to get their way…which in our house, at least right now, is definitely true. But that’s to be expected when you’re a two-year-old girl with four doting big brothers!

What do you think? If you have a girl, does she influence the way you allocate your family’s resources…perhaps without you even realizing she’s doing it?

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2009307/What-wants-gets-How-teenage-daughter-dictates-family-spending.html#ixzz1RMPU7jAb

Image: nuttakit / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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