Chores for Kids: Good or Bad?

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For many children, doing chores is a normal part of their daily or weekly schedule, and are the way they expect to earn allowance money or permission to do extra activities. For other kids, chores are as unfamiliar as going to a full-time office job. In recent years, the divide between parents who require chores and those who don't has become more stark, and parents on each side of the argument – for chores or against – have strong, impassioned reasons for their belief that their way is the appropriate one.

Parents who believe in chores are firm in their reasoning, primarily because they see chores as a normal part of childhood development and growing up. The argument of these parents is that chores help children learn basic, necessary skills involved with everything from responsibility to money-management and time-management. Chores, when age-appropriate, can give children a sense that they are expected to be contributing members of their household, just like their parents. The idea behind this school of thought is that children who feel an early sense responsibility to help out their group will carry this value through the rest of their lives in school, work, and their own families.

Parents who are pro-chores also hope this practice will imbue their children over time with a sense of money- and time-management. By making a weekly allowance conditional on the completion of chores, parents hope to their children a sense of the value of money and an understanding that it doesn't often come for free. Setting a daily or weekly schedule for chores is also intended to cement the idea of accountability for children; if chores are not completed in the allotted time – just as in life – payment will not be given.

Most parents who are in favor of giving kids chores tend to ease them into it, with simple tasks at a young age and assigning more complex ones later on. Helping to fold laundry is a good example of a simple chore given to a younger child to get them started; older children often do more outwardly helpful jobs like walking the dog, taking out the trash, and cleaning communal spaces in the home.

For all of the parents who see the benefits of chores, however, there are many parents who argue that children should absolutely not be given chores. The main arguments behind this belief are similarly economic and responsibility-based. Most parents who are anti-chores believe that the chore systems implemented in most households are over-simplified and actually lead to bad relationships with money and responsibility.

One of the primary arguments of anti-chores parents has to do with the idea of offering an allowance in exchange for housework. The problem, they say, is that children should not be taught to expect money for completing normal household tasks; teaching children that they will be rewarded with money every time they do the laundry or mop the floor sets them up to expect some kind of treat for any work they do for the rest of their lives. This system does not prepare them for the fact that most of work that adults do, in and out of the house, goes unrewarded and unpaid.

On the other end of this argument is the idea that children will learn that the purpose of work is to be rewarded rather than to be a positive member of a team. These parents worry that rewarding children for certain tasks teaches them that other good behavior has less value and that money is the reason why they should help out.

There are also parents who are anti-chores simply because they believe children should be allowed to be children. Though this is a less-common philosophy, there are parents that think chores burden children with work and adult responsibilities too early, and that children benefit more from the opportunity to enjoy their lives free from basic duties as long as possible.

Whichever side of the chores argument you fall on, you will find many supporters. In the end, every family must find the system that they are most comfortable with and that they feel will benefit their children the most in the long run. Finding what works for your family is the ultimate way to determine the right answer in this debate.