The Moon Mom: Teaching Your Children about Greed

I like money.

I like spending it. I like saving it. I like it in my bank, and I like it in my hands. I like it on a boat, I like it in my coat. You get the idea.

According to news reports and the folks occupying Wall Street and other places, I am a have-not, a 99-percenter, and it seems like I’m never going to be part of this 1 percent that is controlling most of the nation's wealth. That’s OK. As long as my family and I have the basics and maybe a few extras thrown in for fun, we will be just fine, but I want my children to do more, be more and have more than me.

We want our children to be successful; we want them to grow up and get good jobs, and according to one of my earlier columns about , it seems a few of us wouldn’t mind if our children became extremely wealthy.

A lot of folks seem to have problems with wealthy people. Any time I hear people complain about what wealthy people are doing, or not doing, it reminds me of complaints I hear about Oprah. She’s forgetting where she came from! Is she too good to have rappers on her show? Why would she build a school in Africa when there are children who need good schools in Chicago?

I have to admit I’m torn when people complain about what wealthy people chose to do, or not do, with their money.

Corporations should pay employees fair wages, everyone should pay their fair share of taxes, and it would be nice if wealth disturbution were more even.

I agree with much of what the Occupy Wall Street movement has to say when it comes to those macro issues, but if you amass a fortune and want to spend it on diamond chokers for your herd of cats, isn’t it your money to do with what you wish?

Hopefully, we raise our children to be good people who look out for others less fortunate. I hope that if one of my children strikes it rich, he would use some of his money to help out those in need, but is it really wrong if they decide they don’t want to?