Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and IRAs

Is it just me or is the enjoyment factor of summer inversely proportional to the number of graduation parties you get invited to?

As I get older, and unfortunately, receive invitations to more of them, I’m convinced of it.

Last weekend, we set a personal record – three graduation parties in two days – one for college and two for high school. Three overstocked buffet lines offering basically the same menu adjacent to the perfunctory coolers of beer, wine and bottled water. The repetitive conversations droned on, only the faces changed.

All I know is that at the end of the day – or more accurately, two days, my checking account was debited for roughly $300. That’s a lot of money for the privilege of eating off paper plates loaded with penne alla vodka and chicken Marsala.

What perhaps shocked me even more was the rapidity at which my checks were cashed. If my offspring were any example, I once found an uncashed graduation check in my daughter’s desk drawer that was – I kid you not – one year old.

But all three from last weekend were sucked out of my account a scant two days later.

But I digress.

In any event one of the proud parents informed me that his son had taken my check – and presumably all the others he received – and incredibly, opened an IRA. He explained that his son had learned about them during a personal finance class he took his senior year.

I could not even imagine myself at age 18 (or 17 as the case was when I graduated) pouring my new found largesse into a retirement vehicle rather than spending it like a drunken sailor on shore leave.

Okay, in my meager defense, IRAs were not available until the year after I escaped high school, but harkening back to those days, I would have trouble spelling I-R-A let alone having the foresight to invest in one.

Which brings me to my topic de jour.

For years I have been a staunch advocate of teaching children at an early age about finance – not just nationally and even globally, but on a personal level as well. I feel that it should be no less an academic requirement than math or science.

Too often, we hear and read stories about the Millenials’ shocking lack of knowledge on financial matters – it doesn’t do much good to understand LIBOR or the ramifications of NAFTA if you’re continually overdrawn on your own checking account.

A number of state CPA societies have been proactive in establishing financial literacy programs and many secondary schools across the country have followed suit, a trend that could and should continue to expand.

As for my friend’s son, here’s hoping his investment pays off down the road. He may need it for all those future graduation parties he’ll eventually have to attend.