I applaud the effort Amazon is making to expand its influence, and giving kids an Amazon allowance would lock them in because it doesn't look too easy to convert that money back to real cash.<p>But I don't think this one will stick around for very long. Prepaid cash/debit cards and automated deposits are an older and more proven way of doing this (not to mention just handing your kids $20 in cash every week). By giving them something that is accepted everywhere, you teach them how to handle limited amounts of money and how to resist temptations -- if I drop $5 on gas station snacks, I've just burned up a sizeable chunk of my allowance on something that will be gone in 10 minutes. Giving an allowance is great to teach young teenagers how to handle money before they get their own job, but I don't see Amazon breaking into this and locking kids into buying only from Amazon.
I want this for something like Fiverr.<p>Instead of my kids accumulating more junk, they learn the skills of hiring and delegating.<p>Don't want to mow the lawn in this heat? Use your allowance to somebody else to do it. As long as the job is done they will earn their allowance.<p>I just need a way to make sure they're not outsourcing their homework or paying somebody buy them alcohol.
I like the idea, but I would really like to see a bank or another finical institution offer some services that I can use as a modern introduction to banking for my kids. When I was a kid I had a savings account, and a savings book that I took to the bank to do all my banking. All my deposits and withdrawls were printed into the book by the teller and it was easy enough for me to fill out deposit slips for the checks and cash my family gave me or I earned doing jobs around the neighborhood.<p>Let my kids have a debit card and let them use ATM's and smart phone apps just like I do, even better if its designed to be useable by children to encourage good banking behaviors.
Simple paypal alternative that is free ....
Could not find any fee info, so should be free...<p>Then this could easily be used for accepting payments for services or sales. Since I anyways spend on amazon, better accept payments this way without any fee...
I don't understand how Amazon can afford to maintain so many projects given their revenue is so low (<a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=AMZN&annual" rel="nofollow">https://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=AMZN&annual</a>). Someone care to explain?