Reinventing Yourself in a Changing Job Market TONIGHT, Part of Money Smart Week at the Library

Recently I've noticed a big trend, my friends and I have started to stop carrying cash around. We pay for our coffees or gas with credit cards. With direct deposit and ATMs all over the place who really needs think about how much is in their wallet? I've seen this attitude a lot lately, even fallen prey to it myself, but it can be very dangerous. Without a good understanding of how to earn money, what happens to it in the bank, and how to set up savings, you can find yourself in a lot of trouble.

In an effort to help educate more people about money the American Library Association has teamed up with the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago for Money Smart Week®, April 20th – 27th. The programs offered by the Medfield Public Library will focus on making sense of money for children, budgeting and saving for teens and reinventing yourself in a changing job market for adults:

Tuesday April 23rd 6:30-8pm Reinventing Yourself with Irene Buchine for adults

Thursday April 25th 4-5pm Teens and Money with Vera Kesley-Watts for teens

Saturday April 27th 12-12:30pm Medfield Visit the Needham Bank for kids

Though this may seem like a big spread of topics, they all relate to the idea of financial literacy and how to navigate through a tough economic period. Literacy is no longer just about reading and writing. It can encompass many other subjects like finance, technology and politics. As a library our job in the community is to facilitate literacy, no matter what kind.

As a kid, my grandmother put $10 in the bank every week so I could have the opportunity to of an established savings account as I got older. In my teens I thought that the $2,500 I had in my savings account was a fortune and quickly blew through it buying things because I could. I regretted a lot of the choices I made when I saw how far my savings account had fallen. I’d had the money sitting in a bank account, but I’d done nothing to earn it. The link between working to buy something and just wanting was still missing. I’ve gotten better at saving and replenished that account my grandmother set up, but it’s still a struggle to look at my paycheck and willingly put a chunk of it out of reach. I’m working on it, but I know I’m not the only one struggling out there with this.

Understanding money and how to be fiscally responsible are important skills. We are very happy to be a partner for Money Smart Week this year and to provide this valuable programming to you.

® Money Smart Week is a registered service mark of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago