Reality Bites: The Frugal Teenager, Ready or Not (NY Times)

From cell phones and designer jeans to graduation parties that felt like a show biz event, many parents treated their kids like royalty (or did they spoil them rotten).

With homes as cash machines a thing of the past and the credit faucet being turned off, reality bites and the grown ups have to explain the birds and the bees of money to their baffled teenagers.

Thrift shops are not cool for most of them as The Frugal Teenager, Ready or Not by Jan Hoffman (NY Times, October 10) reports.