Synopses & Reviews
Parents will do just about anything to give their kids the best shot at good lives. Marketers know thisand use it to manipulate parents into buying millions of dollars worth of unnecessary products each year. Enough is enough.
In Not Buying It, Brett Graff, the Home Economist,” separates the truth about what parents need in order to raise their kids to succeed from the fiction. In this bold takedown of predatory marketing, Brett shows how parents can save over a million dollars by investing the money they would otherwise spend on overpriced and unnecessary purchases for their kids. Plus, Graff exposes the many ways that overspending can actually harm kids by encouraging narcissism and unhealthy habits. Her tips range from the everyday (go for the functional stroller, not the one with an onboard cell-phone charger) to the long-term (dont waste thousands on private school if public school will do just fine), making this a valuable manual for all stages of a parents life.
An essential book both for new parents and veterans , Not Buying It, is the definitive guide for moms and dads who have had enough of dishonest marketingand just wont buy it any longer.
Synopsis
Most parents will do just about anything to secure happy lives and bright futures for their kids. Add in competition with other parents and near-constant pressure, their drive to give their kids the best of everything can backfire, setting back the child and the household finances.
Brett Graff, "The Home Economist," exposes how overspending can harm children by setting back intellect and encouraging narcissism, depression and unhealthy or unsafe habits. By unearthing research on pricey baby gear, oversized houses, so-called "educational" toys and after-school lessons, expensive sports equipment and private coaching, even certain organic products and unregulated "natural" medicines--she even has eye-opening findings on private schools versus public schools--Graff proves that we can spend too much getting our kids ahead and wind up instead setting them back.
Not Buying It proves that sound, rational decision-making about spending is far more beneficial for our kids than purchases made out of fear, pressure and confusion. With Graff's guidance, you'll confidently create the financial strategy that's best for your family, not the one pushed by marketers or practiced by your neighbors. Not Buying It is your blueprint for emotional and financial freedom, and the stability your children deserve.
About the Author
Brett Graff, the Home Economist,” is a former U.S. government economist and correspondent for Reuters who writes on the psychology of consumer spending. Her writing is published in the
Miami Herald, Chicago Tribune, Kansas City Star, Detroit News, and has been featured in Glamour, Good Housekeeping, American Baby, Redbook, Maxim, Ladies Home Journal, First for Women, Cosmopolitan, Womens Health, and the
Los Angeles Times. She has also written for Forbes.com, Learnvest.com, the Nest, the Knot, and the Bump.
Her television segment, The Home Economist,” ran for four seasons on Nightly Business Report, and Brett has made appearances on CNN, CNBC, Headline News, France 2, and each of the Miami ABC, NBC, and CBS affiliates.
Brett is a wife, a mother of two young girls and a recovering PTO officer, where she learned in the trenches that traditional economists are wrong in assuming people are rational shoppersparticularly if those people happen to be parents.