My daughter, Lily, said she had a deal for me. Since I feed my family by making deals, I was intrigued.

Having evaluated the deal, however, I'm not doing it.

She'll be disappointed.

And being right in the middle of what I've come to call "the difficult years," she may even be mad.

"The deal," as she called, was for me to buy her a new set of the 2nd generation AirPod Pros for $250, and she would work for me to pay me back.

My response for your consideration:

Child of mine.

I love you.

You made some convincing arguments in your request, and I applaud you for coming to me with a proposition that was well-intended and well-reasoned.

However, you did not consider a critical aspect of "the deal," as you called it. That's OK; you've probably never even heard of this concept, so I'll explain it now.

Consumer debt is money people owe from buying things like cars, boats, clothes, and other household goods that they paid for with a loan or credit card instead of cash. This means that, although they own them, they still need to pay for them.

A specific type of consumer debt is credit card debt, and I want to explain this to you because what you are asking me to do is function as a credit card for you to purchase the AirPods.

In America, the total debt owed to credit card companies is $925 Billion.

That's $925,000,000,000 with nine zeros!

That's a lot of money, especially considering that we only have about 334,000,000 people, of which only 250,000,000 are old enough to get a credit card. So that means, on average, Americans over 18 owe $3,750 on a credit card.

That's crazy!

But it's worse than it sounds because only some people owe money on their credit cards. Some people, like me, when I was younger, aren't smart with their credit cards and use them to buy things they can't afford. And while I changed that habit and got out of debt, not everybody does.

Buying one thing here and another thing there, some people slowly build up HUGE amounts of credit card debt: $ 10,000, $50,000, $100,000, or more. I had a client with close to $300,000 in credit card debt years ago!

When people do this, they wind up trapped. Many end up working long, hard hours at well-paying jobs but never get to do anything fun with the money they earn because all they can do is pay the bills for the stuff they've already bought.

Imagine if every time you earned money with your babysitting or tutoring, you had to hand it right over to pay your credit card bills. Or if you had to do that even with the money you get on Christmas or your birthday!

Does that sound fun?

Of course, it doesn't!

And that, my love, is why I will not be your credit card to buy new Airpods; that is not a wise use of credit.

For me to do that would be to encourage you to take on debt to buy things you cannot afford.

Instead, consider whether or not you need Airpods. I suggest that you don't, but at the same time, I don't want you to feel like you should never, ever buy something that you don't need.

Being able to buy things with the money we earn is one of the most fun things to do! It is definitely better than having to pay for things we already bought!

So, if you want to buy new Airpods, I have an alternative deal for you. You save up the money from babysitting and tutoring to buy them, and when you have it in hand, I'll pay for 20% of the cost as a reward for working hard and saving your money. And, on top of that, I'll put 20% into your savings or your stock account - your choice.

I know this isn't the answer you want, baby girl, but I care too much about your future to help you build the habit of going into debt for gadgets you can't afford.