#family-finance

20 hours a week at $25/hour, 52 weeks a year, comes to $26,000 — over the 2025 gift-tax exclusion if paid informally, but ordinary taxable compensation under a written personal care agreement.

We ran a $15,000 custodial brokerage account through the kiddie tax calculator for high-bracket parents — $12,300 of it gets taxed at the parent's marginal rate, not the child's, once unearned income clears the $2,700 threshold.

We ran a real 3-sibling scenario — a doctor, a teacher, and a freelancer — through equal, proportional, and hybrid cost splits. The 'fair' answer changes completely depending on which one you pick.

The education-fund math works backward from your target: instead of asking 'what will my savings grow to,' it solves the compound-interest formula for the monthly contribution that actually gets you there.