One day I saw my dad trading on eTrade. It looked interesting so I wanted to do it. I had always saved my allowance money and birthday money, and the first thing I bought was Apple stock -- when shares were only $100.
I now have an eTrade account and a Scottrade account. In addition to Apple, I've also invested in other stocks like Google, Microsoft and Rim. I have some money in a savings account, too. But most of the money I plan to use for retirement is invested in stocks.
This January, the New York Stock Exchange was sponsoring a competition where the challenge was to create something to teach other kids how to save and invest. I decided to make an iPhone app called Oink-a-Saurus targeted at kids and teens who want to learn ways to save money, and I ended up winning first place.
I want to help other kids learn to save and invest more responsibly. The current generation cannot rely on Social Security, so we have to save for our own retirement and can't depend on that.
When I was 7 years old, all the kids would get trophies whether they won or lost and I thought they were worthless. I asked my mom, who would actually pay for the trophies and how much they cost. When she said they were $10 apiece and parents paid for their child's trophy, I asked if I could keep the $10 to save in a bank account instead of receiving the trophy.
I'm not planning on spending most of the money I have invested for a very, very long time. I'm not that scared about investing most of it in stocks, because when you're a kid it's not that big of a deal if you lose a little money -- you still have time to get it back.
A quarter of middle class Americans plan to delay retirement until they are at least 80 years old.
