RE: How Do We Get Kids to Invest?
Big fan of life insurance. In fact, just bought my whole family a combo life/medical insurance package. The deals are quite nice in China, especially compared to the US. I can honestly say that I finally feel safe. Like I actually consider just walking across the street when it's red now. It's super nice.
Coverdells are awesome, dude. Just think that that $2k per year that you are putting away is just for education. And if they don't use it, they can roll it over to their kid. I love it. I'm all about pots of money for specific purposes. Of course, I also provide other pots of savings! The idea here is to just pick one stock per year with that $2k and let it ride until they're 18. Remember that it's not about returns so much as it is developing investing habits. (Although I've done this the past 4 years and the results have been great.)
As for charity... blockchain, baby! That's one of the better use cases of the tech, actually. Let's push this accountability thing out to all charities.
Call me cynical, but whenever the government creates a carve-out for a special purpose and then puts limits on it, I am leery. Look what happened to the Poles in 2013. If I can achieve the same ends with better methods, I'll do that.
Love the idea for blockchain accountability for charities.
I think you're missing the point. You can, of course, do what you want with your money in almost every account there is out there. But the cool thing about education savings accounts (and certain retirement accounts) is that they are tax-advantaged. It's silly to pay more taxes than you have to. Knowwhadimean?