Wondering how to keep your kids busy during the summer months? If you’re a small business owner with older children, you might want to think about bringing them onto the payroll. While we’re not advocating for making your kids work 40 hours a week, a little time at the family shop or office can be an invaluable experience for your child—and a lucrative one for you. Here are some reasons to hire your child this season:
1. You Can Teach Her Strong Values.
It’s tough for children to learn good work ethics if they never hold down part-time jobs. When you hire your kids at your small business, you can start teaching them the value of working for the things they want. Additionally, teens that work for their parents – rather than the local Dairy Queen, for instance – learn what it means to dress professionally and communicate with adults in an office setting. Plus, you can monitor your child’s work hours to make sure time spent at the family business isn’t interfering with her study schedule.
2. You Can Save on Taxes.
If your tax bill is taking a toll on your business, you might want to think about hiring your child this year instead of an extra employee. If your son or daughter is under 18, and you’re operating as a sole proprietor or LLC, you aren’t required to pay social security or Medicare taxes. For best results, make sure your child is only doing work related to your business – not completing chores around the house. The last thing you want is the IRS questioning your employment practices come April.
3. She Can Save on Taxes, Too.
Just as you can save big on taxes by keeping it in the family, so can your son or daughter. Thanks to the Standard Deduction, adults and teens don’t have to pay federal taxes on the first $6,300 they earn each year. Your child can put this money away for college or even use it for a future home purchase.
4. She Can Find Her Future Career.
Is your child unsure about what her professional future holds? Hiring kids is a great way to give them a feel for the family business before they head off to college. After all, you don’t want your teen to spend four years of her time – and your money – earning a business degree she doesn’t end up using. By bringing your child into the office, you give her a chance to try out the career by experiencing the daily tasks and responsibilities.
5. You Get to Guide Her
Now a days no matter which subjects they study in school or college, there is something there to be learnt on the job. Older children can certainly help with data entry, data verification, developing documentation, software testing, performing calculations, conduct basic market research, and prepare reports. All these are essentials business tasks that will help them eventually prepare for their career. One big plus of having them work with you, is you can observe, guide & coach them so that when they get a job after graduating, the skills & knowledge gained are readily immediately applied.
Contact accurants
We’ve created a one-of-a-kind tool that lets you manage and monitor budgets, track employee hours, pay invoices, and assess customer buying behavior in a single location. The benefits of having all these features are numerous, whether you hire your child or an independent contractor, tracking their time & payment are critical items that you can be very easily handled in accurants software suite. accurants generates the Schedule C automatically by compiling data already entered, making tax time a breeze for your small business. For more information about our services, call today or sign up online for a free trial.