Legacy Builder James Barry Watts Explains How To Teach Children The Value Of A Dollar

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Most parents put off the money talk. They tell themselves the kids are too young, that fractions come first, that there will be time once allowance age arrives. Then a birthday check gets tucked into a card, a first paycheck disappears on a Friday night, and a habit forms without anyone choosing it.

James Barry Watts thinks that window closes sooner than most families realize. He also thinks the fix is far simpler than most families expect. It takes three glass jars, a marker, and a willingness to start early.

Watts is the Chief Retirement Designer and Tax Strategist at the company he founded, WealthCare Retirement Solutions in Springfield, Missouri. The firm was named to the Inc. 5000 in 2025. A veteran wealth investor, he is also credentialed by the IRS to represent clients in tax disputes. His days are spent on tax strategy, retirement income, business exit planning, and what he calls legacy design — the work of making sure wealth outlives the person who built it. He has spent decades sitting across the table from people at the most consequential money moments of their lives.

Yet when he talks about the lessons that matter most, he does not begin at the office. He begins with his daughters, and with a philosophy shaped as much by faith as by finance.

“My heart is deeply rooted in ministry: helping people develop a relationship with God through understanding the Bible,” said Watts, whose first career stop was as a minister pastoring a church. “That’s an UMBRELLA philosophy, and money is simply a category under that umbrella.”

For Watts, the Bible is a blueprint for every area of life, and that includes how a family handles a dollar. The book of Proverbs urges parents to train up a child in the way he should go, promising that when he is old he will not depart from it. Watts has taken that instruction seriously, and he has made it practical. According to Watts, the habits that build lasting wealth are rarely complicated. They are taught early, practiced often, and made simple enough for a preschooler to follow.

Three Glass Jars, Three Jobs: A Simple Giving, Saving, and Spending System Parents Can Start This Week

J. Barry Watts’s method is easy to describe and surprisingly hard to outgrow. It starts with a rule about what to do whenever a child receives money. That includes birthday gifts, holiday cash, and eventually paychecks from a first job. Whatever the source, the money gets divided.

“You start this when they are in preschool by taking three glass jars and labeling them OTHERS, SAVINGS, and SPENDING,” Watts said. Of every dollar, 10% goes to charity, 20% goes into long term savings, and the remaining 70% can be spent “on whatever fun things they like.”

The OTHERS jar comes first, and it comes first for a reason. Children learn that money is not only a tool for getting what they want. Some of it is meant to leave the house and help someone else. Giving stops being an occasional feeling and becomes a standing part of how money works, the same way brushing teeth is part of the morning.

The SAVINGS jar teaches patience, which may be the hardest financial skill to acquire at any age. A child who watches a jar fill slowly, month after month, is learning something no lecture can deliver. Money set aside today becomes choices tomorrow.

The SPENDING jar might be the most underrated of the three. At 70%, it is the largest share, and that is deliberate. Children are allowed to enjoy their money. They can buy the toy, the candy, the thing that seems ridiculous to an adult. A system built entirely on restriction tends to get rebelled against. A system that leaves real room for fun teaches that discipline and enjoyment can live in the same household.

A few practical touches make the idea work even better. Glass jars matter because children can see the level rise. A simple family habit helps too. If a birthday card holds $20, the math is easy enough to do together at the kitchen table: $2 for OTHERS, $4 for SAVINGS, $14 for SPENDING. Doing that arithmetic aloud, every time, is where the real teaching happens, Watts explained. The habit outlasts the amounts.

James Barry Watts has put the full framework into an original piece he calls “Six Steps to the Successful Financial Launch of Your Child,” and the jars are its foundation. The message underneath is that financial habits are best taught early and simply, and that the simplest tools are often the ones that stay with a person for life.

What a Working Farm Taught J Barry Watts About Planting, Patience, and Surviving a Bad Harvest

If the jars are the mechanics of Watts’s approach, the farm is its philosophy. It’s a metaphor he returns to often, one rooted in the Midwest sensibility he hopes his daughters carry with them.

“There is a deep rootedness in the Midwest that I don’t necessarily sense in other parts of the country,” Watts said. That rootedness, in his view, is magnified on a working farm, where the connection between action and outcome is impossible to miss.

“In order to have a crop (profit) you must put a seed in the ground (invest).”

For instance, a seed sitting in a shed grows nothing. Money works the same way. Saving is the act of planting, and it asks a person to give up something now for a harvest they cannot yet see. Children who grow up understanding that are less likely to view saving as deprivation. They see it as the first step of growing something.

Watts is equally honest about the other half of the story. “On the farm you usually win, but sometimes you lose, and the animal dies or the crop fails. That’s part of the learning process that equips you for the vagaries of life in adulthood.”

This may be the most valuable idea for parents to borrow. Many families teach children to save but never prepare them for the year the crop fails. However, investments dip, businesses struggle and plans change. A child who learns early that loss is a normal part of planting is far better equipped to stay steady when an adult version of that loss arrives. Resilience, in this view, is not a personality trait. It is something learned by watching seasons turn.

Training Up a Child: How Any Family Can Bring the Jars Home and Build a Legacy That Outlasts a Paycheck

Parents do not need a farm to use what Watts teaches. Nothing in his approach depends on acreage, income, or a finance degree. What it does require is consistency, and a few decisions made in advance.

He said to start with the jars, even if your children are past preschool. Older kids can adapt the idea to a bank account with three labeled sections. The percentages can be discussed openly, and the conversation itself becomes part of the lesson.

Let the giving be real, Watts explained. Encourage children to choose where the OTHERS jar goes, whether that is a food pantry, a church project, or a neighbor in need. Meeting a real need makes giving feel like something worth doing, not an obligation.

Then, talk about the seed. When a child adds to the savings jar, connect it to planting. Ask what they think it might become. You will be surprised how quickly a six year old starts thinking in terms of growth.

Finally, Watts said to talk about the losses. When something breaks or does not turn out as planned — treat it as part of the process. The goal is not to protect children from every mistake but to make sure their first mistakes happen when the stakes are small.

That same patience shapes how Watts works with adult clients, too. His firm believes wealth is personal, and that good advice should be built the same way the jars are built: simply, consistently, and with the long view in mind. Whether he’s talking to a six-year-old about a savings jar or a client about a thirty-year retirement plan, Watts says the underlying lesson doesn’t change. Small, consistent habits, practiced early and often, are what build something that lasts.

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