Lifestyle #5: Charging Cigarettes to Your Parents’ Credit Card

We know what you’re thinking: my parents don’t even know that I smoke, how can I possibly get them to pay for my cigarettes?

Silly question. Most poor rich kids have some sort of access to their parents’ credit card. Even if you’ve been cut off, so to speak (and every poor rich kid will insist that he/she is entirely financially independent), your parents want to know that if someone holds you at gunpoint and the $6.32 in your wallet just isn’t enough, the thief / poor-poor-person will be able to take their credit card. This way the poor-poor-person will feel satisfied and won’t kill you. So your parents give you their credit/ATM card, just in case.

There is, however, another acceptable use for your parents’ credit card: buying items from the pharmacy. Use their credit card to buy a carton of cigarettes. If Mom and Dad call and ask why there’s a $50 charge from Duane Reade, tell them you had a cold or the flu and needed medical supplies, which are crazy expensive these days. What sort of upwardly mobile parents would deny their downwardly mobile children their health?

Now we know you feel ashamed that your parents still pay for shit, but get over it, everyone does it. And if Mom and Dad get an itemized credit card bill, you can always tell them you were mugged at gunpoint and the bandit charged a carton of cigarettes at the Duane Reade. Cigarettes are expensive!