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The cliché in the last century was that students should bring apples for schoolteachers, but these days it’s more like parents need to buy their kids Apples for schoolwork. And a new survey suggests that the pressure to buy new devices for back-to-school is saddling parents with debt.
More than half (55%) of parents said that buying new tech for their kids required them to go into credit card debt, use a payment plan, or borrow money from friends or family, according to a survey from ecoATM Gazelle, which sells pre-owned tech devices.
The survey, conducted through Pollfish, an online platform, polled 1,000 parents with children 8–18 on July 31.
Primal screen: On second thought, maybe forgo Apple: 41% of respondents said that, due to inflation, they were more interested in lower-cost tech brands and deals.
But whether it’s a fancy device or a basic one, parents seem to think that if the school’s not providing one, they’d better shell out. More than two in three parents (67%) said tech devices were necessary for their children to access classwork, homework, and educational resources.
Some parents are more able to equip their kids than others. Among parents with household incomes above $100,000 annually, 77% said they buy tech for their kids at least once a year; among parents with household incomes below $50,000, only 57% said they did.
As often is the case with polls commissioned by companies, ecoATM Gazelle has a dog in this fight, and naturally asked parents if they were considering used or refurbished devices. Nearly one-third (32%) said they were.