Once you become a parent you have certain responsibilities to your child. You need to feed him/her, they have to get an education and then they need to know how to use money. Kids need to be able to understand money. They need to know that every time you buy them that chocolate that the money used didn't grow off your tree in the backyard. Kids are very often unaware of the value of money. There are ways of giving your kids that opportunity without making your account vulnerable.
You might be cringing at the idea of giving your irresponsible teenager a credit card. Teenagers might see it as free money; it doesn't have to be like that. There is a way where you can monitor your child's expenses and at the same time give your teen a responsibility lesson. The answer to this is a pre-paid credit card, with pre-paid credit cards your teen will have the freedom of having money and spending up to a point. Unlike normal credit cards your teen/teens cannot go over the spending limit, resulting in a lesson about budgeting.
If you decide to go with a pre-paid credit card you are basically doing the same as a pre-paid cell phone, where you buy airtime and load on your phone and once that amount has been used it's done. You cannot go into minus with a pre-paid credit card once you have loaded the card with money you can monitor your teen's purchases and limit the amount your kid can spend on that card. You can also "top up" your card by loading more money on it, this is much better than giving your teen cash, because cash can be stolen lost or spent more rapidly.
There are other options too; these are secured and unsecured credit cards for your teens. All three of those options give you the reassurance of a limit. Now there are other important things to look at. You need to analyze your kid and determine whether he/she is really ready for a credit card. Look at a few things like: does he/she always ask for extensions on his/her projects? This indicates that he/she won't be able to pay the monthly payments. Also does he/she lie to you? If your kid asked for money to buy lunch at the tuck shop and came home with a new CD, then you need to consider that maybe your teen will spend more than he/she might be telling you. The last thing you need to look at is whether your teen can budget with his/her allowance.
You are the only one that will know whether your child is ready for a credit card because ask any child/teen if they want a credit card and their immediate answer will not be: "No Mom/Dad I think you need to wait a few more years so that I can become a responsible adult first". If your teen answers that way you have been blessed. More than likely your kid will be more than willing to have a card. It is your responsibility however to make sure you teach them how to use it wisely.
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