Trading Cards, Not Such a Bad Idea

I think a large question to many people is "are trading card games worth it if they are probably just a fad?" Such things might include Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh or the more popular Magic. I believe the answer to that question is yes, especially for younger children, for several reasons. Including, it helps the child "fit in", they are a good use of recreational time, and it helps boost our economy.

The first reason being it helps a child "fit in". It gives them something to talk about and associate with their friends. They can spend time with them talking about the game, which possibly has a TV show to go with it, playing the game and trading cards. All of these would provide time for bonding between old friends and also to help find new friends as well by meeting other collectors from the same game. This will help improve their social skills which are very important. They can also develop basic entrepreneurship skills by buying, selling and trading cards because in order to do this they would have to learn the value of each card as well as how to judge a value based on just looking at the card if they have never seen it before.

Next, it is a good use of recreational time. A good way to spend your leisure time is to collect and trade cards. I do not currently do this but have in the past. You can spend your time playing the game with the cards but also looking for more cards to improve your decks. You can try to find new people to play with and new places to go. There are also commonly tournaments with cash prizes, so it might pay you to collect all those cards anyways. Then when you are done you can always throw them in a shoebox and think what good you have done for the economy.

This leads me to my final point, trading cards help boost our economy. If you buy just one pack of trading cards think about all the industries you are supporting. Printing companies for all the ink and printers that are used to create the cards and packaging. The companies that make the material for the packaging, the paper companies, the company that owns the rights to the card game, the company that might control a TV show that goes along with the game. Many of these companies have a company they rely on like the paper company relying on either the recycling companies or the logging companies. All these would provide people jobs and in these times they are hard to come by, so why not get involved with a trading card game? Your job might even be affected by the trading card industry.

To wrap things up it might not be such a bad idea to let your child get involved with trading cards or to get involved with them yourself. It has social benefits, is a great cure for boredom and helps stimulate our economy. So next time you walk by that isle with all the different types of cards stop in and take a look, don't just walk by and be like what kind of nerd would go in that isle. Most importantly enjoy yourself while doing all this.