When Greg and Rodrick start to ask for more money from their parents, Mrs. Heffley decides to create a system known as Mom Bucks. She promises to pay Greg and Rodrick with fake money that they can cash in for real money, but they must do chores and help out if they want to reap the benefits. While the Mom Bucks are supposed to represent a foolproof system for encouraging responsibility and ambition, they quickly deteriorate into a chaotic system of greed and deception.

When Mrs. Heffley first introduces the Mom Bucks program, she gives Greg and Rodrick some money to get started. Rodrick expresses immediate disinterest in the program by cashing in all of his money and spending it on magazines. Mrs. Heffley is disappointed, but Greg shows great interest in the idea of saving up his Mom Bucks for something he really wants. Mrs. Heffley tries to persuade the boys to help out with tasks like raking their grandmother’s yard, and she even offers to “pay [them] $100 in Mom Bucks for each bag [they] filled” (86). Greg and Rodrick reluctantly agree, but in the middle of their raking and bagging, Rodrick teaches Greg how to cheat the system by underfilling the bags.