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Why Child Care Is So Expensive

theatlantic.com

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Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#31

Post by kauffj »

Child care is likely expensive for at least two reasons:

- Child care is a superior good (in the economics sense). As we get richer, we almost certainly spend more of our money on it, as we do in other areas that are substantially driven by signalling (see health care, education).

- It is absurdly regulated and there is nothing close to a free market. My family participates in a child care sharing arrangement that results in several families regularly breaking the law. That is because it is illegal to watch more than 4 children (if at least one of them is not yours) without state licensing.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#32

Post by lettergram »

ChaosDegenerate wrote: post #6

The thing with female workforce participation: isn't it just symptom of the society getting poorer. My wife worked her ass off. I was making about 130k / year. She was making about 60k / year. Then we not only moved from the US to Poland (where live is just so much cheaper). But I also started making about 330k / year. All the willingness to work evaporated on her part :-) Instead we have another kid. She stopped tal…

I actually just wrote about this lol

https://austingwalters.com/tiny-handcuffs/

My general thoughts are that 90% of people don’t want to work - so yea none of us would if we didn’t have to.

One thing that’s always astonishing to me is that it’s not the the poor are necessarily getting poorer... it’s that we want to give more resources to our kids. You can have 10 kids on a salary of $120k a year, you just have to live on rice and thrift.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#33

Post by nathan_compton »

ChaosDegenerate wrote: post #6

The thing with female workforce participation: isn't it just symptom of the society getting poorer. My wife worked her ass off. I was making about 130k / year. She was making about 60k / year. Then we not only moved from the US to Poland (where live is just so much cheaper). But I also started making about 330k / year. All the willingness to work evaporated on her part :-) Instead we have another kid. She stopped tal…

[dead]

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#34

Post by RandomBacon »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #2

Women's introduction to the workforce was the right thing to happen but it fundamentally hurt labor and the "middle class". You can't double the supply without changing anything in the system and inflationary effects of dual income are ridiculous.

I'm sure it's more complex than this, and of course equal opportunities for everyone is good, but yes I think it hurt.

More people going to university -> Demand outgrows supply, universities can charge more and spend more money on appealing things. More student debt.

More workers -> More supply than demand, companies can pay less.

Each worker needs a vehicle. More expenses.

Both parents working, need to pay someone else to take care of kids. More expenses.

More debt/expenses, less pay.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#35

Post by davidw »

cortesoft wrote: post #18
ChaosDegenerate wrote: post #6

The thing with female workforce participation: isn't it just symptom of the society getting poorer. My wife worked her ass off. I was making about 130k / year. She was making about 60k / year. Then we not only moved from the US to Poland (where live is just so much cheaper). But I also started making about 330k / year. All the willingness to work evaporated on her part :-) Instead we have another kid. She stopped tal…

I would be very careful about making that large a generalization (that all else being equal, women would prefer to stay home over working). Childcare is mind numbing work, especially with young kids. Sure, some women (and men) would prefer that, but a LOT of women prefer office work over raising children. "why not to enjoy life instead of spending 50-60 hours at the office?" is really selling short how much work rais…

> I would be very careful about making that large a generalization (that all else being equal, women would prefer to stay home over working).

Especially within earshot of my wife. Stuff like that pisses her off to no end, with good reason. She's smart and accomplished and very much enjoys the challenges of a professional career.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#36

Post by kauffj »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #2

Women's introduction to the workforce was the right thing to happen but it fundamentally hurt labor and the "middle class". You can't double the supply without changing anything in the system and inflationary effects of dual income are ridiculous.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#37

Post by jsharf »

mkoryak wrote: post #22
FactolSarin wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's necessarily woman-specific. I'm a guy, and if I could stay at home all day and spend time with my kids, I would too. Certainly, I would if my wife was making 330k/year :D

wait, are you saying that staying at home with the kids is not work?! It is arguably a harder job than most white collar jobs out there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWcJZ210AaM

Yeah but kids can smile and bond with you. Computers can't. It's hard work, but it's a bad idea to compare the two either way. One might come naturally to some people, even if they're (gasp) computer programmers.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#38

Post by watwut »

ChaosDegenerate wrote: post #6

The thing with female workforce participation: isn't it just symptom of the society getting poorer. My wife worked her ass off. I was making about 130k / year. She was making about 60k / year. Then we not only moved from the US to Poland (where live is just so much cheaper). But I also started making about 330k / year. All the willingness to work evaporated on her part :-) Instead we have another kid. She stopped tal…

Having nothing useful to do day after day is not an awesome lifestyle. It is depression inducing, lowers your confidence and self respect. You are becoming increasingly pointless. Not just makes you feel dependent, but also actually makes you dependent. On one hand, you feel like a taker and useless and golddigger, so you are restraining yourself from asking what you would consider normal had you worked. On the other, partner feels like contributing more too.

It all has actual consequences. Lastly, I remember reading stats about domestic violence rates going down when economics changes so that women earns more or males less. It goes up when it changes other way.

You assume horrible office that expects you to work 60 hours a week. Somehow it is ok for men to work in that horrible office? Why don't men push to work less to actually be with family? Like, man getting to be actually a father and not just a wallet for family?

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#39

Post by ChaosDegenerate »

cortesoft wrote: post #18
ChaosDegenerate wrote: post #6

The thing with female workforce participation: isn't it just symptom of the society getting poorer. My wife worked her ass off. I was making about 130k / year. She was making about 60k / year. Then we not only moved from the US to Poland (where live is just so much cheaper). But I also started making about 330k / year. All the willingness to work evaporated on her part :-) Instead we have another kid. She stopped tal…

I would be very careful about making that large a generalization (that all else being equal, women would prefer to stay home over working). Childcare is mind numbing work, especially with young kids. Sure, some women (and men) would prefer that, but a LOT of women prefer office work over raising children. "why not to enjoy life instead of spending 50-60 hours at the office?" is really selling short how much work rais…

well, somehow the society at large has no problem with exactly opposite generalization: that women prefer to work over staying home with their kids.

It is an individual matter, I agree. With most women definitely having the preference of staying at home. But for that the right partner is needed, i.e. one who provides enough resources for her and her kids. If this is not present she will go to work. We decided as a society to frame it different just not to face difficult truth, which is society becoming poorer. It's just so much easier to say that somehow nowadays women prefer working to following their maternal instinct.

As a man you are wired to compete with other males for resources to be brought to your partner and offspring. I'm sorry but this is just how it works. Women define male attractivness based on his socio-economic status. Of course if you don't want your wife (and other females and society at large) to look down at you, you will eventually go back to work and work your ass off. She on the other hand, can but she doesn't need to. It's not like you or pretty much anyone will look down at her for not working. Current social fashions aren't going to change five milion years of evolution of the species.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#40

Post by zeveb »

> While it’s admirable for companies to fill the day-care vacuum, the absence of a national solution is an indictment of American policy.

California is very different from Vermont which is very different from Mississippi. It doesn't make any more sense for the three to have identical child-care systems than it does for Denmark, Italy and Lithuania.

I don't find his argument that only the federal government is large enough to capture the upside particularly compelling, and his straw-man counterarguments are … strawmen.

Moreover, it's also important to understand what the second-order results of any state child-care policy are. While parents do mistreat their children, I am reasonably sure that child-care workers mistreat children more often. If so, a child-care policy which substitutes non-parent care for parent care will likely result in increased rates of mistreatment.

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