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Why Child Care Is So Expensive

theatlantic.com

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Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#241

Post by pfranz »

klipt wrote: post #197
darawk wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're missing the point of the "childcare is not part of the workforce" argument. It's not that it isn't work, and it's not that it isn't important. It's that, in many cases, the economic comparative advantage for the (often) female caretaker of those children is not being fully utilized. That is to say, caring for a child is a service that costs X. But it is being performed by a person who's skills are valu…

Why is subsidized daycare necessary in these cases though? In America if daycare costs X and you earn Y much greater than X, then obviously you'll make more money going to work and sending your kid to daycare than being a stay at home parent. The people who choose to stay at home often either have multiple kids (higher X) or earn little enough (lower Y) that it's not an economic advantage for them to work. But those…

Do you care if the country's population drops dramatically? I'm sure many people are fine with that, but if you're a country looking to stay strong economically the math says you'll need to incentivize childrearing somehow.

I think subsidized daycare is a great idea as long as it isn't too much of a disincentive for those who want to stay home with their kids. When I was looking into childcare I noticed there were a lot of options that were only 2-3 hours a day. It took me awhile to realize these were breaks for parents who stayed at home and they were not targeting parents working full time. The parents I do know that have stayed at home could really use and appreciated some reprieve here and there. Nicer gyms and even grocery stores offer temporary childcare. I'm confident there are fewer options in middle/lower class neighborhoods.

Most people I know who chose to stay at home have only one or two kids. Even for those who have, say, five kids I wouldn't say it would still be a net loss to the government (many regulations mandate 1:6 caretaker:child for pre-walkers to 1:15 starting at age 5 for childcare). There are other advantages to group care like being able to spot issues that aren't age appropriate. As a parent I don't have a large sample size for most milestones. "Normal" can have a range of a year for many developmental skills, but others can stick out in a group setting. Spotting these things early can go a long way in addressing them. Scheduled pediatrician visits are only once or twice a year and last ~30m. So many things can be easily missed.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#242

Post by namdnay »

SkyBelow wrote: post #15

So the three reasons given by the article. * Primarily labor driven. You can't automate, you can't reduce hours, you squeeze 9 hours of child care out of an 8 hour workday. * Regulation. This prevents the one way to lower labor cost: increasing child to adult ratio. Laws prevent this. * Real estate costs. Child care can't be moved to cheaper cities and there is even limits on the extent it can be moved within a city…

That’s also before subsidies. You can subsidise so it never exceeds X% of the household income, which is what they do in France

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#243

Post by abbadadda »

A lot of really good discussion in this article. I just wanted to add a couple of things:

It is a true blessing if a mother or father can stay at home to raise their children. However, over time being a stay at home parent is incredibly isolating. Men are suseptible to depression, but women especially so post-partum. Also, many parents do eventually want to work either part time or full time. The longer one stays out of the work force the bigger the gap on the resume and the harder it is to find work as children grow up. I agree the lowest paying jobs should not be subsidized, but I think the benefits of taxpayer subsidized childcare would be overwhelmingly positive. The quality of childcare makes a big difference in the equation, but parents, especially mothers, should be encouraged to re-enter the workforce if they so choose. Every policy creates incentives and I have no qualms with the ones created by subsidized childcare.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#244

Post by HBKXNCUO »

telesilla wrote: post #192
darawk wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're missing the point of the "childcare is not part of the workforce" argument. It's not that it isn't work, and it's not that it isn't important. It's that, in many cases, the economic comparative advantage for the (often) female caretaker of those children is not being fully utilized. That is to say, caring for a child is a service that costs X. But it is being performed by a person who's skills are valu…

Not just an economic advantage either, but for the mental health of the mother, it's very rare to meet a woman who only desires to stay at home for the duration of a child's life.

>it's very rare to meet a woman who only desires to stay at home for the duration of a child's life

I assume you mean until the child goes to school or perhaps becomes an adult, and in my experience it's not rare to meet women like that.

It certainly was not rare in previous generations, so to the extent that it is rare today, it's due to cultural changes. If women's mental health is suffering because certain elements of society have convinced them they should be working instead of caring for their children, we should just as strongly consider countering those elements.

What is very rare in my experience is to meet an older woman who wishes she had spent less time with her children when they were young.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#245

Post by jonas21 »

jstanley wrote: post #154
jperras wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a "nit pick" for sure, but in my understanding, something that "pays for itself" is not dependent on government subsidies. Quebec has some of the highest income taxes in the country - you pay for such services one way or another. The subsidies that are required are offset by the increased labour force participation that occurs as a direct result of said subsidies. Conversely, if the subsidies disappeared, then…

> do I remain in the workforce and pay $1-2k/month for childcare, or do I quit my job and raise my child/children? That the program "pays for itself" in increased taxes implies that the additional tax burden is at least the $1-2k/month required to pay for the childcare. So if you just cancelled the childcare and reduced the taxes you'd end up at the same place on average, except you wouldn't have non-parents subsidis…

No, the argument is that the program increases GDP because more women with children are participating in the labor force. A portion of that increase is collected in taxes, and if that amount happens to be the same or larger than what the government spends on childcare, the program "pays for itself".

Non-parents are not subsidizing parents in this scheme. And if the additional amount collected in taxes is greater than the cost of the program, then parents are subsidizing non-parents.

If you cancelled the childcare, the GDP increase would disappear, so the increase in tax revenue would disappear, and you wouldn't be able to reduce the tax rate.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#246

Post by the_watcher »

ouid wrote: post #111
the_watcher wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The dirty secret is that most women work because they HAVE TO. It's not a choice. If you can have a house, nice car, four kids, vacation home, 40 hour week, no credit card debt, no school debt, and all of that on carpenter salary -- why not to enjoy life instead of spending 50-60 hours at the office? I think you can replace "women" with people and make this statement more accurate. I don't see why this would be uni…

That too is an undergeneralization. People work because they want to just like they breathe because they want to. Claiming that there is some sort of innate desire to work or not work is ludicrous.

That's a separate point from "women work because they have to". Regardless of your POV on whether or not most people work out of necessity rather than desire, I don't see any reason to believe any differences here attributable to gender.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#247

Post by TecoAndJix »

rayiner wrote: post #148
josinalvo wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you be more specific? What is the nature of this toil?

I've got two kids: 15 month old boy, 7 year old girl. With the boy, the toil is literally keeping him from killing himself. If you put him downstairs, he'll try to climb up the stairs. He'll climb on the couch and fall off the other side. He'll drop things in the toilet. He'll try to pull stuff off shelves. He'll climb up the chair onto the dining room table. He is not content to sit and eat. I gave him cornbread yes…

My heart is so full but my mind is so tired!

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#248

Post by yanslookup »

ben7799 wrote: post #194

I live in Massachusetts.. mentioned in the article as averaging $16k. I have a child who stopped going to private day care a year and a half ago. For us it was more like $20-24k/yr for child care. There were centers near one of my workplaces that were more like $35-40k/yr/child. Anything near the trendy high tech office spaces in Boston/Cambridge is going to be in that > $30k/yr/child range. I think there are nice pr…

For another data point, my wife and I live in Cambridge, MA we just hired a nanny for our 6 month old son at a rate of 23/hr for 30 hours per week (~35k/yr)... This was competitive with nearby day care center rates.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#249

Post by decebalus1 »

pfortuny wrote: post #57
jperras wrote: post #7

It doesn't have to be this way. Québec has had subsidized daycare for almost 25 years, and the program literally pays for itself (and more!) via increased income taxes from parents that would have otherwise chosen to stay at home. https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/12/affordable-daycare-su... > In Montreal, Quebec’s largest city, a day of child care cost on average $10 in 2016 > Quebec’s program, which introduced lo…

“It would allow more women to enter the workforce”. I understand what the quote means but, honestly, this is one of the big wrong points of our society: that caring for the children full-time is NOT being part of the workforce. This is one of those cultural ideas embedded in XXI Century logic which only does harm and transmits the wrong message: people’s life is as valuable as the money the work or the “job” they hav…

> I understand what the quote means but, honestly, this is one of the big wrong points of our society: that caring for the children full-time is NOT being part of the workforce.

I see it more as a way of self-sufficiency and financial independence from the spouse. I believe one of the wrong points in our 'free' society is that it's perfectly acceptable to basically rely on your spouse for financial stability. That is a frequent source of abuse, resentment, unfulfilled dreams, and the regular 'i raised MY kids' narrative during divorce proceedings etc..

> people’s life is as valuable as the money the work or the “job” they have,

Unfortunately this is the world we live in, especially with the lack of social safety net provided by the state. Someone must go out and make money in order to sustain a certain level of quality of life.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#250

Post by strenholme »

Here in California, once a kid is four or five years old (ready to go to elementary school), we provide subsidized care at public schools in the form of ESS (Extended Student Services). It costs under $5000 a year to have the kid cared for from 6:30am to 6pm (usually, parents drop off their kids later and pick them up earlier). The staff are very professional and kind people.

Yes, there are issues with more parents who want their kids to be in it than slots available, and there are about four or five weeks a year when it’s not available, but it does provide excellent child care for kids.

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