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Why Child Care Is So Expensive

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Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#381

Post by Aeolun »

kodablah wrote: post #333
Dove wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am convinced the isolated stay at home parent model is not normal human behavior, but a pathology of our particular society which represents an unreasonable expectation derived from an excessive commitment to individualism and independence. It is not psychologically reasonable to expect one person to care for children all day every day. It is not historically or broadly culturally normal. It is not healthy for eith…

> It is not psychologically reasonable to expect one person to care for children all day every day [...] It is normal for children to be cared for by many adults throughout the day I'd argue having the child away from parents so often is harmful as well. Financials aside, that middle ground somewhat exists: stay at home parents that still leverage social environments for their kids. I too don't know how we can get ev…

I just cannot see any harmful effects of my child being at daycare every weekday from the age of around 9 months.

If anything he seems to really enjoy both going there and coming home. He has tons of friends, and the teachers are fantastic.

I guess this strongly depends on the environment though. Maybe we just found a really good one. It kind of feels the same as having the community take care of the kid.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#383

Post by dr_dshiv »

vkou wrote: post #351
xsmasher wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be a side effect of suburbanization and the mass migration to single-family homes.

While we can blame the suburbs on a lot of social problems, this is not one of them. Families who raise their children in cities have all the same problems.

I personally think it is much easier in a city than a suburb, or at least very different.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#384

Post by bonoboTP »

aceofspades19 wrote: post #367
edoceo wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right! Taxing the high earners is a good idea, subsidized child care is just one of the many benefits.

Why is taxing high earners more a good idea? It just gives people an incentive to either not make that much money or leave the country to make more money.

Not everyone grew up in an as money-centered society as the US. A middle class Swedish lifestyle is plentiful and way beyond the reach of most people in most countries, including most Europeans. Whether you believe it or not, making 1.5x as much (or twice) in America is not that attractive for many people, especially because of how social issues are handled there. Not to mention family, friends etc. People aren't some mindless particles flowing towards more money.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#385

Post by asteli »

aceofspades19 wrote: post #367
edoceo wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right! Taxing the high earners is a good idea, subsidized child care is just one of the many benefits.

Why is taxing high earners more a good idea? It just gives people an incentive to either not make that much money or leave the country to make more money.

The aforementioned Swedes appear to be quite content paying their high taxes, given the benefits conferred.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-bur... [2] https://taxfoundation.org/sweden-competitive-spite-high-tax-... [3] https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-02-09/bernie-sanders-wants-...

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#386

Post by bonoboTP »

Digory wrote: post #215
umvi wrote: post #179

Unpopular opinion - but I think farming out the majority of the raising of children to daycares is a bad idea in the long term. Obviously some times you don't have a choice, but I think stay-at-home moms (or dads) are extremely valuable for the development of the child and potentially worth more than any monetary gains to be had from dual-income. Yeah, you might not be able to afford a nice house or car as quickly, b…

The person who gets "Uber, but for Parenting, not cars" right will make a fortune. The solutions in the article are "Medicaid, but for Parents, not doctors." What we need is "a culture with jobs that will pay enough to support two adults and their children, so that care of children, family, and the community is an expected part of every adult relationship."

It would probably end up in way too many lawsuits from all towards all directions and across.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#387

Post by aceofspades19 »

ihumanable wrote: post #370
aceofspades19 wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is taxing high earners more a good idea? It just gives people an incentive to either not make that much money or leave the country to make more money.

"Taxes are high so I won't try to make more money" - No one ever.

There are lots of people who don't try to make more money because of roadblocks put in by the government. Obviously the uber-rich like Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates don't care that much about taxes but for someone in the low to middle income brackets it can be challenging to move up as you pay more in taxes and receive less help from the government.

If you make enough money that you can live comfortably and you would have to move up a lot to counter the offset to make more money in the next tax bracket, I think the majority of people would not bother. Outside of HN, a lot of people are satisfied with making an okay salary and having steep tax bracket changes just amplifies that. Obviously, everyone would like to make more money if they could do so easily but if it is very difficult to do so, a lot of people will not be bothered.

The people who do want to make a lot of money and become rich, well if they have to deal with crazy taxes, they are going to either find away around the tax laws, or simply leave the country which both options are not good for the country.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#388

Post by usaar333 »

jandrese wrote: post #4

We definitely felt this. My wife ended up quitting her job when we had our first because all of the child care options we investigated were going to require basically her entire after-tax income to support. It only made sense if she was planning to grow her career and just ride out the daycare for 5 years until the kid went to school, but even then it's contingent on not having another kid during that time. At the en…

> her entire after-tax income to support

An interesting fact of our progressive income tax that combines spousal income is that the lower earning spouse is strongly disincentived to stay at home instead of work. This is especially true if one spouse has very high income.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#389

Post by HBKXNCUO »

vkou wrote: post #362
HBKXNCUO wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You are assuming massive incompetence on the part of child care workers with no prior evidence. The fact that they earn minimum wage is evidence of their collective incompetence. The fact that they would not be emotionally destroyed by never seeing the child again when either they leave their job or the child moves on is evidence of their indifference. >19% of women with a post graduate degree is huge. How many mill…

> The fact that they earn minimum wage is evidence of their collective incompetence. So, because society undervalues their work, they are incompetent losers, with anti-social behavior disorders? Please, pray tell, how much do you think the people who grow the food that you need to live get paid? Do you think as poorly of them?

>So, because society undervalues value their work, they are incompetent losers?

Because society pays less for that sort of work, the sort of people that end up doing that work will tend to be less competent than the people that do more highly paid work.

I'm not sure how you've concluded that society undervalues their work, though. That seems to me to be a matter of opinion.

Re: Why Child Care Is So Expensive

#390

Post by aceofspades19 »

bonoboTP wrote: post #384
aceofspades19 wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is taxing high earners more a good idea? It just gives people an incentive to either not make that much money or leave the country to make more money.

Not everyone grew up in an as money-centered society as the US. A middle class Swedish lifestyle is plentiful and way beyond the reach of most people in most countries, including most Europeans. Whether you believe it or not, making 1.5x as much (or twice) in America is not that attractive for many people, especially because of how social issues are handled there. Not to mention family, friends etc. People aren't som…

That may be true, my perspective as a Canadian which is a fairly socialistic country compared to the US is a bit different. We have a massive problem with the brain drain as a lot of people who are college educated go to the US to earn higher salaries, especially in but not limited to tech. But its possible that the proximity to the US is a factor as you can still easily visit your friends and family in Canada while living in the US.
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