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Why are diapers so expensive?

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Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#551

Post by eesmith »

linkregister wrote: post #550
eesmith wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Do tell me more about the benefits of water system privatization in the US. Story upon story like https://heavy.com/news/2018/02/risks-costs-private-water-lea... doesn't make me conclude that letting the market deliver water is "far more efficient than" a public water system.

Calm down. Assuming bad faith is for Reddit, not here. Your argument is making a straw man. You are the first commenter to bring up public utilities. Everybody needs water. Systems that are accountable to local government are the most effective way to get it. Usually that is with a publicly-owned water corporation. A basket of goods is far different. Back to the subject actually at hand: some people will need cloth d…

And tone policing is its own uncharitable rhetorical style.

You said "letting the market deliver necessities". Water is a necessity.

I'm also for single-payer government run state-wide/national health systems. Somehow those work and are more cost-effective for overall public health, despite a variability of need which is far higher than that of diapers.

Now, I agree that akira2501's proposal isn't tenable, and in a parallel thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16763183 ) you see I list some of my objections.

What I disagree with is your broad and non-nuanced statement regarding the supposed efficiency of letting the market deliver necessities.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#552

Post by NoGravitas »

speby wrote: post #487
nostrademons wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just had a kid 2 months ago, and 12 changes a day doesn't seem all that unreasonable for a newborn. At our one-month checkup he was averaging 9 pees & 5 poops per day - several of the poops were doubled-up where he also peed, so a dozen per day is about right. It's dropped a bit since, but instances where a single changing results in multiple diapers used (eg. he shits the table right as I'm getting the new diaper…

10 changes/day is a lot, even for a newborn. This number quickly drops to perhaps 4-6 per day, and continues to drop towards 1 year of life. As others have mentioned, it would not be uncommon to get to around 3 per day for a 1-3 year old. I also speak from experience with my own kids and would back that up as true. Therefore, the cost of diapers is probably quite a bit less than $1000/year even in the worst case. We'…

Cloth diapers are fantastic, but they're a case of "Sam Vimes' Boots"[0]. Over the course of a year, they're a lot cheaper than disposable diapers, especially if you can get hand-me-downs from a friend or eg. a local parents group on Facebook. BUT, the initial outlay is still way too much for most working-class people, and they're really only practical if you have a washing machine at home. We ended up buying a used dryer when we had our first child, just because the diapers didn't dry fast enough on the line during the winter. The article mentions that a lot of coin laundries don't allow you to wash them there, and besides, you'd be at the laundromat at least once a day.

[0]: http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/index.php/Sam_Vimes_Theory_...

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#553

Post by NoGravitas »

Robotbeat wrote: post #475
mattbee wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you missed the part of the article where they talked about never having enough cash to buy in bulk, instead buying at 2 or 3x the unit cost in 5s and 10s from the corner shop.

I do not blame stressed people (single mother most of all!) from making decisions based on lack of time. However, it really IS helpful to make a larger purchase. You can think of convenience-purchase-pricing of things you use regularly at home like loan-sharking at exorbitant rates. It hits those least capable of affording it. The flip side is you get a huge benefit from scrounging for the money/time to get the bulk…

It's not just convenience. Because of cash flow (rent, groceries, etc), people on the poorer end of working class just never have enough money available at one time to do bulk buys, even with perfect money management.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#554

Post by NoGravitas »

flukus wrote: post #163
romwell wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 100 years ago housekeeping was a full-time job, and quality of life was generally pretty bad. Also the society functioned differently; one middle-class salary could sustain a middle-class family, for one. We no longer live in that reality, nor would anyone want to. It's like saying that homeless people are OK because there were no buildings in prehistoric times.

Neither societal structure or quality of life affect the drying time of cloth diapers in humid places. Edit - and having lived in both, you're much better off drying things in a hot humid place than in colder ones.

We used cloth diapers in a place that's hot and humid but seasonally cold (the US Deep South). Outside on the line, diapers dried a lot faster in the summer than the winter. We ended up having to buy a used dryer for winter use, because they simply didn't dry fast enough to be ready by the time we needed them.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#555

Post by NoGravitas »

steelbird wrote: post #436
dbatten wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question(s) from a father of 2 under 2... How do you get the cloth diapers clean? Like, really clean so they don't still smell after they've been cleaned? My wife and I were planning on cloth diapering. We bought some high-end cloth diaper and liners and started on our merry way. We found that no matter what we did, our little guy smelled like piss all the time. My wife was washing diapers 2 or 3 times in bet…

Our routine: Warm wash with Oxi-clean, Hot wash with detergent, air dry the covers, tumble dry high the inserts. Baby is 8 months and so far no smell and very little stains on the inserts.

Yes, that's exactly what we did.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#556

Post by NoGravitas »

flukus wrote: post #20
projektir wrote: post #9

Whenever something like this comes up, my first question is always: "OK, how did we do this before diapers were invented, and what happened to that?"

It's a good question, but often the answer is "we had a stay at home mum that had time for all this stuff", which I think could be the answer here (I don't know if cloth diapers are time consuming or not). Older solutions might be perfectly viable but no longer practical because of cultural changes.

The laundry can be only slightly time consuming. If you didn't have your own washer and dryer, however, it would be very time consuming.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#557

Post by NoGravitas »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #133

Hmm, not one commenter here in 120+ addressed the point of the article, namely why don't companies make cheaper diapers, instead of only ratcheting up the high tech? Obviously it's more profitable, but are there other factors?

There doesn't need to be any factor other than "it's more profitable", though. The higher tech is there to produce higher margins.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#558

Post by EugeneOZ »

c22 wrote: post #236
ILikeConemowk wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At which point did we, as a society, settle the philosophical conundrum that is taking an unborn life? Cells, fetus or baby? What is it? Since when? Why? How should it be done? I'm not religious at all but it seems to me that, at least tangentially, most religious believes are rooted in philosophical unknowns and feeling of uncertainty. Religious people then resort to their faith of choice as a way to find answers. T…

It's not that religions are idiotic. It's that trying to enact any moral framework homogenously across a global population is idiotic and completely unrealistic.

Religions are for slaves.

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#559

Post by cm2012 »

epicureanideal wrote: post #548
cm2012 wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If money was originally distributed magically - by an amoral higher entity of some sort - would you be in favor of some democratically decided redistribution afterward to make it a little more fair? What if you had to decide the answer to that before you found out how much in lifetime earnings you'd be randomly assigned? The unfortunate fact of our world is that, statistically, very few people escape their demographi…

I would argue that my 40% tax rate already qualifies as "some level of redistribution". Like I said, I'd be happy to discuss some kind of social contract, but I get nervous about people saying "well he makes a lot of money, let's take it from him". That's too simplistic.

We completely agree there!

Re: Why are diapers so expensive?

#560

Post by MandieD »

hycaria wrote: post #374
hyperpape wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very effective and a good choice, but I know someone who had a child after getting an IUD.

IUD pregnancies are often extrauterine (which are mostly non viable, so that solves the unwanted pregnancy problem). And there's still abortion. I wonder to what point having a child was a choice in the case you evoked.

As someone who had a very wanted (married, secure in our careers) pregnancy end up being “extrauterine” (tubal, if you must know) and therefore requiring emergency medical intervention to not kill me, I think you may want to reconsider that as a better or more economical outcome.
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