Quick poll - annual cost of nanny

[Anonymous]

No different *

[Anonymous]

Nanny here. My gross salary is $60k. My employer also pays for: unemployment insurance, worker's compensation insurance, employer portion of fica, payroll company, car and health insurance, car usage (negligible, since I'm 24/7 and rarely have my own errands which can't be combined with my employer's needs), room (no added cost to my employer), bonuses (merit, gratitude and yearly), food (live-in nanny, all food consumed in the house is included, averages $300-600/month), my portion of utilities (negligible), gifts (varies year-to-year), etc. All told, my employer's cost is probably around $80-85k per year, but that allows her to work out of state without worrying about her child.

[Anonymous]

$65k once you factor taxes we pay. One kid. $500k income and one job requires a lot of travel so worth every penny!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:$74k

Hourly Pay
Overtime
Health insurance stipend
Payroll service
Taxes
Workers comp

We have one baby. Dh travels a ton for work and I travel intermittently. HHI $300k but we are on the younger side of DC parents (30/31) and should both hit growth soon in our careers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

I'd never pay 72k and put my trust in a nanny. I only trust center-based childcare and you can do it for about 26k/kid at good ones and you kid gets socialization. That said, nobody loses 50% of their salary to taxes, which is what your calculation implies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

I'd never pay 72k and put my trust in a nanny. I only trust center-based childcare and you can do it for about 26k/kid at good ones and you kid gets socialization. That said, nobody loses 50% of their salary to taxes, which is what your calculation implies.

After tax income includes other deductions. My take home is actually 50% of my gross because I also carry the family health insurance, max retirement, and use health and child care FSAs. But I don't make 140k, and those amounts wouldn't scale up proportionally with a 40-50% increase in income, so I feel like as income goes up you'd have to have a higher percentage take home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

The average American doesn’t have savings and 64% live paycheck to paycheck. You have to make a certain salary for it to be an option and if you don’t realize that, you are pretty out of touch with reality.

[Anonymous]

When researching and looking to hire a nanny the range was 65 to 75k.

We ended up changing our schedule to work four 10 hour days. We took turns starting at 6 am so the kids would be picked up before 5. Kids went to a center 3 days a week and stayed home 2 days a week when we were off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

I wouldn't be paying a nanny $60-$70K a year as a renter. That's just giving money away hand-over-fist. But TETO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

I feel like this proves my point that it's about money, not just priorities! When DH and i were finishing our doctorates, our total HHI was about $60-65k, we definitely didn't have a year of income in savings. When you literally don't have the money, you can't prioritize the impossible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

The average American doesn’t have savings and 64% live paycheck to paycheck. You have to make a certain salary for it to be an option and if you don’t realize that, you are pretty out of touch with reality.

Well, yeah - obviously but priorities matter as well. The pp mentioned her mortgage. We chose a nanny before we chose to own our home. Our saving was largely a lump payment when DH left the service. It was a sacrifice for us but we felt it was important for our baby.

Obvythst is not possible for everyone!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much are you people making to pay 72k after tax income to an employee? It means you would have to make at least 140k just to break even and afford nanny, and at least 200k to make the extra income worth it (assuming you work just for the money)? So approx 200k income for the parent who would otherwise be caregiver seems to be the minimum income to have a nanny make sense?

Two working parents and prioritizing childcare. Our nanny basically earns my salary but she has a skill set we don’t have (preschool teacher and ECE degree) and I love my work. Two children.

It's not JUST prioritizing childcare though. We make 60k and 95k. After taxes, health insurance, and retirement savings, our $1250 mortgage, bills, and groceries, we literally do not have the money to pay someone this much. I guess maybe we could swing it if we completely stopped saving anything and paid on the lower end, but our retirement savings would be post tax and day care is about 15k, so still we wouldn't wind up with 70k+.

My point is just it's a little ridiculous to say the salary amount doesn't matter, it's all about priorities, because math is real. Many working adults do not have enough income to pay a full time household employee. Doesn't mean they wouldn't prefer not to have to rush their kids out the door in the morning! Money really does make things easier and more pleasant! It's ok to admit.

NP here. We had a nanny before we had a mortgage and DH was finishing his doctorate. It is prioritizing to some extent for some parents. We paid her largely from savings.

I feel like this proves my point that it's about money, not just priorities! When DH and i were finishing our doctorates, our total HHI was about $60-65k, we definitely didn't have a year of income in savings. When you literally don't have the money, you can't prioritize the impossible.

But when you do have a little money you can prioritize childcare before home ownership, vacations, new clothes, retirement savings, etc.

[Anonymous]

$60k, roughly.