RTO and No Childcare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People will just have to do whatever they did before COVID.

My kids are 8,6,3. Before Covid they weren’t in school and were in daycare. Our school hours are super short and the day ends at 2:30. We do have aftercare but my kids would prefer to walk home and play outside with their friends while I finish working.

I personally think the solution is that the school day should be longer. If school ended at 3:30 or 4, a lot more people wouldn’t need aftercare.

If a fed doesn’t have childcare, they can be disciplined and fired. There’s no excuse.

Schools are schools, not childcare centers.

This hasn’t been true for years, now, and the sooner we admit it and start formally tailoring it as such, the better off we will be as a society.

*Public* schools have always been child care. some of the earliest public schools were for children of single mothers in order to allow them to work.

The covidians and SAHMs that deny that history are idiots.

[Anonymous]

Anything that gets the screaming kids off of my team zooom calls will be supported by me. So sick of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue for me is the 8-6 in office requirement. Right now, I work 8-5, pick up my kids, and then work a few more hours at home in the evening. Daycare closes at 6 and I have a 45 minute commute, so I'm not sure what I will go if the 8-6 requirement goes into effect.

Right. I think that is what the childcare threads are talking about. It’s not lack of childcare it’s the commutes along with the 8-6pm requirement. If before care and aftercare is from 7:30-6 and my commute is an hour it doesn’t work.

It works if there are TWO responsible parents. you stagger your days: DH does drop off and gets home later; DW does pickup and gets home earlier. When my kid was little and in daycare I left for work at 7:45, worked from 830-5, picked him up by 530, home by 6:15. DH dropped him off in the morning, got to the office later, and worked pretty late (maybe until 730 or so most nights).

Later on we got a part-time babysitter for after school so that made it even easier - we would stagger drop off at 8:30 and then the other just needed to be home around 6-630.

[Anonymous]

A good solution is to provide on-site childcare and deduct the cost from the employees' paycheck.

[Anonymous]

Families need to do shift work, even if it means changing careers.

It's a 24-hour world. Times are a-changin'.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another reason why 1950s America was better.

For white mothers.
Black mothers didn’t have that privilege

My working class white grandmother had to work too.

[Anonymous]

When my non-Fed DC office drafted a RTO policy with hybrid WFH and flexible (read: changing) schedules, I flagged that the draft policy didn’t mention childcare. Long story short: GC said we couldn’t reference childcare.

I gently pushed back, flagging that most of my team was obviously at home with infants, toddlers, etc. all day and it impacted availability and productivity during covid (when we gave everyone a free pass), and I suggested it would be wise to establish guidelines for WFH when we RTO.

Nope.

And now it’s nearly 2025 and I have staff at home with toddlers. One has a nanny but they are constantly in the background or can be heard.

While we are at it, how about a simple rule that you can’t wear t-shirt or hoodie on interviews or outside meetings? That’s another area where my GC said it was best not to set clear rules on paper.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Np, and I told a coworker last week that I suspected lack of childcare as the real reason many are flipping out over RTO. I also suspect some are working two jobs.

I think a lot of people are working two jobs. Like, a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another reason why 1950s America was better.

For white mothers.
Black mothers didn’t have that privilege

My working class white grandmother had to work too.

Yes, the blatant racism on this board has got to stop. My white immigrant grandmother worked as a maid from age 16-60. My other white grandmother worked as a "lunch lady" at the local public school from 6am until 3pm, when real food was actually cooked there.

The kids just had to grow up faster and learn to take care of themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue for me is the 8-6 in office requirement. Right now, I work 8-5, pick up my kids, and then work a few more hours at home in the evening. Daycare closes at 6 and I have a 45 minute commute, so I'm not sure what I will go if the 8-6 requirement goes into effect.

Right. I think that is what the childcare threads are talking about. It’s not lack of childcare it’s the commutes along with the 8-6pm requirement. If before care and aftercare is from 7:30-6 and my commute is an hour it doesn’t work.

It works if there are TWO responsible parents. you stagger your days: DH does drop off and gets home later; DW does pickup and gets home earlier. When my kid was little and in daycare I left for work at 7:45, worked from 830-5, picked him up by 530, home by 6:15. DH dropped him off in the morning, got to the office later, and worked pretty late (maybe until 730 or so most nights).

Later on we got a part-time babysitter for after school so that made it even easier - we would stagger drop off at 8:30 and then the other just needed to be home around 6-630.

NP here. Well, yes, if you stagger your schedules it works. My husband and I did that for years. But PP is referencing DOGE saying all federal hours will be a mandatory 8-6. No more staggering hours; no wiggle room. You and your spouse are now both leaving the house at 7am and returning at 7pm.

[Anonymous]

why RTO is Govt issue? People should do it in the same way they used to before COVID. Some people have got too comfortable and assume some of the covid time perks as permanent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue for me is the 8-6 in office requirement. Right now, I work 8-5, pick up my kids, and then work a few more hours at home in the evening. Daycare closes at 6 and I have a 45 minute commute, so I'm not sure what I will go if the 8-6 requirement goes into effect.

A mandate that people now have to be in the office for 10 hours a day is not happening.

Given that my office is 2 hours away (my job was advertised, and I was hired, fully remote), this actually would make me quit. I'd try to stick out a full RTO with flexible hours.

And yes, OP, for me it's the aftercare. My kids were in day care until elementary and now we just have an after school sitter the one day a week neither of us can make school pickup (husband works in person locally and has a lot of flexibility, I am remote and start my day early). It costs us $200/month. Putting both of my kids in daily aftercare would be over $1200, plus getting to the office costs me $26/day, of which I think commuter benefits would only offset about $130. So we're talking about $1600/month higher cost of RTO. My take home is only about $4000.

Unfortunately I'm the higher earner, so I couldn't quit unless I found a job locally near my MUCH smaller town, or my husband changed to a higher paying career. But yeah, while i paid for 10 years of full time day care, my current life IS set up around being remote, just as my job offer said. This would be a big impact.

If you're two hours away and they order you to come in, then you'll need to pay relocation. That might mean a pay increase assuming you're not always in the DC pay locality region.

I wish! That 2 hours is 49 miles as the crow flies...so no relocation. Worst possible scenario, basically.

Like i said, when I took the job (advertised as remote for anywhere in the US, and most of my team is in other parts of the country), it was with the understanding that i wouldn't be making that daily commute. This wasn't a "you did it before covid, stop being so entitled" thing. This is a "unilateral change of employment terms" thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue for me is the 8-6 in office requirement. Right now, I work 8-5, pick up my kids, and then work a few more hours at home in the evening. Daycare closes at 6 and I have a 45 minute commute, so I'm not sure what I will go if the 8-6 requirement goes into effect.

Right. I think that is what the childcare threads are talking about. It’s not lack of childcare it’s the commutes along with the 8-6pm requirement. If before care and aftercare is from 7:30-6 and my commute is an hour it doesn’t work.

It works if there are TWO responsible parents. you stagger your days: DH does drop off and gets home later; DW does pickup and gets home earlier. When my kid was little and in daycare I left for work at 7:45, worked from 830-5, picked him up by 530, home by 6:15. DH dropped him off in the morning, got to the office later, and worked pretty late (maybe until 730 or so most nights).

Later on we got a part-time babysitter for after school so that made it even easier - we would stagger drop off at 8:30 and then the other just needed to be home around 6-630.

NP here. Well, yes, if you stagger your schedules it works. My husband and I did that for years. But PP is referencing DOGE saying all federal hours will be a mandatory 8-6. No more staggering hours; no wiggle room. You and your spouse are now both leaving the house at 7am and returning at 7pm.

Oh I missed that tidbit … so DOGE wants everyone to work 10 hrs/day? lol.

[Anonymous]

100% some of the women that I work with cannot afford childcare. They really shouldn't be working from with children there, but they do, and I don't blame them, we don't pay them enough. I have two single mothers on my team, both of them have their own mothers who come by for a couple hours a day to help with their children. I don't know what they'd do if we had to RTO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:why RTO is Govt issue? People should do it in the same way they used to before COVID. Some people have got too comfortable and assume some of the covid time perks as permanent.

Prior to COVID, official government policy was to encourage more telework.