Reply to Au Pair just asked for more money

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Reply to "Au Pair just asked for more money"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We host and have a new aupair coming this week from Mexico. We don’t pay over the stipend. We’ve never hosted an impoverished aupair. Most of our aupairs come from well off families. If our aupair wasn’t engaging with our kids, she wouldn’t be our aupair long. [/quote]

Please review what you said — it’s because you have the upper hand. It doesn’t matter what type of family they come from — they all deserve a fair treatment and cultural exchange. Sadly, there is abuse. A couple in the UK starved and murdered their French ap. That is an extreme but redolent of a power imbalance that allowed it to happen, even to a French middle class girl in the EU. So I wouldn’t underestimate the one-sided power balance of this relationship.

I do feel for the families who describe treating their aps well and being in it for the spirit of the program when they say they couldn’t afford the MA pricing. Perhaps a middle ground could be found with fewer hours, so enforce MA rules, but families and aps can negotiate fewer hours, more education, all in the spirit of cultural exchange. Agencies in MA had to return/pay part of families’ fees too.

Even while empathizing with well meaning families, it is hard to accept as legitimate the building in of a portion of family vacation expenses as less discretionary spending (instead of taking ap on 4 vacations, it sounds like going on 2 would allow fair pay). It would be similar to serving caviar or truffles because you like it, having the au pair partake because it’s fun and a different cultural experience, but then charging $30 instead of DoL mandated $2.25 per diner deduction.[/quote]

But it wouldn’t be far and equal treatment.  The point is that it’s a cultural exchange program.  “Au pair” literally translates to “at peer,” or equal.

Oh, and the US is already protecting APs more than other countries.  Here, there are LCCs and agencies who step in to help, and there are federal maximums.[/quote]

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