Reply to Kids are really expensive

Forum Index » Money and Finances

Reply to "Kids are really expensive"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]SAHM for the early years seems like the logical decision unless she is making a large salary. Or you’re paying someone about $20 an hour to raise your child. [/quote]

It’s only logical if you’re okay with women not achieving the same career potential as men. And life isn’t all about career but women shouldn’t have to be the ones to sacrifice.[/quote]

Raising a child shouldn’t be a sacrifice. It’s a privilege. Young children need stability, competence and love. It’s unfortunate that so few children get that.

The first three foundational years of life are the most critical years.

What would happen to your house if it had a faulty foundation?
[/quote]

Well then there should be more community and government support for parents of young children.  Instead, maternity leave is sh*t, daycare is exorbitant, employers are unforgiving of parents tending to kids needs/illnesses.
Raising children takes a village- always has.  But sadly, the US has turned it into an individual responsibility over the last 60 years.  Therefore women (and men) are saying it's too hard and expensive, so forget it.[/quote]

This. People often perceive the choice not to have kids as selfish or as someone simply not caring about children or families. That might be the case sometimes, but often it's a conscious choice to avoid raising children in a society hostile to children and parents.

This is why I only had one kid. I realized after the first one that you are truly just on your own in terms of providing everything for your kid, including education and basic safety (things that other countries treat as social goods provided to all). Covid really hammered this home for me -- this is not a village. It's every family for themselves. Don't have kids unless you are prepared to provide everything they could conceivably need yourself (or via outsourcing you personally pay for), and only have as many kids as you can do that for. You will be *shocked* by the degree to which public schools are nothing more than daytime holding pens for kids -- you will be in charge of their education and socialization and there's no guarantee they will get this at school. Also public schools do not really serve as childcare and are structured as though it's still 1975 and stay at home moms are common, even though it is no longer possible for most families to get by on one income and also SAHMs are viewed with derision culturally. So get ready to pay for childcare until your kids are teens. Oh, you thought your responsible 9 year old could be home alone in the afternoon? Nope it may be illegal where you live and even if not it will be culturally discouraged -- you need to pay for aftercare or activities so that your child has adult supervision at all times, but also you can't provide that supervision directly because you have to work, and you have to work so that you can afford to pay for that supervision and enrichment (since obviously your chid didn't actually learn anything all day in school, why would you expect that -- get thee to a Mathnasium so your kid can do long division). Your pediatrician will expect you to do much of the legwork on diagnosing your kid and will largely serve as a prescription and referral generator. [/quote]

Schools should not change to be "childcare".  Being at school from 7am until 6:30pm is not ideal.  For those who make the choice, they want the ability for their kid to do something else at 3pm when school lets out.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics