Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You all are very out of touch. $20/hr for 20 hr/week is $1600/month. This is the rate of full time day care for a 1 year old where I live in MD. I know a ton of people who can't pay that and cobble together what they can. I assume that's why this poster is only looking for a PT babysitter. It's not "cheap" to not be paid enough to pay your own bills and a living wage for a second adult, it's just sad.

What??

Many many people in this country do not make enough to afford full time childcare. They also cannot afford to pay someone else $20/hr. It doesn't mean they are cheap, which implies you choose not to spend more, it means they literally do not have the money.

Yes but don't get angry at the people who don't want to subsidize you. Get angry at the system that's left you so bereft of options. If we had universal daycare this wouldn't be an issue - but let me guess that some people (perhaps even this family) would decry that as "muh socialism."

I think the day has finally come that people feel so entitled to someone else's money that they can rationalize asking for anything. Babysitting is a low-paid, unskilled job with zero formal requirements needed to call yourself one. You need a pulse. That's it.

Being a nanny is also *not* a formal title which is why there are so many people calling themselves *nannies* who are actually full time babysitters (for now) who believe this will help them get more per hour. I can work 40 hours, I must be a nanny! You can be, because this is also a job title that requires no actual education, formal training or qualifications to call yourself one.

We all want the best for our kids. It's not being cheap to do the best you can do. There has never EVER been a time in history where someone is able to demand a wage they believe an unskilled and unlicensed job should pay simply because of the cost of living in the area. Yes, you can force minimum wage, but that isn't the wage being expected in this conversation.

Not all jobs will pay a living wage in DC. They simply won't.

I'm so tired of these threads. Hire a nanny with experience and education and pay their worth. Hire the reliable sitter who shows up for the wage you can afford.

Ignore the crazy people who think that if they can't live on a babysitter wage without a second person contributing to rent that there is something wrong with the wage. Maybe there is something wrong with the job choice.

Anonymous wrote:Well then good luck raising your kid in poverty! Never have a child if you don't have funds in the bank for just such emergencies.

You are the one living in a fantasy. As the PP pointed out, few people plan to have a child in poverty. Young mothers, in particular, are often naive about what parenthood will require or how quickly expenses add up. It's unrealistic to assume everyone who has a child will have perfect expectations for how much it costs. And the savings to cover it.

Not to mention, the expectations change. I had a child in 2017 and planned to send her to the local public PK3 with affordably priced aftercare in the fall of 2020. I did all the research to make sure we'd be able to get a spot (which we did) and pricing out the aftercare, talking to families who had done it, etc. We structured our family finances around this plan with the expectation that when she started preschool, we'd be able to get rid of the 20k+ we were spending on childcare. Then Covid hit and our school was virtual all year. We were entirely unprepared for that shift and the result was a mad scramble and a LOT of hunting for the least expensive childcare option we could locate that was sufficient. I wasn't trying to hire a sitter for $10/hr because I live somewhere where that would be laughable, but I honestly wasn't that far off.

The best laid plans and all that.

I hope she’s paying employer taxes on this! I wish there was a way to turn people in to the irs.

My family lives in the rural south and this is a fair rate. The factory in town pays $15/hour but requires 40 hours a week.

This woman needs to find college age sitters or a SAHM looking for extra income who could keep the baby in their house.

Well then good luck raising your kid in poverty! Never have a child if you don't have funds in the bank for just such emergencies.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most of the country does NOT pay 20/hour for a babysitter! That is crazy. DC area folks are so out of touch.

yes, she's having trouble finding a reliable PT nanny, and if you need someone 5 days/week, that's a nanny, not a sitter.

No, it's part-time, and requires no special skills. It is a babysitter and in most parts of the country 10$/hr for a babysitter is acceptable. Not in major metropolitan areas.

By the way, the mom needing a babysitter should not have had a child if she cannot afford the child. What are women thinking when they do this?? That society will take care of the expenses for their kid? This is what abortion and adoption are for.

Ok I'm a fiscal conservative but you are missing a lot of nuance here (and being kind of a jerk).

Some moms start out able to afford a child, then lose their job (sometimes *because* of childcare obligations/lack of paid leave etc.)

Others are left by their significant other and become single.

Sometimes they are also caring for aging relatives.

Adoption is NOT for everyone; it seems like a fairy-tale ending (and I know many families it has worked wonderfully for) but it can be a fraught, emotionally traumatic process for both adoptive and birth parents not to mention the child.

Some people genuinely believe abortion is killing, and while I don't agree, we shouldn't force it on people as an option.

Anonymous wrote:She she do what a lot of working moms do…take advantage of a stay at home mom. They work for free.

Not at all. When my sister, a teacher, had to return to work when her baby was 3 months old, the stay at home mom next door approached her and offered to take care of the baby for a very reasonable rate. My sister cried when they moved 2 years later.

I made $10/hr babysitting in 2002 when I moved to DC for college. I was THRILLED to be making that much, as my previous jobs at Quiznos and Kmart had paid about $6.50/hr each.

I babysat for about 5-6 years, nannying full time during the summers. By the time I stopped around 2007 I was making $20/hr or more, typically. I also found though that the people at that time that were willing to pay on the higher end were also more likely to treat me like an underling.

I don't know where the OP lives (it is blocked in the post) but here in the DC area all the girls in my high school where I teach get $15/hour. They are happy with it. Of course they cannot work weekdays.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most of the country does NOT pay 20/hour for a babysitter! That is crazy. DC area folks are so out of touch.

yes, she's having trouble finding a reliable PT nanny, and if you need someone 5 days/week, that's a nanny, not a sitter.

No, it's part-time, and requires no special skills. It is a babysitter and in most parts of the country 10$/hr for a babysitter is acceptable. Not in major metropolitan areas.

By the way, the mom needing a babysitter should not have had a child if she cannot afford the child. What are women thinking when they do this?? That society will take care of the expenses for their kid? This is what abortion and adoption are for.

Anonymous wrote:Most of the country does NOT pay 20/hour for a babysitter! That is crazy. DC area folks are so out of touch.

yes, she's having trouble finding a reliable PT nanny, and if you need someone 5 days/week, that's a nanny, not a sitter.

Most of the country does NOT pay 20/hour for a babysitter! That is crazy. DC area folks are so out of touch.

This was posted in a military group I’m in. The person who was searching for a nanny is in Florida. For reference, the housing allowance for that area for an E6 is 1902 and and E6 in the dc area is 2928.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You all are very out of touch. $20/hr for 20 hr/week is $1600/month. This is the rate of full time day care for a 1 year old where I live in MD. I know a ton of people who can't pay that and cobble together what they can. I assume that's why this poster is only looking for a PT babysitter. It's not "cheap" to not be paid enough to pay your own bills and a living wage for a second adult, it's just sad.

What??

Many many people in this country do not make enough to afford full time childcare. They also cannot afford to pay someone else $20/hr. It doesn't mean they are cheap, which implies you choose not to spend more, it means they literally do not have the money.