posted
One of the lowest paying jobs requiring a college degree is being a teacher.
Daycare is an entry level minimum wage job. Career oriented women drop their kids of at places with names like "Lots of Tots" or "Kiddy Kare"
Women who choose to stay at home and don't have a career are thought of as less educated, less ambitious, more docile, and lazy.
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posted
I would argue that children are, overall, more valued in the last century than they have ever been in history.
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posted
Of course, many of the people who need daycare wouldn't be able to afford it if it got more expensive.
I'm glad to see you stress women in your post. Nobody is respected more than the stay at home father. Also, fathers who drop their kids off at daycare always take care to choose places with classier names and higher paid employees.
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posted
I think it's not likely that this means children are less valued. I think the low child care wages just means the number of people capable and willing to take care of children for a living is high.
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posted
We've looked at places called "Lullabies and Love," "Tiny Tots," and "LaPetite Academy."
I had to learn to stop cringing, on the grounds that their ability to pick a name wasn't really an accurate reflection of their childcare skills.
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posted
"Lullabies and Love" sounds scary. The coolest one I've heard of is "Barefoot Days". Hey we have a LaPetite here too. Guess it's a chain?
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posted
Tres, willing yes. Capable? No. Let me microwave up something I posted on the other thread:
I despise feminists who challenge a woman's right to stay at home. One latent form of sexism that has not been challenged enough is that the world still defines success from a male's perspective: i.e. your career.
But what "career" is more important than raising your kids? I think any woman or man who stays at home to raise children is more valuable to our society than any doctor, lawyer, or author.
The correct feminist viewpoint is not to force women out of the home, but rather to elevate the position of a homemaker as not only a valid career choice, but a celebrated one for men and women.
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posted
I really don't care who drops the kids off at the 'raise them on an assembly line' places. Man or woman, typically, both of those people have put their priorities in the wrong place.
What about single women? They need cheap daycare! I would support subsidising daycare for those women and having more expensive daycare. And more qualifications. A teenager is fine for a night out, but I'm not sure I want my child in a place where the daycare worker comes and goes in shifts.
Fact of the matter is that where I live, a lot of women work in order to afford a house and nice car and to have their nails done every week.
I think we were making headway on this for about the first half of the century, even moving into the seventies. But as a society, I think we have been devaluing kids for about the last 30 or so years.
posted
"Yeah, and?" That's pretty darn sad! Tom D., you may be right, but is that any reason to blow off this issue! Gay people are being treated better than they ever have in history, yet still there is a big issue in society.
In our generation, we now KNOW the importance of early childhood experiences. What children experience deeply affects what they grow up to be. What kind of world do you want to see? There's a reason I'm in education. I want to change the world. I want kids to have hope and power, and to learn how to use their minds wisely. But no one will thank me or give me monetary recompense. Many of my students will leave my classroom into a world where they are squelched, or manipulated, or at the worst abused. Is that not something to take issue with?
And paying our child-care professionals an extremely low wage, and downplaying the role of stay-at-home moms... How is this getting quality people to be interested in giving kids a quality upbringing?
Indeed, why SHOULD we care how kids grow up?
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posted
I think we have been devaluing the effect of a parent who stays home with the kids, especially a mother. It's been devalued enough that we can put our own pursuits in front of the needs of our children. Our priorities have shifted.
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posted
"I would support subsidising daycare for those women and having more expensive daycare."
If daycare were any more expensive than it is, there's no way a typical family could afford it. Christy and I are both relatively well-paid, but we're going to be seriously stretched by the $200/week cost of infant care -- per child -- in this area. If your goal is to make daycare so prohibitively expensive that families with upper-middle-class salaries find that it's cheaper to keep one parent home, I suppose that's one way to do it.
And if you're going to suggest that it's possible for people to raise families on one income, regardless of geographic location, I'm afraid you're going to have to institute widespread reform and/or federal subsidy of housing costs.
posted
We have two kids and it's definitely more expensive to do daycare than to stay at home. It's probably more expensive for people with one kid as well, and after transportation, food and other things that go with having a second job, I'll bet it IS more expensive.
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I'm not saying child care is a easy job. It is hard, and I know several individuals who are great at it. But one of them recently quit her job and went to law school because her job wasn't paying enough due to cut-throat competition from people who are less qualified but are willing to work for less.
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posted
It is cheaper to breastfeed babies too, and better for them, but that doesn't stop people from buying lots and lots of formula.
More expensive daycares isn't the only thing I'm aiming for. I want more qualified daycare workers. That is why it would be more expensive.
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posted
I personally think it might be nice if housing costs fell enough that it became possible to house a family on a single income, again.
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posted
The daycare I attended was staffed by several 16-yr-old girls held up by one adult woman. I wouldn't think that most 16-yr-olds are qualified to give long-term care. Being a child's care-giver all day, five days a week puts one in the position of teacher and role model, and makes them the main source of information that the child receives. I find that scary.
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Her presumed focus and audience are the professional women supposedly reading the article, so it does not claim to be exhaustive. But it's very interesting.
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Day care has a tremendous turnover rate. The wages are next to nothing for the teachers. You are expected to take care of small children, not your own flesh and blood, and deal with all the exasperations that come with the territory, and multiply it by 10 or 20. It is a terrible job, because the training is usually minimal and the children are of course so needy, and the pay SUCKS.
Those of you who think the market is glutted, try looking into childcare as a viable occupation for yourself or your loved ones. Think about the kind of person who WILL work under those conditions and for that kind of pay. Think of the way they will treat the kids when they're having a bad day.
Good childcare providers exist, and they are priceless. However, they are in it only for the love of the kids. And unless they have other economic support, they will have to leave in order to make more money. The not-so-good ones will turn over quickly as well, because they do something dumb or potentially harmful, or they aren't very dependable people.
For small children, who, for the most part, need consistency, this continual shifting of important adults wreaks havoc on their sense of stability.
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posted
Guess what? That's about how much a daycare worker gets paid. Think she can afford to work and still find quality care for her kids?
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posted
It is possible to raise a family on one income. We have been doing it for several years. My kids are 5 and 18 months. I am a computer programmer. We bought a house last summer and always have all of our bills paid on time. We don't have all the latest technology in our home, but we have a computer that is only a year old. We don't have high speed internet right now, but are considering fitting it into our budget. We are building up a savings after having some unexpected expenses at the end of last year. It isn't easy, but it is possible. At least in Edmonton. My brother is also doing it in Vernon (a small town in British Columbia). He works at a saw mill and has 2 kids. His wife hasn't worked since the kids came along and they have always gotten by. It does involve adjusting your lifestyle and spending habits. I'm not saying it is the only way, but it works for us.
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posted
then the daycare centers are either making HUGE profits or have worse liability insurance than I realizes.
Even if you consider 50% overhead the ratio would be two children per worker at that pay rate. I guess I assumed that the workers would be able to bring their own children to the facility as well. Especially working for such lousy pay.
quote:Women who choose to stay at home and don't have a career are thought of as less educated, less ambitious, more docile, and lazy.
Was the title supposed to be, "SAHMs are less valued"?
In answer to that, I don't know. I also don't think it matters terribly. The two-income family is seen as necessary more because our standards of "basic living", including luxury of house, have risen than because the world has become more expensive. Outside of that, it doesn't matter to me what the world thinks of my decisions. I suspect the world doesn't actually care one way or the other.
posted
I'm just curious as to what people who think day-care pay is a problem think we should do? If it involves paying them more, where should the money come from?
It seems to me that some of the ones trumpeting the need for moms to stay at home with the kids, are also the ones who brandished stay-at-home-moms on welfare as a societal evil.
You can't have it both ways.
I've been on both ends. When my kids were young I stayed at home (and loved it). When my husband left us, I continued to stay at home because my kids were my priority (but needed public assistance to be able to do that).
People scorned me because I was on public assistance.
So then I went back into the workforce and paid for childcare at one of those mega-daycare centers, but working and paying for it with money I earned, and not getting to spend near enough time with my kids.
And people scorned me because I wasn't home with my kids.
You can't win in this battle. Not unless you have the perfectly balanced, perfectly happy nuclear family. And those are getting more rare all the time.
quote:I personally think it might be nice if housing costs fell enough that it became possible to house a family on a single income, again.
Yes. Granted the Bay Area is extreme in this regard. But if I could drop the % of my income that goes to rent by 15%, my family would be much better off. It's impossible to start off your career here and not have dual-income and still be able to afford even the crummiest of starter homes in a not-horrible-but-still-not-great neighborhood (and even then, it really needs to be a professional level dual-income -- my wife should be doing what I'm doing now and I should have gone to law school).
*Sigh*.
I wish there was a way that job creation could be a little more de-nucleaized.
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posted
Every time I read one of these threads, I hear Reverend Lovejoy's wife hysterically saying, "Won't anyone think of the children!?"
Guess what, you can't have both. You can't. Either stay at home with the kids that you chose to create, or stuff them into assembly line daycare tended by workers that make less than a good pizza delivery guy.
The money has to come from somewhere. No one can afford to pay daycare a ton of money, and people still want to have kids and work too. There it is. Whining won't change it.
Or, should they raise taxes and government subsidize daycare, so that the rest of us get to pay for you to go to work and drop your kid off somewhere?
I mean, what exactly is the point here? Daycare workers don't make enough? Then YOU pay them more. If you don't want to spend more on daycare, then stop complaining.
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quote:Or, should they raise taxes and government subsidize daycare, so that the rest of us get to pay for you to go to work and drop your kid off somewhere?
Yes. Of all the things the government subsidize, what could be more important than childcare?
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posted
I was a database adminstrator for an up-and-coming pharmaceutical company and I made pretty good money. We did the math, and if I were to keep working after the twins were born I would bring home less than $100 dollars a month.
And that was with us at a daycare that only cost $75 per week, per child. That's rare, and the only way it was possible is that the daycare was run by someone that owned the facility outright in an area where the property taxes and cost of living are low compared to many others in the area. My brother and sister-in-law pay about twice that, in the same metropolitan area.
So yeah, I quit my job. And I've noticed a huge difference in the older kids, even though they are at school most of the day, it still matters a lot to them to have someone here waiting for them at the end of the day instead of them having to go to a daycare with 50+ other students.
Most people can't afford real quality childcare. By that I mean centers that are staffed by people with degrees in Early Childhood Education. But doesn't that say something? Why should we entrust the care of our children to someone who has only a high school diploma (and many not even that) Should we leave our kids for 10 hours a day or more with somebody that we don't know, and that probably won't be there in a month because of the high turnover rate?
For parents that don't have any choice, it's a heart rending thing to do. I remember crying all the way to work, when I had to leave my daughter somewhere she hated being. Where she was susceptible to all kinds of teasing and taunts from kids. A place where her finger had been broken because a child hit her with a bat. A place where I'd had to run and get her one day because another child scratched her, laying her face open from above the eyebrow to the cheekbone, and I had to rush her to the doctor to make certain the eye itself hadn't been injured.
A single mom that has to work, or a working mom whose job provides the benefits and a lot of the monthly income, these women don't like the idea of leaving their kids in substandard care. They wouldn't do it if they could afford to either stay home or get better care for their kids. But many times, they are left with little choice.
I agree, if we valued our kids, this is the situation that feminists would be more concerned with, not abortion which appears to be their flagship issue. Finding viable options for these moms, encouraging them to stay home, lobbying companies to provide quality, on-site childcare.
And for a somewhat unrelated rant, Why do at-home mothers not get any tax considerations? Why do we give a break to families that pay for childcare, and not for the ones that stay home? Economically, one income families are statistically worse off than their two income counterparts, yet we punish that by giving the break to the working parents instead. Why shouldn't we reward people staying home (whether it's the father or mother) and committing themselves to the full-time care of their kids? Considering the amount of income we gave up when I came home...a childcare tax credit would have come in handy, especially the first two years when we struggled immensely just to pay the mortgage. Instead, I lost that tax credit I used to get each year when I was working.
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posted
Sometimes the workers can bring their own kids for a discount. Probably depends on the place. And I may be exaggerating the pay. Here in Kokomo, about 5 years ago, I was paid around $300 a week. It wasn't much.
I think that daycare centers are not the best option for childcare. I did use one, though, last year. Abby loved it. Then again, she's a precocious and independent child, and she WANTED it. Not many 4-year-olds are so well-adjusted and cavalier about leaving their moms.
In my personal ranking, these are the best childcare options:
1. Mom and/or dad at home. 2. Close relative as babysitter. 3. Nanny/babysitter for one family. 4. Nanny/babysitter for two or three families. 5. Small, in home daycare (make sure it's high quality) 6. Montessori or other school-type daycare. These places require their teachers to have some training; sometimes they require extensive training. 7. A public-school related daycare. These places also tend to hire folks with more training, and check up on them. 8. Government subsidized or Church-run daycares. These places tend to be staffed with fewer professionals. They pay less and charge less. Quality is so variable that you absolutely MUST check them out before entrusting them with your children.
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posted
Belle, I thought that you got added to the list of your husbands dependents and did get a tax break as a result. Am I wrong on this, or how much less is it in comparison?
quote: Or, should they raise taxes and government subsidize daycare, so that the rest of us get to pay for you to go to work and drop your kid off somewhere?
quote:Yes. Of all the things the government subsidize, what could be more important than childcare?
I don't think this is the government's problem. It's the problem of the parents to provide the care for their children whether they do it themselves, or pay someone else. I actually kind of agree with what Slash said.
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No, this thread really is about children, because I have another point:
Who suffers the most harm from no fault divorces? Children. If a couple has children, they should not be granted a no fault divorce until those children move out. They should have to prove there would be more harm to the children if the marriage stays intact.
Children are the adults of the future. If they are messed up...
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posted
Right now, we share a nanny with another family. She is a lovely young Amish girl, who packs a cell-phone and drives an SUV! The family we share with spared no expense to find a nanny they could trust. To them, good childcare was too important. If more families felt this way, I don't think we'd have such big problems.
Also, why shouldn't we spend our tax dollars on good childcare as opposed to Social Security? Old people have had the chance to make something of their lives and save for the future. Children are starting out with nothing yet. I think it would make more sense to invest in people up front - through childcare and education - and then let them make what they will of this quality upbringing. In their old age, they will reap the consequences of their ADULT decisions.
As it is now, we pay for all older people to stop working, and we increasingly draw funds away from the young ones needing a good start.
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posted
Our taxes went down because our income went down, but so did our witholding with me no longer having a check that taxes were taken out of.
Overall, we paid less in taxes, but if you consider it proportionally, comparing the drop in taxes with the drop in our income, we lost ground on taxes. We paid a greater percentage of our income to taxes after I quit. Sounds wrong, and unfair, and confusing, but it had to do with tax brackets and what my witholding rate used to be, and all sorts of stuff. My CPA sister in law tried to explain, but I just shook my head and said I wasn't surprised.
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posted
"It is possible to raise a family on one income. We have been doing it for several years. My kids are 5 and 18 months. I am a computer programmer."
To be blunt, if I were a computer programmer -- or even made another $16,000 a year -- then I wouldn't be arguing this with you. But I already make more than the typical American median wage, and there's absolutely no way -- NONE -- that I could own a home and raise a family in this area on that salary.
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posted
On another topic, do people here think that it makes more sense for Christy and I to actually look for a nanny -- even a shared nanny -- than an accredited daycare?
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posted
When it's a necessity to work and put the children in daycare, so be it. But I disagree with putting one's career pursuits in front of staying home with the kids, if staying home is an option.
Like solo said, living on one income is quite possible still. We've gotten by fine on my income, which until just recently was below the Utah average. My wife WAS working before our first child came, and with our combined incomes we paid off school loans, the car, and what credit card debt we had. We haven't been in debt since (save for our mortgage ). We started a pretty strict budget and managed to live within our means enough to be able to buy a house and pay mortgage payments. With my recent promotion/raise, we're able to put more into the 401(k) and pay down the principal on our mortgage much faster.
I know couples who earn two salaries and who are deep in debt and struggling to make any payment at all. It's all how you approach it.
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posted
Obviously this won't solve the problem for a lot of parents, but I wonder if the time is ripe for a childcare co-op movement somewhat similar to the home school movement. It would be more difficult to organize, and it requires huge levels of trust and agrement among participants on all those things that are easy to disagree about when it comes to childcare -- diet, acceptable play, discipline. And only those with a certain level of income could do it -- but for middle-income families, it might be just the ticket to allow one parent to work full time and another to work part time/free lance.
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). We started a pretty strict budget and managed to live within our means enough to be able to buy a house and pay mortgage payments. With my recent promotion/raise, we're able to put more into the 401(k) and pay down the principal on our mortgage much faster.
