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user72230 t1_j8wb43c wrote

Reply to comment by jkjeeper06 in Daycare prices by PrincipleLarge2118

.......holy fuck, I can never afford that

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SpyCats t1_j8wcdqe wrote

When my kid was a toddler 16 years ago I asked about part time pricing at the bright Horizons nearby. $1800 for two days a week. Childcare is broken!

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icebeat t1_j8wu66i wrote

The sad thing is that workers have pretty bad salaries. Everything goes to licenses and insurances.

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OnlyNormalPersonHere t1_j8yjqfx wrote

This is not true. Their are only two costs that matter to a daycare center: labor (plus related taxes and benefits) and facilities (rent + cleaning and maintenance).

The labor is by far the largest cost area. When you factor in administrators and different shifts to cover the full-day, the effective ratio of adults to children is just so low. Then you factor in Boston rents and all the cleaning, etc and there’s not much left. Insurance is <$10k/year for a large-ish center, so a pretty small cost. (It’s not like these policies have to pay out almost ever. Tragedies are few and far between, thankfully.)

As for licenses, it’s a couple hundred bucks a year. Regulation is a bureaucratic pain and has some material admin cost in terms of man hours per month to log/track various things, but do you really want daycare to be unregulated? I don’t.

Source: I’m in the business

Edit: I should add, when I said “this is not true” I meant that about the license and insurance cost. It is absolutely is true that the workers are not paid enough, but that’s because there are no economies of scale in daycare so there just isn’t enough money to go around for workers. The industry needs to be permanently subsidized.

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ZebraAthletics t1_j8y5uvs wrote

Yeah, because daycare has to be a highly regulated industry and the liability is just enormous. It's really hard to see how it can actually be made more affordable. And subsidizing daycare isn't even necessarily a good idea because the economic benefit of another parent working often isn't more than the cost of the subsidy.

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jpk195 t1_j8yiu5d wrote

> And subsidizing daycare isn't even necessarily a good idea because the economic benefit of another parent working often isn't more than the cost of the subsidy

Disagree. The benefit/pay over an entire career of just about any full time job will far exceed the price of childcare.

The problem is when the paycheck doesn’t cover childcare in the short term, and (generally women) are forced to drop out of the labor market.

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[deleted] t1_j8ygbz6 wrote

The government could always offer a child care service…..no license fees to pay if you are the entity offering the services and can just not hire pedos.

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SharpCookie232 t1_j8yttht wrote

and the shareholders profits and the CEO's compensation package - don't forget those!

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V9luv t1_j8x1os2 wrote

The teachers don’t even get paid that much which makes no sense

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TiredPistachio t1_j8y5nfo wrote

bright horizons is probably like 99th percentile in price. they are insane

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Humble-Koala-5853 t1_j8zopp8 wrote

Fwiw, pricing isn’t linear. The more they go, the cheaper it is per hour. At our daycare in Sudbury, a toddler for 10 hours a day, 5 days per week is 594, 4 days 580, 3 days is 472, 2 days is 344.

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LowkeyPony t1_j8x977r wrote

It's why I left my job when my kid was born 20 years ago. Also another reason why I only have an only.

And I'm pretty sure my sister and BIL have 3 kids because our mother retired early and took care of all three kids free of charge. If they had had to actually pay for child care, they would have stopped at one.

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jkjeeper06 t1_j8wb7wd wrote

Yeah its not cheap, but its much cheaper than one person giving up their income to stay home

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tapakip t1_j8wjkz7 wrote

Only if you make 30 an hour or more. Otherwise it's pointless.

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jkjeeper06 t1_j8wmqg0 wrote

2300/mo = $27,600/yr post tax. Its about $42,000/yr pre-tax. $20.50/hr full time.

At the low end of daycare its $13.75/hr, below our minimum wage

McDonalds is paying $19/hr near me so only a little more than that. If there is career growth potential you may miss out on that by becoming a caregiver

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tapakip t1_j8wp5ay wrote

I said $30 an hour because I would not work for a wage that equals what I'd be paying for childcare, it would need to be substantially more to be worthwhile. I'd rather be with my child for those years than working 40 hours a week just to pay someone else to watch them.

Career growth potential is the only factor, and I won't judge anyone either way. People should make their own decisions as to what's more important to them. Some will value their overall careers more, and some will value that time with their child.

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Victor_Korchnoi t1_j8xlqls wrote

What if you have two kids?

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jkjeeper06 t1_j8xtul9 wrote

Depends on the daycare. Some are discounted. If you have 2, they likely arent both infants unless they are twins so its a bit cheaper for one of them anyway.

But yes, 2, 3, 4, or 5 kids definitely changes the math

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verucaNaCI t1_j8xydjx wrote

Not necessarily. I was working full time as a lead teacher at the daycare my son attended, and even with my employee discount, I was only bringing home about $100/week. So when I had my daughter, it was considerably cheaper for me to stay home. To be fair, though, that was nearly eight years ago, and I was making less than the current minimum wage. But daycare prices have increased in those eight years as well.

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GezinhaDM t1_j93tpg9 wrote

Yup. That's why a huge portion of people I know personally use Brazilian/Hispanic sitters because they charge a fraction of that and they'll take great care of the babies.

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PinkLemonadeJam t1_j9c7zij wrote

Way to exploit undocumented workers. If a documented nanny would make $30/hour, that's what they should be paying a "Brazilian/Hispanic sitter" too.

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GezinhaDM t1_j9c8x15 wrote

These ladies watch 3-5 kids at a time, so...and, btw, I'm an undocumented immigrant, so I don't make all the money in the world and I must find care for my son, so thank God for other Brazilian and Hispanic sitters.

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LeeSheltonsHat t1_j8xbinl wrote

Well, if you don’t have kids you’ll be miserable and your life will be meaningless by the time you’re 50

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