Strollerderby : stay at home parents

No Good Choices in Child Care Debate

Amy Kuras — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:28:00 GMT

It’s a familiar paradox to every parent who works outside the home – childcare costs so much that sometimes it just makes more sense to stay home, even if that’s not what you would really prefer to do –and that’s if you can find a spot in a halfway decent center.

So I thought this brief blog post from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer’s Working Dad, Paul Nyhan, to be interesting. He stated that on average, child care center directors – that is, the people running the show – make 35 percent less than kindergarten teachers. You know the people who have the most direct contact with the kids make much less. And 17 percent of all family-owed child care centers have closed in the last five years.

Something like half of all kids are regularly in child care, he states – although I don’t know if that number includes just kids who are in full time daycare or those who go to Grandma’s every afternoon or preschool two mornings a week.

He points out a fundamental disconnect between supply and demand – that child care workers often don’t make a decent wage, but parents struggle to pay for it. I wonder why that is, although I have a few theories.

One is that child care has traditionally been women’s work, and we generally undervalue anything traditionally done by women, like teaching and clerical work and so on.

And I think it’s also a fundamental discomfort in this county with the idea of women’s economic power. There’s a strong cultural bias against middle class women who work outside the home if they have young children, but the feds mandate only a paltry three months unpaid maternity leave. Other countries offer one year, paid, minimum, so mothers of babies don’t have to go back to work right about the time they are beginning to feel somewhat good at the baby care gig.

All I know is, I envy my friends who have on site child care at their jobs, or free and loving grandma care. Because for the rest of us, the choices suck.

The Anti-Day Care Contingent

Jen Chaney — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:02:00 GMT

Am I the only person who finds this post on MomLogic a little surprising? In it, the author writes about her decision to place her son into fulltime daycare and how that has provoked extremely negative and judgmental reactions from other moms.

"I would never send my kid to day care," one supposedly said. "Isn't that going to traumatize him?" asked another.

To which my response is: Whaaaaa? Where are these people living? The majority of moms and dads in this country work, and quite a few of them send their kids to daycare. Plus, studies show that children develop just as well, and in some cases even better, when they are enrolled in a daycare center. Given how common this is, it's hard for me to fathom how any one could possibly find it strange or misguided if another parent decides to go the daycare route.

So am I crazy, or are there people who a. are ignorant enough to think a daycare center will actually traumatize a kid and b. are rude enough to say this out loud to someone's face? Obviously every parent makes his or her own choices based on what he/she believes is best for the child. Will we ever reach a point where all of us accept those choices -- whether it's stay at home, get a nanny, sign up for daycare or some combination of these options -- and not judge each other for them?

Frankly, I thought most of us were already mature enough to have gotten there. Either I'm horribly mistaken or this MomLogic blogger is hanging out with the wrong crowd.

Image: Lilsugar.com

Stay at Home Moms Now More Housebound?

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:07:00 GMT

According to a CNN report, the economy is requiring more stay at home moms to stay home rather than go on outings or playgroups or employ other methods of insuring sanity stays in tact.

With the high cost of fuel and food, more women who aren't working are also experiencing more isolation as they choose to combine trips and errands to save money.

Jen Singer is says stay-at-home moms are good at living frugally but are fearful of their partner's losing their jobs, since worrying about job loss in a one-income family is... "much more frightening" than for dual income families.

Some economists are wondering if more people are opting out of the workforce as the costs of working become higher. Whatever the case, families living on only one income are having to become more frugal in order to survive.

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Patti — Thu, 24 May 2007 21:02:00 GMT

I read this letter and response from the advice column at the Roanoke Times, and all I could think was "Are we still talking about this?"

I mean, really. Still? In 2007, there are people who are still unable to combine their observations and personal experiences to grasp the concept that stay at home parents aren't just sitting around eating bonbons and watching Oprah all day. There are other people who think working parents can't possibly be good parents. There are people who think a dad can't be as effective as a primary caregiver as a mother, and I've learned my lesson about even contemplating the child-free-versus-childbearing points of view, but those people are all out there sniping at one another too. Still.

I like advicegiver Carolyn Hax's response (especially the part where she suggests the letterwriter is lying about having friends with kids). But the real answer here is to stop worrying so much about other people's choices.

Great. Now I'm craving bonbons.