The Rising Cost of Child and Pet Day Care

And the largest part of those salaries is again used to pay for housing.

Roughly one thirds of American incomes go to cover housing. Cheaper housing means lower wage demands.

Yeah but real estate costs a close Second. Then probably insurance

The people working there don’t live in the church

That is value transfer not value creation.

> I currently believe that period of time (mid-20th century, esp. in the US) was a historical anomaly set up by a fairly unique set of circumstances

It was a period of high taxation on the highest incomes, large social welfare programs and by relative terms fairly low income inequality.

Finally productivity gains benefitted the labor class and not just the capital class.

That all halted in the 70s and 80s.

I know a decent number of single income families and they even have A/C!

You do have to intentionally budget but you can raise five+ kids on a single salary if you want to.

This is an outdated view.

The essential costs - housing, healthcare and education - have far outpaced inflation while the cost of food and appliances has not. How can a single income compete in buying from the limited supply of houses against dual incomes?

Well there are no security guarantees with being a SAHM. Your husband can easily cheat divorce you now and you don’t get much alimony and only some child support. Its better for the woman and the child to have a backup plan.

I just had this conversation with a friend today.

Yes - given a small number of rights that frankly we should have always had - women have found all kinds of representation in education, salaries and diverse paths in life. Paths not previously open to us and pursued at tremendously high cost.

But population decline frankly is occurring because society is uninterested in changing its relationship with child bearing and child rearing. Men have limited interested in stepping up, women are doing work at home, work at work, work in society. Corporations have less interested in flexibility where women are near continuously penalized or held back. Even in a "progressive" presidency there were more CEOs named John than women CEOs. There's disinterest even when the next generation of workers is on the line and the government...well they are actively moving to unwind the rights we've won.

> It's because women frankly have better options than motherhood and what stay at home parenting entails.

It's not about having better options so much as knowing that they'll be bringing a child into a world that's only going to get worse. A child who may never own a home, who may struggle to make ends meet. A child who may go bankrupt if they lose the healthcare lotto.

While it's true that women's professional opportunities were limited in the past, I disagree that this was the sole or even primary reason for single-income stability. My grandparents' generation, for example, often saw one parent (usually the father) working a manufacturing or union job that paid enough to cover a mortgage, raise several children, and afford basics, even with the mother not working outside the home. The purchasing power of those wages was simply far greater.

That's kinda still the case. The half below the median can't all magically find jobs above the median. Though talking heads would lead people to believe that's true.

Let’s now t forget about the large population of black Americans who were left out, too.

Now they don't have the option to be housewives unless they actively seek out a rich husband. Who benefits? (There is only one correct answer):

1. Families. 2. Women. 3. Corporations.

The workforce saw an explosion of productivity, and women added upwards of 100% more members of the workforce.

The problem is that all of that wealth went to the billionaires and the rest of us got the bones in the scrap pile. Now we can't even raise our children because we need to work, but we cannot even not raise our children because it costs more than we make.

1 adult per 18 4-year old children seems... hectic.

> This just spreads the cost across all taxpayers, instead of just the people consuming the service.

Yes—and then we can (in theory—obviously not going to happen in the current political climate) shift the bulk of that cost onto the taxpayers who can most afford to subsidize it, and away from the people who are just getting by. Who are, not entirely coincidentally, also the people most likely to be in need of childcare services.

Obviously you’re not going to meet the families that don’t use daycare … at daycare.

I think the theory is that they buy up a significant portion of the market, i.e. consolidate lots of independents. Then they raise prices in concert, and take advantage of reduced competition.

> Is the theory here that the previous owners were altruistically pricing below what the market would bear?

As someone who has done research on pricing in a range of sectors, it’s usually some form of ignorance rather than altruism.

In case you think I’m just picking on child care providers, I will provide an additional example — non-VC SaaS services were often wildly mispriced/underpriced until the “charge more” mantra became more widespread (thank you, patio11).

I'm starting to think "altruistic pricing" is a skewed framing to begin with. The implication that not maxing out every trick in the book to find the highest price the market will "bear" is a loss.

That "slack", where people provide better goods and services, for a lower price than the market could theoretically bear, is the very definition of Having Nice Things.

The implied "optimal" price discovery is a highly adversarial process - derived from an every-growing playbook of price discrimination tactics, deceptive marketing, high-pressure sales tactics, exploitation of intertia and other external overheads, covert cuts to the quality being provided, etc, etc.

Such pricing is both a symptom and cause for "low trust society" behaviors. The increasing ubiquity of those "efficient" pricing strategies may very well have amounted to a covert pillaging of the commons.

PE buys all these businesses out (there's demand, and its rising), and they close most of them to consolidate into cold, brutal buildings.

PE did this with medical providers. When I was a child family doctors were a thing (btw, 2000s). I saw in my area that a lot of the small practices were bought out, and now there are medical "campuses" which have like dozens of different providers. I was talking to my dentist about this and she explained it to me that way so unless she's lying idk what to say.

"All markets cater to those who can afford it"

I'm not sure this is true. PE driven markets currently seem to cater to the break point. What is the absolute most I can charge until someone will walk away? If I break it into a subscription, or into pieces will I be able to charge even more than that break point because the buyer has not or cannot easily do the math? Maybe offer financing and take a cut there as well.

I am not making a moral argument, but it is far more sophisticated than "those who can afford it" and so, this is then not really about affording it, rather its about restructuring what the category should cost socially speaking and pushing that even further. This is happening in a large number of sectors at the same time.

It's so great living in the ~best~ only system for organising the economy.

Working people can't afford homes or starting a family, but at least we are generating amazing value for shareholders.

Quit your full time job and do home childcare!

Infinite money glitch with no downside??? Simply never stop importing people I'm sure there won't be any issues at all!

umm, americans? its true though. how can there be so many people struggling financially in the richest country on the planet?

My dog would bark if we left her alone. Wouldn't make a difference to us since we wouldn't hear it, but I refuse to subject my neighbors to it.

I've had neighbors that clearly had no such concerns.

There is a solution to this, though, and it is the solution that generations -- generations -- of people have chosen.

1) don't have a pet that you will have to leave alone for too long because it is cruel to do this just so you have a pet to keep you company when you have time to enjoy it

2) there is no 2)

I have plenty of grace for people in my life -- much, much more than you might imagine. I have no patience for people who treat the happiness of their pet as transactional and have created a service economy to support it.

As I commented elsewhere, I have, and I have very nearly called the RSPCA on their owners.

I think these people should not have pets (not least because dogs fully can be trained to be happier alone).

If you work away from your home for long days, you should consider not having a social animal as a pet. Get a cat; they don’t give a shit.

And it necessarily conflates them so that the comparison is meaningful. Otherwise why not compare it to, say, gardening?

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If you have pets you care about that much, take them with you or don't do the things that require you to be away. So much is about "I want" and refusing to accept reality. If you are away from the house for 12 hours a day then having a socially intelligent pet such as a dog is an experience you will simply have to do without in your life. If you want a pet, get some fish or a hamster.

> A lot of couple do the math and end up in the same place, where working their ass off to earn more, just to pay more doesn't make sense.

I think if you're breaking even on daycare and salary then you're still coming out economically ahead to keep working.

Daycare costs stop once you enroll the kid into school. Typically salaries scale with years of experience so you're forfeiting ~7-9 years of salary growth by stopping work.

That said, there are non-economic reasons to raise your kids ...

Exactly this. And those people never complain about daycare costs because they’re not paying them at all.

And for awhile the market looks good as the prices can rise as the “cheapest” leave.

But eventually it will collapse.