It's worth noting here that the cost scales pretty well with income; what they've really found is not that children are expensive per se , but rather that people choose to spend on them.
For example, the first $5000/year or so is housing and daycare costs. Yes, if you get a bigger home ($30k bigger by my estimate) and pay a lot for daycare ($5-10k) is typical, you can pay a boatload of money for your kids.
On the other hand, if you sensibly realize that the #2 income of the wife is taxed away and eaten up by expenses, you can drop most of that expense.
Still an expense, but most families with a lick of sense aren't paying near that much.
The USDA obviously never heard of yard sales. 8-) As with health care, Americans spend so much on their children because they can, not because they have to. If you knocked a zero off the USDA figure, your kids would still grow up in greater comfort than 99% of the people who've ever lived, and they'd have a better work ethic than those $221,000 USDA Choice brats.
It's worth noting here that the cost scales pretty well with income; what they've really found is not that children are expensive per se , but rather that people choose to spend on them.
ReplyDeleteFor example, the first $5000/year or so is housing and daycare costs. Yes, if you get a bigger home ($30k bigger by my estimate) and pay a lot for daycare ($5-10k) is typical, you can pay a boatload of money for your kids.
On the other hand, if you sensibly realize that the #2 income of the wife is taxed away and eaten up by expenses, you can drop most of that expense.
Still an expense, but most families with a lick of sense aren't paying near that much.
The USDA obviously never heard of yard sales. 8-) As with health care, Americans spend so much on their children because they can, not because they have to. If you knocked a zero off the USDA figure, your kids would still grow up in greater comfort than 99% of the people who've ever lived, and they'd have a better work ethic than those $221,000 USDA Choice brats.
ReplyDelete