Hacker News Reader

> My child goes to daycare and it is infinitely more stimulating than anything we could do for her at home even if we've "given our best effort".

Is stimulation the most important thing in childrearing?

> What is the spouse who stays home supposed to do in ten years when the child is much more independent and at school or activities much of the day?

Volunteer? Find self-fulfillment in something other than a career?

Plus, I think you may be begging the question: while older children require less immediate attention than younger ones, they still require plenty of care. It just tends to be more planning and less direct interaction.

Plus, why do you assume only one kid? My mother spent more than a quarter-century with children at home. She certainly was never bored.

> And what are two spouses supposed to do when they both deeply enjoy their work and the value it brings them as individuals?

Maybe work from home? Ultimately, though, parents today must sacrifice for their children, just as parents have done for millennia. Kids aren't expensive status symbols: raising them well is a duty, not a lark.

It's also just not financially possible. At one time you could raise a family on a single income, but unless you are in a fairly narrow set of professions, this isn't possible, at least not the same way it was then. I don't just think I should "raise" my child, I want them to have opportunities to do things. To travel, to try sports or music, to do activities, and all these require money. Even if you did none of these things, money would be tight on a single income of, say $70,000 a year in a midsized American town or city.

It's all a matter of priorities. When my wife and I got married we knew that she wanted to stay home with the kids when we had them. To avoid becoming comfortable with two incomes and have to back down later, we made the choice to live on only my salary and put hers in the bank. We never got used two incomes, so it was pretty easy for her to leave her job when the time came.

There's all sorts of caveats with this, of course, and not every family can make it happen. We definitely don't regret the choice, and I'm certain our kids are better for it.

I'm not criticizing people who chose to stay home, but I'm also defensive of being morally judged for having two working parents. Even if I can afford to do so (and many people can't), I've opted to give my child a different set of experiences.

I'm not at all judging anyone who chooses differently than we did. I do think our kids are better off than if we had chosen differently, but I think they'd turn out great either way. You're absolutely right - you're giving your child different experiences, and that's not right or wrong - just different.

I make it a point not to judge other parents' choices (except parents who let their kids wear camo - that's just inexcusable).

First, I would agree it's very difficult now days to raise children on a single income but if it's a priority I know it can be done because my family is a data point.

But you've touched on something that could get me talking for hours... Namely, the detrimental affects of inflation on a society and why the populace hasn't had the politicians' collective head in a noose for it.

Of course deflated real wages operate in tandem with inflation to put pressure on the family but that blame lies more with the populace. I mean why did we ever think that significantly adding to the labor pool (double income families) wasn't going to suppress real wages?

I think we ought to be very careful about blaming wage deflation on double income families since there are much larger factors related to wage deflation:

1. Free trade and aggressive foreign monetary policy. The ability to manufacture good with much cheaper labor.

2. Automation.

3. The shift in the workforce to skilled labor. This has some overlap with 2. Even if the manufacturing industry that enabled the heady economic days of the 1950s and 60s return to the US, the people who get them will need some education. This problem was laid bare after the housing crisis. The problem of the "unemployable male", a man with a high school education who was doing fairly well working low skill labor jobs in construction. When all that came crashing down, those men were left with nowhere to go. One of the ironies is that, at least where I am, we are very lacking in some jobs. Skilled labor, such as carpenters, welders and technicians of varying kinds are in demand. There's still wage deflation, but certainly there are jobs.

Yeah, I wouldn't suggest double incomes families is the sole reason for wage deflation but I'd submit it played a significant part.

WRT point 1; I remember 30 years ago thinking if the U.S. consumes such a disproportionate amount of the world's resources just how it was possible to bring the rest of the world up to the U.S's standard of living. Seems like the math doesn't add up here.

Your points in item 3 are well taken. It's interesting, or maybe obvious, that the skilled labor examples you've listed can't be off shored.

Often I think inflation has caused people to subconsciously choose to buy cheap, less quality goods. For example, buying furniture at IKEA versus buying hand made from someone local craftsman. Do people really demand the cheaper (price and quality) furniture or are they forced to accept the cheaper furniture because they're real disposable income is diminished? When we're talking about furniture it's not such a big deal but what about food? Are people really demanding carb, corn syrup laden crap with maximum calorie density or are they forced to make that choice because of the lower real wages?

Finally, I'm generally for free markets and against the idea of tariffs. However, it seems to me business and labor are not playing on a level field here because business (specifically multi-nationals) are allowed to take advantage of labor arbitrage but labor is not allowed to take advantage of rent arbitrage; meaning labor just can't up and move to Thailand or where ever to take advantage of the cost of living difference.

>It's also just not financially possible while maintaining a standard of living similar to my current one.

Fixed that for you.

Or not financially possible. I just checked. In my town the average cost of housing is about $650/month, but that includes apartments of varying sizes. So lets assume a family of four is spending $10,000-$15,000 year on housing. That makes the math easy and is not too far off for the price of a three bedroom home. Average household income here is about $50,000/year, so already we're using 20% of our income on housing. According to the USDA, the "low cost" food plan for a family of 4 is another $10,255 [0]. So now we've got almost half our income in just housing and food. Add to that transportation (where I live you have to own a car), sundries, clothing, utilities, health care, school supplies and so on and I can absolutely see how two children would be a financial hardship on a single income, standard of living or not. Even at slightly higher than average that would preclude all sorts of things (the activities, travel, and so on).

I'm not trying to make excuses for people's choices, but kids cost money and financial hardship happens. People get laid off, they make bad decisions, the economy goes boom or bust, changing the cost of living and incomes, shit happens. You also have long term security to think about, making sure you're putting money away for retirement and so on. It would be hard to raise kids on $50,000 a year, and I suspect the median income in most of the country is actually less than that.

[0]:https://www.cnpp.usda.gov/sites/default/files/usda_food_plan...

Don't misunderstand me, I am not criticizing someone who chooses to stay home with their children. Opinion masquearades as fact on this topic, and I firmly don't believe that a child is going to be better off raised at home or better off going to daycare. They will for certain be better off in a family where their parents are happy, and if that means both work or one stays home so be it.

> My child goes to daycare and it is infinitely more stimulating than anything we could do for her at home even if we've "given our best effort".

Are you sure? I remember daycare and it was mind-numbing torture. The parents all thought it was great but I would have preferred to be anywhere else.

Same. It's a dim memory at this point but at best it was OK, and I mostly hated it.

I actually remember having a good experience. We were taught how to play chess, played Mario on an MS-DOS machine and I remember there being a ball pit.

> but all of our family is on the east coast or in Germany

So I take either you or your wife is German. If your child doesn't spend enough time with the German parent, he or she will not know the German language, so please be careful with that.

Disclaimer: I don't speak the language of my father (Vietnamese), for the reason I mentioned, and as a French expat I try to make my two kids speak French when I can, but they don't have the same level as "normal" French kids, especially my older son who is 6.