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Child care is expensive everywhere, but some states cost more than others
Working parents, beware: child care costs will eat up a huge part of your personal budget.
This is probably true anywhere, but where you live makes a big difference. Child care costs can vary widely by region. According to CNN’s guide to the most expensive states for child care, my home state of Massachusetts is the priciest in the nation. Cost of living here is high, but it’s not just a case of people having higher incomes and paying more dollars. The percentage of your household income that’s eaten up by day care here is higher than anywhere else.
Childcare here typically costs about sixteen percent of household income. At the other end of the spectrum, moms and dads in Mississippi pay just over seven percent of their incomes to have their little ones cared for while they work. Why the big gap?
Bloomberg's Budget proposal includes cuts in child care which will affect many single moms.
I don’t envy any mayor, especially Michael Bloomberg, for being the mayor of New York can’t be easy. With so much diversity comes countless points of view such that virtually every decision made is a potentially controversial one. Except, sadly, ones which pertain to childcare.
While decisions adversely impacting senior centers or libraries are sure to cause great strife, changes to subsidized childcare go virtually unnoticed, except of course, to the folks who bare the brunt of those decisions. And those folks?
Often, they’re single moms.
Even before she was born, I knew I couldn't bear to leave my daughter's sweet face to go to work every day
“You can’t have it all,” my mother warned when I was pregnant with my daughter. “No woman ever really does.”
Eh, I thought. I’ll show her.
One of the most distressing things at that time was trying to figure out how I’d continue working after the baby was born and keep her out of daycare at the same time. I know many kids who have thrived outside of the home from the time of their infancy, but it wasn’t a choice for my child that sat well with me. Not working was not an option, and the dearth of solutions kept me up at night.
Federal guidelines recommend that families spend no more than 10% of their income on child care expenses. But in the real world, many spend two and three times that amount because they simply have no choice. And while quality child care is expensive no matter where you live, in some states it now costs more to send your kid to day care than it does to send your kid to college. Continue reading »
The Chicago Tribune ran a wonderful story about the powerful impact libraries – and loving librarians – have on low-income children, especially in the summer months. Many poor children and their parents are using their local libraries as a makeshift camp or child care provider. And Chicago librarians seem happy to report for parent/teacher duty.
Susan Neuman, professor of educational studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who is writing a book on public libraries and education, lauds librarians as “the hidden stars of our communities.” She adds, “Librarians act as substitute mother teachers. They have taken it upon themselves to fill this role. They are doing it and doing it well, even if it is not something they wanted to do.”
In Zion, a suburb north of the city, “the children without parents are especially welcomed,” reports Carol Cramer, the library youth services coordinator. “We like to see our library used,” she said.
It’s quite touching to read the stories of these unsung heroes, like Jan Brooks at Thurgood Marshall Library in Englewood, who “has at times checked out books in his own name for children and paid their late fines” and even “taken children outside to the fenced-in courtyard and shared his peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the ones who don’t have a lunch.”
Brooks admits that he’s a bit of a softie when it comes to kids. He says, “So you’re running around, that’s no big deal for me. If you’re talking, it doesn’t bother me. That’s so insignificant compared to what we could do to help a child.”
Indeed. Which is why it’s so sad that year after year libraries around the country have to fight for funding and in fact to stay open. Continue reading »
When Carmela Khury got called up for jury duty, she probably wasn’t thrilled. But the Rochester Hills, Michigan woman did what she had to do and arranged child care for her two young children so she could fulfill her civic duty. But when, on the second day of jury selection in a murder trail, Khury found herself unexpectedly without a babysitter, she again did what she had to do: She phoned the court clerk and informed him of the situation.
While Khury might have expected to be excused from jury duty under the circumstances, she was not. The court clerk told her that if she didn’t show up, she’d be arrested. Continue reading »
Summer camp is a great way to keep kids entertained and out of trouble in the summer months, but in today’s economy, luxuries like camp are often the first thing to go.
Joan Brackin, a 64-year-old grandmother of nine from Grant City, MO, has come up with a solution for her family. According to the Los Angeles Times, Brackin takes in all of her grand-kids for a full week every summer and holds “Grandma Camp.”
Joslyn Gray 
Amber Doty 
Julianna Miner 
Monica Bielanko 
Sierra Black 
Meredith Carroll 
Carolyn Castiglia 
Sunny Chanel 
Madeline Holler 
Wendy Michaels 
Rebecca Odes 
Danielle Smith 
Danielle Sullivan 
Katherine Stone 
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