There are a lot of women who are having trouble figuring out what childcare options will work best for their family and budget.
Nicole Slemp is one mom who has had a hard time getting cheap child care. It took her a while to find a job she liked because the pay was so low. But the cost of child care for her to work almost made it not worth it. The cheapest choices for child care cost about $1,500 a month, and the most expensive ones cost about $2,000 a month.
She said that she and her husband made too much money together to get any help from the government, and they were thinking about their choices. So Slemp said, “I really didn’t want to quit my job.”
This problem has been seen all over the US because good child care is very pricey. Not only that, but it’s also hard to find babysitting because most of the time there are waitlists that last for months.
In 2022, one in ten young children had a parent who had to quit or greatly alter their job because of having to care for the kid. Most of the time, mothers have to quit or change plans to care for their kids.
Also, there is a big gap in job rates between women with and without a four-year degree.
There aren’t many choices for childcare, so this problem affects families all over the country. If a parent can’t find childcare, they often have to take time off work or even quit their job.
According to sociologist Jessica Calarco from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, “the stay-at-home moms in this country are disproportionately mothers who’ve been pushed out of the workforce because they don’t make enough to make it work financially to pay for child care.” Based on what she found, three-quarters of stay-at-home moms live in houses with incomes of less than $50,000.