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posted by janrinok on Monday May 21 2018, @08:11AM   Printer-friendly
from the richest-country-in-the-world dept.

http://money.cnn.com/2018/05/17/news/economy/us-middle-class-basics-study/index.html

"Nearly 51 million households don't earn enough to afford a monthly budget that includes housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and a cell phone, according to a study released Thursday by the United Way ALICE Project. That's 43% of households in the United States."

The figure includes the 16.1 million households living in poverty, as well as the 34.7 million families that the United Way has dubbed ALICE -- Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. This group makes less than what's needed "to survive in the modern economy."

"Despite seemingly positive economic signs, the ALICE data shows that financial hardship is still a pervasive problem," said Stephanie Hoopes, the project's director.

California, New Mexico and Hawaii have the largest share of struggling families, at 49% each. North Dakota has the lowest at 32%.

Many of these folks are the nation's child care workers, home health aides, office assistants and store clerks, who work low-paying jobs and have little savings, the study noted. Some 66% of jobs in the US pay less than $20 an hour.

See also: https://www.forbes.com/sites/noahkirsch/2017/11/09/the-3-richest-americans-hold-more-wealth-than-bottom-50-of-country-study-finds/


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  • (Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Monday May 21 2018, @02:07PM (3 children)

    by GreatAuntAnesthesia (3275) on Monday May 21 2018, @02:07PM (#682170) Journal

    I'm not sure I follow your logic there. The staffing ratios are just there to make sure that childcare provision is safe - one adult trying to keep an eye on a couple dozen 3 year olds is a recipe for disaster.

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  • (Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday May 21 2018, @03:00PM

    by PiMuNu (3823) on Monday May 21 2018, @03:00PM (#682206)

    I know. The point is, by construction, the childcare worker, by construction, won't be able to afford their own childcare worker. And that is, for good reasons, one in three or four people in a universe with full employment of both parents where everyone has a young family. So one in three or four people "cant afford childcare" by construction.

    I realise that not everyone has a young family, so my math is off. I am trying to make an "in principle" point.

  • (Score: 1, Troll) by jmorris on Tuesday May 22 2018, @07:28AM (1 child)

    by jmorris (4844) on Tuesday May 22 2018, @07:28AM (#682559)

    You are the problem, the innumerate. Think of it this way. If a child care worker can only watch three children and gets one "full time equivalent" pay then it stands to reason that after taxes, overhead, liability insurance and profit the daycare center is going to be charging at least half a FTE to take on a child. So if we are talking about childcare for the lower middle class (the same general class as a worker in a good daycare center) the mom wanting to put her child in daycare will be spending about half of her pretax money to have someone else do her job. If she has two children she is out being an "empowered women in the workforce" all day just to pay someone else (plus the overhead of them being raised in a daycare center vs a home) to raise her children. Might was well hire an illegal to be a nanny, would be cheaper and the kids at least stay at home. Or if she was smart and is married to the father of their children, she stays home until they are old enough for school. The only way to make it look like the scheme is working is for the government to steal more money to cover up the the side effects of its regulations. Note that this does not in any way eliminate the stupidity, it only masks it.

    That 3:1 ratio sounds oh so enlightened and compassionate and "for the safety of the little ones" but it is actually quite mad. The only people it "works" for are the upper classes who earn so much more than a daycare worker that 1/2 of the cost of one is a small fraction of their earning power, the very self centered bastards who passed the law to ensure the "best" for their kid while feeling oh so superiorly compassionate. But since the vast majority of the population will be earning between 50% and 200% of the cost of a daycare worker, it can't possibly scale. You are simply too dumb to see why, probably won't even after I have rubbed your nose in it.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday May 23 2018, @12:17AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday May 23 2018, @12:17AM (#682859) Journal
      jmorris, a mother with two children could legally care for a third. So the breaking point really would be at three children per mother. But in a low fertility world, there would a considerable number of childless women and single child mothers to make such mathematics at least theoretically feasible. And if one allows men to tend to children as well, you might be able to manage it barely with present demographics.