Did you have a kid in 2013? Congratulations! That will cost you a quarter of a million dollars.
Yes, all you procreators: according to new stats from the US Department of Agriculture, the price tag for raising a baby born in 2013 to the age of 18 just soared over $245,000 for a middle-income couple. The figure is up $4,260 from 2012.
Notice that this number does not include college, just your basic food, lodging, transporting, clothing and various sundries associated with just getting the kid up and through the door.
WTF? Part of the problem, the report shows, is that childcare costs have rocketed into the stratosphere, often costing as much as renting a home. CNN cites recent data on center-based care for a single infant, and it has surpassed median rent payments in nearly half of the states. Meanwhile, America’s median income is 8 percent less than its pre-recession level, and healthcare costs are still growing faster than inflation.
Is it any wonder that millennials, also saddled with student debt, are not planning to have children, even though they may want them? Research conducted by the Wharton School’s Stew Friedman comparing millennials to Gen Xers finds that the younger cohort is more nervous about the future, more financially insecure, and daunted by the prospect of working 72 hours a week even when they can find a job— which is not easy for them to do. With all that burden, Friedman found that despite a desire to be parents, young people could not see how it would be feasible.
And who could blame them? How can parenting look attractive when you only see yourself strapped for cash and exhausted?
Friedman’s cross-generational study revealed the stunning fact that the rate of college graduates who plan to have children has tanked by nearly half over the past 20 years. The words “childfree” and “millennial” are becoming linked in the media landscape.
The US is way behind the curve compared to most developed countries with policies that allow parents (especially mothers) to work, raise kids, and not go completely insane.
Could the new numbers on childrearing be a wakeup call to America? You would think at least this info could be used by Democrats to wrestle the “family values” boast away from Republicans like Paul Ryan, whose social and economic policies leave parents high and dry, with insecure employment and an inadequate social safety net. But leave it to Dems to suck up to rich donors with Republican-lite talk of cutting deficits and reducing social programs. The wakeup call will probably have to be sounded by a mass movement to take our society back from forces so inhuman they foreclose the possibility of life itself.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy