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Childcare is a must if you want an equal society. If a family gets to choose who works, the incentive is toe choose the one that makes most money. By statistics

by Moru 5y ago

Childcare is a must if you want an equal society. If a family gets to choose who works, the incentive is toe choose the one that makes most money. By statistics this is by a far margin male. So childcare is the solution to inequality, not a cost. We call it a women trap. Healthcare has a problem with insurance where the hospitals have to blow up prices to cover costs and give some wriggle room for haggling with the insurance company.

mschuster91 5y ago
Alternatively, society could combat the "birth trap" by providing legal protections for mothers, like the right to return to their old jobs, protecting them from getting fired during and after pregnancy, providing them with post-natal PTO... just like it's the norm across Europe. > By statistics this is by a far margin male. And again, that one can be combatted by society. Mandate opening up wage lists in companies, mandate equal pay for equal work, support unions and collective wage agreements, mandate gender (and other) equality in hiring. All of this is what various European countries do. > Healthcare has a problem with insurance where the hospitals have to blow up prices to cover costs and give some wriggle room for haggling with the insurance company. The fact that hospitals have to haggle with insurance companies is mind-blowing on its own, or that they have to cover for un(der)insured people and have to spread out the cost to all actual payers. In Europe, neither of these is a thing.
- Moru 5y ago
  Well, we are importing those problems here in Europe too. Private practices does surgery that isn't needed because they get more money from the state. There seems to be a number of standard procedures in USA medicine that doesn't really exist in Europe but the private medical community would be happy to import them.
MomoXenosaga 5y ago
Women today are completely free to make their own choices. As society is finding out they can choose not to have kids. The first time in human history where that is happening. The government needs to make having children worth it.
nostrademons 5y ago
It doesn't make an equal society, it shifts the inequality outside of the family. It's not more productive to care for somebody else's kid than to care for your own; most parents would argue it's less productive, because they're more attuned to their kids' needs. So you need a certain amount of labor devoted to childcare in any society, and this amount is dependent only on the number of children, not the amount of income or its distribution. Economy-wide, if a market chooses who works, the incentive is to choose the people who make the most money. The arbitrage here is that if you make over the median income, you can pay someone who makes less than the median income to take care of your kids, keep your high-paying job, and everyone comes out ahead. But if everyone makes the median income, then it'll cost just as much to pay someone to take care of your kids as you make, making it economically unprofitable. And this is exactly how it plays out in real life. High-income families get a nanny or au pair, who makes a small fraction of what the mother does, but generally does better than she could've in other equivalently-skilled jobs. Middle-income families like teachers end up spending as much on childcare as one spouse makes. Low-income mothers drop out of the workforce when they have a kid, unless they have family help for childcare.

by Moru 5y ago

mschuster91 5y ago

Alternatively, society could combat the "birth trap" by providing legal protections for mothers, like the right to return to their old jobs, protecting them from getting fired during and after pregnancy, providing them with post-natal PTO... just like it's the norm across Europe. > By statistics this is by a far margin male. And again, that one can be combatted by society. Mandate opening up wage lists in companies, mandate equal pay for equal work, support unions and collective wage agreements, mandate gender (and other) equality in hiring. All of this is what various European countries do. > Healthcare has a problem with insurance where the hospitals have to blow up prices to cover costs and give some wriggle room for haggling with the insurance company. The fact that hospitals have to haggle with insurance companies is mind-blowing on its own, or that they have to cover for un(der)insured people and have to spread out the cost to all actual payers. In Europe, neither of these is a thing.

Moru 5y ago
Well, we are importing those problems here in Europe too. Private practices does surgery that isn't needed because they get more money from the state. There seems to be a number of standard procedures in USA medicine that doesn't really exist in Europe but the private medical community would be happy to import them.

MomoXenosaga 5y ago

Women today are completely free to make their own choices. As society is finding out they can choose not to have kids. The first time in human history where that is happening. The government needs to make having children worth it.

nostrademons 5y ago

It doesn't make an equal society, it shifts the inequality outside of the family. It's not more productive to care for somebody else's kid than to care for your own; most parents would argue it's less productive, because they're more attuned to their kids' needs. So you need a certain amount of labor devoted to childcare in any society, and this amount is dependent only on the number of children, not the amount of income or its distribution. Economy-wide, if a market chooses who works, the incentive is to choose the people who make the most money. The arbitrage here is that if you make over the median income, you can pay someone who makes less than the median income to take care of your kids, keep your high-paying job, and everyone comes out ahead. But if everyone makes the median income, then it'll cost just as much to pay someone to take care of your kids as you make, making it economically unprofitable. And this is exactly how it plays out in real life. High-income families get a nanny or au pair, who makes a small fraction of what the mother does, but generally does better than she could've in other equivalently-skilled jobs. Middle-income families like teachers end up spending as much on childcare as one spouse makes. Low-income mothers drop out of the workforce when they have a kid, unless they have family help for childcare.