I suspect that the $500 figure does not account for the wage that the parent(s) would be making if they were working. Defining a number that would be good to co

I suspect that the $500 figure does not account for the wage that the parent(s) would be making if they were working. Defining a number that would be good to compare is probably quite difficult because different people would spend different amounts of time, so maybe an average amount of time, average salary of parents, and standard deviation for both would be more accurate (but also much harder to find). Take it with a grain of salt.