Full time childcare more than mortgage

noodle_doodle

Goddam, tell me something I didn't realise about 3 years ago

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-26373725

And the big difference is where the banks have been swatted down to pretend to be understanding about late payments, switch mortgage lengths, provide mortgage holidays etc you try doing that at the nursery. They're like the goodfellas.

Kids sick? F*ck you pay me.
Lost your job? F*ck you pay me.
House hit by lightning? F*ck you pay me.


PS. For light relief, and at the risk of incurring the wrath of "do not invoke the hpc forum" types, here's a link to a post :-) -->

http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=197133&view=findpost&p=1102477618

bluep

Nurserys have it sewn up - use cheap labour (it should be a much higher paid/high trained profession given the job they are doing), overheads aren't huge and its a captive audience. You have to book places months, even years in advance and they have waiting lists.

Primary reason we didn't have another child - the childcare costs would have crippled us financially at the time.

movilogo

At least those parents have sensible mortgage then!

noodle_doodle

bluep wrote: »

Nurserys have it sewn up - use cheap labour (it should be a much higher paid/high trained profession given the job they are doing), overheads aren't huge and its a captive audience. You have to book places months, even years in advance and they have waiting lists.

Primary reason we didn't have another child - the childcare costs would have crippled us financially at the time.

One thing I've found strange is that a lot of the childcare workers have kids in childcare themselves. I could see the point if they got subsidised places for working at the same nursery, but often their kids are in other nurseries! I've never figured out the economics of that, because as you say it's not exactly a 40% tax bracket job....

ruggedtoast

The profit margin for running a nursery is very low. By law you can have no more than three children per child, most of whom aren't paying much more than £5 per hour.

Thats £15 - £20 an hour to hire a staff member and premises to look after three kids, feed them, provide snacks, toys, activities, health and safety, maintenance, NI, holiday cover and and back office support as well as keeping in line with Ofsted requirements.

If you want someone to blame for expensive childcare blame the government for insisting on a ratio of child to carer that is obviously too low, and for not providing subsidised child care as most of the EU enjoys.

Edit - 3 children per adult!

dryhat

Of course, the REAL problem is the high cost of housing.

But never mind, it will soon get to the point where the kids are put straight to work to contribute to the mortgage/rent - so childcare won't be needed.

michaels

noodle_doodle wrote: »

One thing I've found strange is that a lot of the childcare workers have kids in childcare themselves. I could see the point if they got subsidised places for working at the same nursery, but often their kids are in other nurseries! I've never figured out the economics of that, because as you say it's not exactly a 40% tax bracket job....

That is an easy question to answer - tax credits.

Are there any figures out there on how child care costs (net of subsidies) compare with other European countries?

In a way I wonder why people find it surprising given the 3:1 ratio that it doesn't make financial sense for many women to work. It is lucky that once they reach school age suddenly ratios of 30 to 1 become possible otherwise we would literally not be able to afford to educate our children as the majority of the workforce would have to be teachers....

CLAPTON

bluep wrote: »

Nurserys have it sewn up - use cheap labour (it should be a much higher paid/high trained profession given the job they are doing), overheads aren't huge and its a captive audience. You have to book places months, even years in advance and they have waiting lists.

Primary reason we didn't have another child - the childcare costs would have crippled us financially at the time.

presumably you and your partner are now running a nursery, paying excellent wages and still coining it in?

wotsthat

£600/ month for the average mortgage - is that all?

noodle_doodle

michaels wrote: »

That is an easy question to answer - tax credits.

Are there any figures out there on how child care costs (net of subsidies) compare with other European countries?

In a way I wonder why people find it surprising given the 3:1 ratio that it doesn't make financial sense for many women to work. It is lucky that once they reach school age suddenly ratios of 30 to 1 become possible otherwise we would literally not be able to afford to educate our children as the majority of the workforce would have to be teachers....

bah i earn too much for tax credits (i.e. more than minimum wage), so my wife has chosen to work very part time to just under the £10K income tax threshold. If she goes above that, the tax deductions start making it less and less worthwhile to bother working extra hours. Some employers offer tax-free childcare vouchers, but these are only £243 per month per parent, so only give you a further £2,916 of tax avoiding income (and you only save 20% of that £2,916 anyways)

I know a couple whose nursery outgoings are £1,500 a month. They earn a fair whack to afford that but that means a good chunk of their income is in the 40% tax bracket, and over a £1,000 of that nursery bill comes out of net income. One of them is really only working to keep up their NI contributions...

noodle_doodle

wotsthat wrote: »

£600/ month for the average mortgage - is that all?

That'll include mortgages that were started 15/20 years ago on 25-year repayments. £600 a month was probably loads in 1994 when they started it :-)

Maybe it includes interest-only too

I bet figures for FTB'ers are a good bit higher