Agreed, this is going off the reservation polite society inhabits but it is true that childcare is not, in fact, worth it. Or, to narrow the claim a little, much of the childcare that it is being proposed we all pay for is not worth it:
Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, believes the “scale and ambition” of Labour’s childcare reforms will compare with Aneurin Bevan’s creation of the National Health Service.
In a bid to resolve one of the biggest problems facing families, and therefore the economy, the rising Labour star has a plan, as yet not fully costed: to guarantee childcare for all parents of children aged nine months to 11 years.
That children are taken care of is, of course, entirely worth it. So much about homo sapiens sapiens only makes sense when seen in the context of the young of the species being helpless for just so many dang years.
But that other people are paid to take care of other peoples’ children isn’t, for the vast majority, worth it. In that overall and national economic sense.
Britons pay the third-highest childcare costs in the developed world. The average cost of sending a child under two to nursery full-time is £263 a week, according to the National Childbirth Trust.
Let’s just use that number as the full cost. It isn’t, that already contains some subsidy but we’ll use it all the same.
So, we have a cost to society of that £263. The average wage in the country is £32,000 a year or so, call that £600 a week. The benefit of bearing the £263 cost is that a further parent can go out to work instead of being stuck at home. We gain the benefit of the £600 in production at the cost of the £263.
But that’s only for someone on median wages. Someone on minimum wage might make £370 or so working full time for a week. And once we tick off taxes then the value of the output is pretty close to that £263 cost. So, it’s not obvious at all that paid childare for someone on lower than median wages is in fact a worthwhile economic endeavour.
Or, of course, if there are two children - which is, among families which have any children at all, the modal number. £263 times two is £526 and it looks like it’s not worth it even for someone on median wages - and it’s definitely not for someone on minimum.
For those in the top 10% of the income distribution this all makes perfect economic sense of course. But for those lower down, well, it really isn’t obvious that the economic output gained is worth the economic costs that have to be carried to gain it.
Therefore, you know, we shouldn't do it.
We do, these days, call it childcare instead of having servants but it’s the same activity all the same. And has always been true it’s only logically sensible for those who can afford servants to have them. Waving around claims of subsidy from taxpayers - that’s all the rest of us - doesn’t change this calculus at all.
For very large portions of the British population paid childcare doesn’t make sense. So, why is everyone shouting that this is what we must do?
We can put this more simply perhaps. The lady who does the childcare has children. So, the children of the lady who does childcare have to go to childcare to free up the lady to do childcare. And what on Earth do we gain from that arrangement?