Who will watch the children?

It is very, very hard for single moms to find work that provides adequate pay and scheduling to meet the needs of her kids. And by “the needs of her kids,” I don’t mean their need for ballet and soccer and a new video game once a month, and a lot of other things that other kids often have. I mean their need to not be alone for extended periods of time; their need to have appropriate food in the house; their need to have parental help with homework or problems at school — those sorts of things that are not, at all, in any way, frivolous.

During the first several years I was a parent, I was able to stay home with my kids — at least most of the time. Any childcare I needed, I swapped with family members and good friends. I know that on many levels I was very, very lucky to have these arrangements. I also know that the lack of support for members of the workforce who are also mothers is outrageouly poor — and the reason that many, many women end up staying home with their kids instead of adding to their family’s economic well-being.

After my divorce, it became necessary to work more, and to find more creative ways to get my children adequately cared-for while I was gone. For a while, I had a cooperative relationship with my downstairs neighbor. She worked part-time during the day, and her eight-year-old son would come up and play with my kids. I would work some third shift hours, and she would keep a baby monitor hooked up in her room at night, so the kids could yell for her if they needed anything. This is just one example of how us single moms try to make it work.

Because daycare is EXPENSIVE. It’s summer now (at least for another month), and the cheapest day camp I can find is at the YMCA. Good, high-quality children’s programming to be sure. But at 170 per week, per kid (and that’s the discounted price), it’s almost impossible to send the kids there. A real math story problem:

Molly Swenson is making $9.00 per hour (she’s not, but it’s close enough), working 30 hours per week (because after applying for jobs for months, the one she was finally offered wasn’t quite full-time, which means Molly also doesn’t have health insurance). Molly’s rate of taxation is about 25%. She has two school-age children who both require some degree of childcare if left alone for more than 3 hours. The cheapest all-day childcare she can find for the rest of the summer is $170 for each child, each week. Can Molly afford to send her kids to day care? (Space is provided for you to show your work.)

It’s not that I have been lazy, just hanging around — I’ve been keeping a house, caring for kids, managing a yard, instilling values and morals, doing all of the shopping, paying the bills, being a one-stop triage center for all illnesses and injuries, and pretty much never sleeping more than 6 hours a night. It’s just not feasible for many families to put kids in childcare so that the primary caregiver can earn a wage.

You may notice my emphasis on safe, quality child care as well. I know that no one out there faults me for that, but I feel like it is an important distinction to make. Last winter, the news reported a few of incidents of kids getting left on the bus during field trips — an idea that is horrifying to me. And on the way to work last week, I saw an event that reminded me exactly why my family (and so many other families I know) decided to have one parent home full time with the kids.

Driving on a very busy downtown street, my eyes were attracted (as they always are) to a group of young children. An overheated day care worker in scrubs, talking on her cell phone, was pushing a a Bye-Bye Baby Buggy — a giant red stroller that holds four toddlers at once. Behind her straggled three or four more kids (they looked like they were about 3 years old), also very overheated. I was gazing at all those little ones when one of them said something to their teacher. Without turning around, she delivered a sharp smack to the little girl’s face and kept walking, pushing the buggy. The little girl let out a wail that pierced the glass of my rolled-up car windows, and stood stock still on the sidewalk. The “teacher” kept walking. She got about 10 steps ahead when she noticed that the little girl was still standing where she left her, and still screaming. The woman went back, grabbed the little girl by the arm and yanked her up to the stroller to keep walking. (I slowed down to try to figure out what day care they were from, but couldn’t see any signs. I went around the block so I could check on them again, but they were gone before I got back.)

So, here’s what Molly has done. She did her training on the second shift so that her friends and family could help with the kids in the evenings. And when she’s done training, she will be starting her workday at 6 am so that hopefully her kids will sleep for most of her shift and barely miss her at all. Though she misses them like crazy. (Note to self: Referring to yourself in the third person is STILL creepy.)