Alex, do you have any idea how the bottom 95% live?
Statistically or qualitatively?
In all seriousness though, I have no aspirations of living the elite-NYC-preschool lifestyle. That being said, life is about tradeoffs and while some of the expenses might seem patently absurd, others seem like things that anyone might reasonably want for their children: to play sports, go to summer camp, to be able to get a chemistry tutor if they needed one, etc.
That's not to say that all of these expenses are necessary or that your kids can't have just as good of a childhood without them, but at some level enough of these expenses do have merit that there is a tradeoff.
Ever notice how many of the highest performing athletes in the world tend to come from exactly the kind of environments where parents don't have a lot of money to spend on things like sports?
So, maybe it's possible to play sports without spending a ton of money?
In sports like golf, gymnastics, figure skating, hockey, gridiron football, tennis, skiing and snowboarding it's another story.
In other words, just the ones that most people like to play and draw the most talented athletes.
The sports that require alot of money to play are mainly ways for upper class white kids to avoid having to compete against the black kids and still feel like they are good athletes. At least in the US.