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Comment by Barrin92 | Hacker News Reader

A metric isn't a value judgement and it's almost certainly true that childcare has enabled a vast amount of mostly women to enter the workforce and do highly productive work.

You can have different opinions on whether that's good or bad, and I personally think you can make a strong case for it being a good thing, but there's nothing wrong with the metric itself.

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When the median household income is 75,000 and the average household size is 2.5, yes, a metric like this can be a value judgement of policies.

I have another kid on the way and daycare for both kids (when the new one is about 8-9 months old) is going to be around $3,700/month, or $44,400 per year. For my family we will spend more than half the median household income just on child care. The story is almost the same with nearly every parent I talk to.

When we did the math on 2 kids in daycare, we hired a nanny. It was cheaper, more convenient and better for the kids. Plus, the nanny has become a lifelong family friend.

We did the same. And then did the math again and moved to Scandinavia...

So an average Kindergarden group of 10 would net the operation 220k annually? That must be some high cost of living area, where child care workers earn decidedly above the median income. Or someone is extracting massive profits.

At that age span, you're looking at 3-5 children per adult.

A metric is literally a value judgement. Especially when it's talking about economic value. Now, there are other kinds of value, but those aren't so easily amenable to metrics.

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