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How much does it cost to raise a kid? Well, according to the USDA it’s $233,610 USD through age 17. And this doesn’t even include college costs! That study was done back in 2015, so when you adjust it for inflation, that figure suddenly balloons to $310,768.71!
That number scared the crap out of me almost as much as my childhood trauma and made me swear off having kids for nearly a decade. But knowing that a significant chunk of that cost is childcare, which you no longer need if you’re FI, made me realize the financial advantage of waiting to have kids when you no longer need a job. Which is probably why when I asked other FIRE bloggers about their child rearing costs they didn’t think it was nearly as bad as the USDA number predicted.
Speculating and doing are two different things though, and now that Little MatchStick has turned 1, I have a full year of child rearing expenses recorded in my trusty spreadsheets. A few readers have told us how terrifying the costs of raising kids are according to their peers, and wanted to know how much it costs us to raise LMS so far.
Was it as horrendous as the USDA numbers suggested? Has our portfolio been decimated, and should we be polishing up our dusty resumes and going job hunting?
Let’s find out!
Here’s how much it costs us to raise LMS month-by-month, broken down by categories in USD:
Yearly Total | Average Monthly | |
Food (formula, milk, solids) | $815.87 | $67.99 |
Diapers & Supplies | $610.18 | $50.85 |
Gear | $824.50 | $68.71 |
Clothing | $132.07 | $11.01 |
Toys/books | $114.01 | $9.50 |
Meds | $332.34 | $27.69 |
Childcare | $772.34 | $64.36 |
Transportation | $725.13 | $60.43 |
Travel | $395.15 | $32.93 |
Misc | $129.52 | $10.79 |
Grand Total | $4,851.12 | $404.26 |
So, it cost us $4851.12 USD/year for the first year to raise our son. This translates into an average monthly cost of $404.26 USD/month.
According to the USDA, it costs on average $18,280.51 USD/year or $1523 USD/month, after adjusting for inflation.
So as it turns out, our personal cost of raising a child is only a quarter of what the USDA number predicted. There are two main reasons why our costs are significantly lower.
The first reason is that childcare costs are optional for us since we don’t need to work. We took care of LMS ourselves until he was 10 months old and then spent some money on a combination of joint childcare/co-working spaces and having a babysitter over once a week to give us some couple time.
The second reason is housing. For the first year of life, the WHO recommends co-rooming with your infant for the first 6 months of life to reduce the risk of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). As a result, we stuck with our 1-bedroom apartment and didn’t move out to a bigger place. So far, it’s working out just fine and as we gradually start travelling again, we don’t really need much more space. That said, as he grows, if we decide to settle down instead of going back to a nomadic lifestyle, we’ll likely have to upgrade to a 2-bedroom apartment. And depending on where that apartment is—Canada, Portugal, Thailand—it could increase our costs by $500 USD/month or even reduce it by $500 USD/month using the power of geographic arbitrage.
But even with the most expensive scenario factored in, that would still only increase our child rearing expenses from $404.26 USD/month to $904.26 USD or $10,848 USD/year, still only 60% of the USDA estimate. When you breakdown the $18,280.51 USD/year USDA number into categories, here’s how it breaks down into percentages:
If you compare that with our childcare costs, also broken down into percentages, here’s how they compare:
How does this Impact Our Portfolio?
Long term readers of the blog know that we split our net worth into 2 portfolios: A & B. Portfolio A is the amount we originally retired on and we still withdraw from for our living expenses. Portfolio B is the money we made after FI through passion projects like writing and speaking. Portfolio B is only for extraneous unnecessary expenses like donations, treating family and friends, and fancy things like spas and massages that are only for when we’re feeling bougie. We keep the money separated to keep the experiment pure so you can see that FIRE works even if you don’t earn money from passion projects in retirement.
Portfolio A is currently worth $1.64M Canadian dollars, which means, by the 4% safe withdrawal rate, that gives us $65,600 CAD /year to spend. Since our initial $40K/year expense in 2015 is allowed to go up to $48,759.78/year this year after adjusting for inflation, that means we have $16,849.22/year left over to raise LMS. That’s $10K/year more than we’re currently spending to raise him. So even if we hadn’t earned any money after retirement, our portfolio would still generate enough passive income to cover the extra cost of our son even though we didn’t factor him in in our initial FI number.
Reflections on Child Rearing Costs
For those of you thinking of having kids, here are some take aways from our first year of child raising costs:
Childcare
Childcare is the most expensive category in the first 5 years of life. But if you’re FI, you don’t need childcare 5 days a week, so your childcare choices go from “must-have” to “nice to have on occasion.” As a result, costs are significantly lower than the average reported by the USDA.
Shelter
Housing can be expensive if you decide to upgrade your space before giving birth rather than stepping it up gradually as your kid ages and needs more space.
Clothing
Clothing is very cheap in the first year. Infant clothing (0 to 2 years old) is so abundant, even thrift stores want to get rid of them quickly and sell them by the bag for $3.99, so you’re essentially paying only 50 cents/item. There’s no need to get new items since infants grow out of clothes and shoes within weeks. They also poop and spit up all over them, so new and used pretty much look the same just days later. Buncha Farmers stain remover stick is your new BFF as it removes even the toughest stains.
In my opinion, buying second hand clothing makes me a better parent because I can let my son play in the dirt without worrying about him ruining his clothes. Whenever other moms are like “oh no, he’s getting mud all over those nice pants!” I’m like “relax, they cost me 50 cents.” There’s already so many things to worry about when it comes to parenting, why worry about clothing?
Food
Food can also be cheap in the first year and most of it is milk. If you can get breastfeeding working, it saves you as much as $100-$250/month, but knowing how stressful it is, it’s perfectly fine to use formula as a tool, for your sanity’s sake. The cost is worth it in my opinion.
Once you start your kid on solid foods at month 6, you can save money by buying reusable pouches (I use Baby Brezza) and making puree yourself in big batches. This cuts down costs from $2 per pouch to only $0.50 each and is healthier since there aren’t any preservatives. But if you’re a busy working parent and simply don’t have the time to blend the pouches, spend the money for convenience and don’t feel guilty about it.
Gear
There is a lot of gear you need in the first year, like car seats, strollers, cribs, feeding supplies, breast pumps, etc.
However, if you buy them second hand you can resell them on FB Marketplace, making it nearly free to “rent”. Ditto with toys and books. The trick is to pick brands that hold their value and are high quality. It’s better to buy expensive good quality items used on FB marketplace and resell them instead of cheap new items that break easily.
For example, instead of buying a cheap $30 baby bouncer from Walmart, buy a used Baby Bjorn bouncer (one of our best purchases) for $70 (it retails for $200+ new) and sell it back to the secondary market for the same price a few months later after your baby has outgrown it. They are so sought after, they sell quickly. If you had gotten the cheap crappy bouncer, you’ll be lucky to get $5 for it and your baby might hate it (ours did). There is a ton of baby stuff for free in Buy Nothing groups as well.
Transportation
Transportation can be expensive, just like housing, if you live in a place where public transportation isn’t readily available, or you choose to drive everywhere for convenience. Under the age of 2, kids can travel for free on public transport, so it makes sense to take advantage of this if you can.
The Cost of Your Sanity
What I realized is that the most expensive part of raising kids (at least in the first year), isn’t the feeding, clothing, and diapering parts—which is what I thought it would be. It’s the childcare and the “sanity saving” costs: a bigger car or Uber rides, a bigger house, more take out to save time on cooking, and Amazon Prime to have things conveniently delivered.
There are things you pay for that saves your sanity and makes your life as a parent easier. It’s money you spent out of desperation when you’re out of energy, sleep and time and you’ll throw money at the problem just to survive another day of indentured servitude. So, if you’re an exhausted parent, I get where you’re coming from and why you say kids are expensive, even if there are more cost-efficient ways to raise them. Sometimes you’re too sleep deprived and just don’t have the brain power and willpower to optimize. And that’s OK. Cut yourself some slack.
Conclusion
What I will say is that for those who are thinking of having kids, the more flexible you can make your life (remote work, part-time work, freelance, passive investing, etc) and the more help you can get (grandparents, aunts/uncles, friends), the easier time you will have with parenting, and the less money it will cost you to raise kids.
The more fixed your life is, the more expensive it will be. Don’t be scared off by the USDA number, but don’t be naïve and think that you’ll somehow “just make it work”. It takes a lot of energy to raise a kid, and it can be expensive unless you plan your life carefully. And if you don’t want to have kids because you think the cost and effort isn’t worth it, I totally hear you and your childfree choice is 100% valid.
What do you think? Is the USDA child expense number accurate? How does your child rearing cost compare to it?
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What about the child Canada benefit? Don’t you get like $600 a month from that? So effectively raising a child doesn’t cost anything extra… plus you get resp government matching grants for college.
Yes, good point about those benefits and they definitely help with costs. That’s for another article as this is just focusing on the USDA numbers and how it compares to child raising costs, outside of college savings.
In my experience, the DIRECT costs of kids can be kept fairly low, by having one parent stay home and do all the ‘kid stuff’ (finding cheap clothes/toys/activities/etc.), and life can then be kept at least reasonably sane for the whole family. That said, the sneaky hidden opportunity cost of lost income and career capital sneaks up over those early child rearing years, and you wake up in 10 years with friends that have become doctors or executives while in the meantime you’re now picking up your ‘career’ making minimum wage with no good career prospects. It can still be totally worth it, but just a potential HUGE cost to consider when making the decision. For example, a doctor that raises kids for 10 years vs. a doctor that works for that time could easily amount to maybe a $5-10,000,000 difference in net worth at the age of 60, after 30 or 40 years of salary discrepancy, compounding investment returns, etc. Being FIRE’d prior to having any children would of course eliminate this whole phenomenon, since you’re already ending your career and paycheck already anyways.
It’s true. There’s definitely a opportunity cost to your career, but gains in terms of benefits to your child in spending their formative years with them. Even if you continue on the career path and outsource their care, then you feel guilty that you’re missing out on their milestones and time with them. Impossible to “have it all”, but FIRE makes it possible.
I think saying that childcare cost goes down if you’re FI is shortsighted. Some people send their kids to daycare not because they need to work but because they need alone time from the toddler energy. For some parents it can become to much to take care of the hyper active kid full time.
I think this sounds like a bougie phenomenon that you decide you must have. Plenty of families couldn’t afford to exclusively have daycare or sitter (or struggle when even both need to work), when otherwise not working, because they can’t deal with a toddler for a couple years. It certainly isn’t a required cost. But dang, one must have some low energy to both not work and also need to pay for daycare. You can have some things, but not everything.
It’s still a choice, not a necessity. Also, you can find part-time childcare, which costs way less and is more flexible.
This tracks very closely with our experience during the past 14 months. We did get a slightly larger car as our small sedan hatchback was pretty tight for three. A small SUV works perfectly. Good write up.
Thank you so much for posting this. It’s great to see how it breaks down. I really look forward to seeing future costs in the coming years!!
Thanks MI! Good to see that our costs are comparable.
Not dumping on choosing purees, but avoiding this step entirely is an option too. Our kids just ate what we ate, driven mostly by laziness. This has been coined Baby-led Weaning, but no need to buy the book as the concept can be summarized into a few obvious guidelines: supervised eating, no hard-textured or crunchy food (e.g., raw fruit/veg, nuts, popcorn, chips), cut round fruits so they’re not throat shaped (e.g., grapes), no tough/chewy proteins. Easy, cheap, and promotes fine motor skills and textured eating.
Yeah, it depends a lot on the kid. I tried BLW, but my son just threw everything on the floor and barely ate anything. Purees are the only way to get any nutrients into him. Would’ve loved for him to eat what we eat. That would’ve saved me so much time.
Haha…yes, it’s messy! The food throwing didn’t last long for us, and they ate when they were hungry (once food got tossed over the side, the meal was over). Fortunately, we had some very happy dogs who cleaned the floor in real time.
We live in Toronto Canada which is crazy expensive and our kid who is now 17 has ceiliac disease which can be very expensive if you don’t like cooking. What saved us funny enough is we chose to cook rather that spend money on eating out and using Uber eats. Also getting clothing from older cousins or friends can help keep costs down as well. Raising our kid turned out to be very affordable. Even now she’s into shopping at value village and learning to cook and save money. If you teach your kids to cook and be frugal raising them in the big expensive city can be quite cheap. If you’re raising a kid as a single parent all this goes out the window. I can’t imagine being a single parent and costs associated with that! Unfortunately single parents really suffer!!!
“If you teach your kids to cook and be frugal raising them in the big expensive city can be quite cheap”
Love this!
Sorry to hear that they have ceiliac disease. Glad cooking is helping and saved you tons of money though. Have you ever heard of the travel blogger Jodi from LegalNomads? She writes a lot about food while travelling and how to do it safely if you have ceiliac disease. it’s the reason why she loved SE Asia so much because she could eat most of the food!
And yes I agree with you on the single parenting thing. No idea how single parents do it. It’s so hard.
In the US, things could be different from Canada or other developed countries where childcare, private school tuition, health care, and college tuitions are much lower. Daycare is the most expensive for US parents who still choose to work after babies are born. Not everybody wants or could afford to be a stay home parent after all especially for work types that don’t like gaps, although the flexibility and wlb are always appreciated. If you could enlist family help and still maintain good relationships among adults, that could be better for the babies and finances. Babies need adult attachment the most, no daycare could beat a loving, caring, consistent and competent caregiver dedicated to the babies. When the kids grow up, it is nice and safe to have a house with yard for them to play and that is just the nature of the US, where good schools are typically located in nice suburbs not inner cities. They are still affordable if the parents have decent income but could get crazily expensive in both coasts. For example, any bearable looking house in SF bay area is over 1.2 million dollars. Thirdly again the nature of the US, extra curriculum could be expensive when the kids are school age and become competitive. Group lessons are OK, but once they get to some clubs, travel teams etc., the expenses and time quickly adds up. It applies to musical instrument as well. Clothes and food are the least expensive of all. Finally, the college applications and tuitions for the US kids. Canadians don’t have to worry about that too much and it sounds like you could get into U Toronto with good grades, right? In the US, good grades are not enough especially you are of Asian origins, you need to outcompete the other Asians with tons of extra curriculum, clubs, etc. etc. for any decent university or good majors. The most expensive thing the kids could cost is the time and energy for the parents, especially in today’s overscheduled, overwhelmed and overstimulated society. It is no easy matter raising the kids right and the parents stay sane and I salute all the parents who are dedicated to their kids (including myself). The joy of raising a child and see him/her grow and bloom could not be described with words, but I don’t think the tasks are for everybody.
Most of the FI bloggers are American, and their numbers are all lower than the USDA numbers and similar to mine. The key, it seems is that expenses go down significantly when you don’t need to worry about childcare and when you can be flexible with housing decisions because you no longer need to work.
In terms of college costs, Jeremy and Justin both wrote articles questioning whether a college degree is worth it, and how to hack costs if you decide it is:
https://www.gocurrycracker.com/is-college-worth-it-with-future-tuition-predictions/
https://rootofgood.com/pay-for-college-while-retired-early/
So, all hope is not lost.
That said, the fact that Americans don’t have parental leave is horrifying. Another reason why FIRE is desperately needed. If the system doesn’t help you, you need to make your own parental leave.
Housing decisions for families with kids mostly depend on school districts not necessarily where parents work. Houses in good school districts tend to be more expensive in general in the US. This is basically a price out to choose your peers and neighbors and generally the group of families that highly value education and child raising tend to aggregate, like Asian immigrants and domestic highly educated parents.
Colleges, whether worth it or not, people need to choose them wisely. In state schools, good majors that could translate into paid interns and good salaries later and you can’t hate it too much either. The first step to FIRE is decent income, and corporations and so called professionals mostly provide that, and still today a college degree is the prerequisite to have your resumes reviewed by HR. Unless that is changed, a college degree in a decent major is mostly required for a young person to make him/herself sustainable in society (not to say that is the only way but that seems to be the most straightforward way). That is the path of MMM, Financial Samuri, white coat investor, you and wanderer etc. etc. have taken. A child could get in trades but that is a whole different area where small business owners need to watch out for their business and navigate in the complex society. Still parents don’t need that high number to raise the kids and it doesn’t hurt to be prepared. People just need to realize that raising kids is a big task and it takes a lot of efforts, money is probably ranked lower compared to the energy and brain power required.
I think your experience tracks with ours during the first year and a bit of our kids lives, but I find the costs get higher as children get older. Ours are 5 and 8 and even living frugally with flexible jobs, and no childcare costs (we have lots of family help) costs go up as kids get older. Clothing starts to cost more with larger sizes (even bought on sale or second hand), more food cost, social costs (gifts for other kids bday parties, activities, extra cost of plane ticket if wanting to travel, etc). All of these add up as children get older.
That’s good to know. I do know that housing costs and travel costs will go up once LMS ages out of the “kids under 2 fly for free” rule and he needs more space to run around.
On the plus side, the portfolio also rises as time goes on, so let’s see how they track each other.
It bugs me a little how the media and interested parties publicize the highest cost of everything, rarely mentioning how much less things can cost if you dump conventional thinking. For example: Apparently, you need $10M to retire, college/university will cost $150K, a house will cost you $1M, and of course, the cost of raising a child discussed above. Armed with just a spreadsheet and a bit of independent thinking, the FIRE community repeatedly blows these numbers out of the water.
Another cost saver for Canadians is the government’s goal of bringing down the cost of childcare, our daughter now pays just $10 a day for the full day.
Those with children also receive a bigger carbon tax rebate, at least in our province. It’s $300 for the first child, and less for the other children. It’s a small amount, but every penny/cent helps and should be included in the calculation.
Child Tax Benefit: Another commenter mentioned this.
Yes, there are also government programs and tax incentives that help with child rearing costs. Thanks for mentioning this. That will be an article for another time 🙂
The media does tend to use scary mongering to exaggerate the cost of everything. That’s how they get clicks. If they wrote about how “everything is fine. No need to worry, there are ways to optimize everything” then nobody would read it. I guess they need to do what they need to do to survive?
Thanks for the detailed breakdown! As you know, we still don’t plan on having kids, but it’s reassuring to know that the costs aren’t as overwhelming as they seem when researching online—especially when you leverage the principles of Financial Independence.
That being said, I’m curious to hear from European readers about the cost of raising children there. With the cost of living generally lower in Europe than in the U.S. or Canada, I wouldn’t be surprised if the expenses for a FIRE lifestyle match what it costs to raise a family while still working full-time and paying for a nanny. Have you done any research on the costs in other countries? Geo-arbitrage could be a great option for Americans or Canadians looking to raise a family overseas, similar to what Go Curry Cracker did in Taipei for a few years.
I’m also curious about the cost in European countries. There are also more social programs so childcare is also less of a burden. And yes, Geo arbitrage definitely helps child rearing costs if you’re FI or if you have a location independent job.
You managed to keep your expenses much lower than they estimated by avoiding full-time childcare and living modestly. Childcare is one of the biggest expenses for most families, so being a sole proprietor and being able to handle it yourself has been a huge advantage. Plus, the used baby market is a game changer! I think the biggest expense in this case is still college and education in general. And it would be a big disappointment to be expelled from college. To make sure that never happens, there are services like https://edubirdie.com/book-movie-review-writing that can help students. It’s great that you were able to do it for less money, but I agree that planning and flexibility are essential to keep costs down. Definitely something to think about for anyone thinking about kids!
I’m really questioning how useful a college degree is these days. It seems like you need higher and higher levels of education and they don’t always translate into a job. Would be interesting to evaluate whether a trades degree is better ROI or starting his own online business once my son is a little older and we can see where his interests lie.
Our child related expenses decreased significantly after I retired. Childcare was a huge piece of it and that was 13 years ago. I heard it’s even more expensive now. Housing expenses stayed the same for many years for us. We already lived in a 2 bedroom condo before our child was born and stayed for many years. Now, we live in our duplex and rent one unit out. Once our son is in high school, we’ll take over the other unit and expand our living space.
If you can keep those 2 big pieces down, your budget will be way below guidance.
Once your child is old enough, I suggest sending him to preschool. We started with 3-4 hours per day, 2 days per week. Then increase from there. It improved my sanity tremendously. Well worth the money and kids can learn to socialize.
Enjoy!
Thanks for your input, Joe! I’ve read those child cost posts on your blog way before deciding to have a kid and they were super useful. Good tip about pre-school! I will look into it. My biggest concern with that is him getting sick all the time. I get that he needs germs to develop his immune system but so many friends and family members complain about their kids getting them sick on a weekly basis.
Btw, I loved that graph you made that showed childcare costs from age 0 to 13 for your son. Super eye opening!
The concept of being FIRE first then having a child may be too overwhelming for the new comers. It could be done but that is not the only way to have kids. What if you don’t achieve FIRE before the child-bearing window closes? It is OK to plan these things long term so people don’t burnout. Also I heard working woman in Canada gets like a year of paid leave when the baby is born (at least my colleague in Canada got that and we had to hire a contractor to cover her job for that year). Not in the US, although many big corporations tend to offer 12 to 22 weeks of paid leave/short term disability for both parents. And back to the point whether a college degree is worth it or not, most of these big corporations hire salary workers with minimum college degrees unless in manufacturing settings. And work from home is pretty much a privilege for college graduates.
Unfortunately in modern society, the years to accumulate wealth (peak earning years before burnout) tend to overlap with childbearing years, especially for well-educated women. We are talking about 30 to 40 years old: when biologically healthy babies are born in higher statistics and on average less physical impact on mothers (not always true), and when people just start gaining more experience and more responsibility at work and getting higher pays. It is not easy to balance, or it is impossible to balance that all the time. People don’t need to be deterred by the official cost of having children, but they need to be mentally and physically prepared being parents. It is a grind when the parents are pulled in different directions. And believe me, parenting does not get easier as the child grows older. Yes, he/she could feed themselves, dress themselves and maybe not cry for milk 3 times a night, but he/she could have peer issues, school problems, or behave in such an obnoxious way that any correction could bring a fight etc. Parenting is a continuous process and could not be outsourced, and it conflicts with personal pursuit sometimes (interests, career, etc.). And this is all based on the assumption that the child is born healthy without special needs.
Of course, all parents’ hearts would melt when the sweet little souls smile and hug you and tell you something funny and look up to you and hold your hands and show you stuff, and suddenly all the misbehavior, the labor, the mess, etc. seem to disappear. This is the charm of having children. You have a chance to learn and practice unconditional love and receive it from the innocent kids. It is the building of beautiful human relationships that matters and if we are too focused on the monetary cost, we lose the point of childbearing and child raising.
“People don’t need to be deterred by the official cost of having children, but they need to be mentally and physically prepared being parents.”
This is true. It is definitely mentally and physically draining and there is never any time off. The emotional payoffs are worth it for me, but not necessarily true for everyone. Now that I’ve had kids, I agree with friends who have made the perfectly valid choice to not have kids. It’s not a good fit for them.
If your cost is 1/4 of USDA’s estimate, ours is 1/4 of your cost. We didn’t spend nearly as much as you guys have. No formula, no meds, no childcare, no gear other than a car seat and a stroller (new at Goodwill), no transportation (what this even is?).
Only diapers and some clothing…about 450/yr
I only see this getting bad at school age or college…not before. You can manage all that with planning and giving up some of your sanity (which clearly is a millennial excuse)
Glad to know it can be done even cheaper. Congrats, you win the frugal parent award!
Meds are optional vaccines and transportation is the cost of insurance and gas for an old car that belonged to a family member. We barely drive the car but decided to have it around just in case. Will likely get rid of it in the future. These are optional costs that other people may choose to forgo since you don’t really need car in a major city and optional vaccines aren’t necessary. So yes, my costs can be even lower.
Having been raised with very little sanity from my mom and abused, I’m happy to spend some extra money for more sanity to raise my son. To me, it’s money well spent! If I lose out on the frugality parent award, that’s fine with me! 😀
The cost of raising kids involves expenses such as housing, food, education, healthcare, and extracurricular activities, which can add up significantly over time. On average, raising a child to the age of 18 can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on factors like location and lifestyle choices. Understanding these costs helps parents plan financially and make informed decisions about family budgeting. 다낭 풀빌라
I found I could control the costs reasonably well until preteen / teen years. Then the costs start to escalate. Their tastes in clothes become expensive and because kids like to do the opposite of their parents, they will have zero interest in being frugal at that age. But even making them work/save for what they want doesn’t work. They starting eating the food of 3 adults each, age out of kids’ meals, and basically eat so much. If you want them to be healthy and not into drugs etc, you have to put them in activities with other good kids. So academic sports, dance, music lessons and instrument rentals, etc. You can’t easily buy used equipment because they wear it completely out, etc. Then there are school trips and fees for extracurricular activities. If you want your kids to do interesting activities and be good at school, not just play video games and hang around the neighborhood bored, then it gets expensive. It’s easy to be naive when your kids are young and don’t yet have any say in how money is spent. But I’d say 75% of the costs come after age 10. Food alone is absolutely insane. You can’t refuse to feed your kid a second breakfast, lunch and dinner, never mind snacks, when they are literally starving.
How about the child Canada benefit? Isn’t that around $600 monthly for you? Raising a child doesn’t incur additional costs, and you benefit from RESP government matching grants for college.
Wow, those USDA numbers are scary! It’s true, childcare is a huge cost. Reaching FIRE early and then having kids feels like unlocking a secret level, like finding the right costume in Poptropica to access a new island! Maybe those bloggers found FIRE allowed them to focus on less expensive, quality time. Good insights, thanks for sharing!
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