The Cost Of Raising A Child
Raising kids is both fun, nice and wonderful, not to mention fulfilling. However, we cannot deny the fact that raising kids costs money. Wanna know how much?
It now costs about $220,000 to raise a child born this year to maturity. That's about one percent higher than the year before. This includes expenses for child care, education, health care, and transportation. On an annual basis, child-rearing costs for a middle-income family have gone up to about $13,500.
About 17% of the total cost of raising a child will go to child care, while education will account for about 16%. Housing costs are calculated based on having to put up an additional bedroom for every child, although children over 17 are not included in the computations. This also means that costs of college education, which is usually nowadays the single most expensive item related to raising children is also not yet included in our totals.
It is most expensive to raise children in the Northeast, although those bringing up children in cities in the West are not far behind. Cities in the Midwest follow, while families in the rural areas and in Southern cities have the least expensive child-rearing costs.
Families with several children actually spend less per child. Kids of the same gender can usually share a bedroom, pass on old clothes and toys, and consume food in bulk quantities. Many private schools and child-care centers also offer discounts for siblings.
Between 1960 and 2008, overall costs of bringing up kids went up 15% in inflation-adjusted dollars. These costs have been mainly affected by upswings in the costs of health care, child care, and education. Clothing and food costs on the average, have fallen probably due to mass production.