Very interesting, thanks for sharing.
At exactly the halfway point tomorrow, our first year experience is similar: our housing and furnishing costs have been low, feeding her has been nominally free so far (though you are right there is an increased grocery bill for the nursing mother!), and between hand me downs and gifts, we have only bought about 4 items of clothing! Travelling costs have been low - £90 for an ergobaby carrier was well spent as we haven’t needed a pram. We were handed down a car seat but got rid of our car as it wasn’t needed.
I’m not sure disposable nappies have been very costly: we spend about £15 a month by only buying when they are on special (which is about a third of the time). The laundry costs and initial outlay would have to be quite low to better this.
A few country specific differences arise for us. There are no insurance premiums or costs associated with her birth. I get free prescriptions and dental care during pregnancy and the first year of her life. In the UK we get £80 pcm in child benefit (this disappears if one of us earns over £50k). My paid maternity leave means the lost wages so far total £2400 post tax, this will increase to roughly £9k for the next six months. (Paid childcare would be cheaper if I returned to work now, but I’ve decided that since my return to work will be full time, it’s better to have another 6 months at home. ). This is a combination of employer maternity pay and a universal (statutory) one.
An aside: while those lost wages are in one sense a baby cost, I’m reluctant to tally them up that way mentally. Staying home with her has often been a joy for me, and has mentally rebooted me in unexpected ways. It’s kind of analogous to taking a sabbatical to mentally recuperate. I suspect this is the sort of thing that varies with the parent and also how easy going the child is, but it hadn’t struck me that way beforehand.
Very interesting, thanks for sharing. At exactly the halfway point tomorrow, our first year experience is similar: our housing and furnishing costs have been low, feeding her has been nominally free so far (though you are right there is an increased grocery bill for the nursing mother!), and between hand me downs and gifts, we have only bought about 4 items of clothing! Travelling costs have been low - £90 for an ergobaby carrier was well spent as we haven’t needed a pram. We were handed down a car seat but got rid of our car as it wasn’t needed.
I’m not sure disposable nappies have been very costly: we spend about £15 a month by only buying when they are on special (which is about a third of the time). The laundry costs and initial outlay would have to be quite low to better this.
A few country specific differences arise for us. There are no insurance premiums or costs associated with her birth. I get free prescriptions and dental care during pregnancy and the first year of her life. In the UK we get £80 pcm in child benefit (this disappears if one of us earns over £50k). My paid maternity leave means the lost wages so far total £2400 post tax, this will increase to roughly £9k for the next six months. (Paid childcare would be cheaper if I returned to work now, but I’ve decided that since my return to work will be full time, it’s better to have another 6 months at home. ). This is a combination of employer maternity pay and a universal (statutory) one.
An aside: while those lost wages are in one sense a baby cost, I’m reluctant to tally them up that way mentally. Staying home with her has often been a joy for me, and has mentally rebooted me in unexpected ways. It’s kind of analogous to taking a sabbatical to mentally recuperate. I suspect this is the sort of thing that varies with the parent and also how easy going the child is, but it hadn’t struck me that way beforehand.