Would Economy Crumble With No Nannies?

[MountainLaurel]

An interesting exercise in what-if scenarios:

Imagine a world without nannies.

Now think about the thousands of highly paid women — and, yes, they would still mostly be women — who would abandon their jobs to be with their kids.

The U.S. economy might not quite fall apart under such a scenario, but several experts said it could have far-reaching effects.

snip

Let's say -- hypothetically -- that 10 percent of the 65.7 million women in the work force today decided to stay home. That would mean a sudden shortage of about 6.6 million workers. Productivity would plummet and millions of dollars would stop flowing through the economy.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/story?id=4982205&page=1

[Warpy]

1. Think about ending access to birth control and abortion

which is the right wing fantasy. With no way to control their fertility and being disadvantaged by weight and size, most women would find themselves stuck with a lot of kids they didn't want and couldn't feed and no place to dump them so they could get to work.

And y'all wonder why I post here.

[MountainLaurel]

2. It's a frightening future alright

:scared:

[My Good Babushka]

3. I wouldn't "dump my kids"

to make a few lousy bucks for some CEO sh*tbag that could fire me at anytime. I get a little tired of the stigma attached to mothering, and the people who say "you don't work?"
I think mothers at home with children 0-5 should get a stipend, as should caretakers or elderly family members or handicapped family members.

[companionnow]

4. you bet

Productivity would decline greatly.

[Hannah Bell]

5. Oh, baloney. Somehow the economy is fine if you pay someone

else to care for your kids, but tits-up if you stay home & the nanny does something else?

Ball-o-ney.

[newfie11]

6. If salaries were enough many women would stay home

But it now take a 2 or 3 wage earner to make it. Many of the young women I have worked with would have loved to stay with their babies but could not afford it.

[Hannah Bell]

7. well, then the problem is low wages, not lack of nanny jobs.

talk about throwing up smoke to hide the obvious.

There didn't use to be lots of nanny jobs. That developed when wages started stagnating.

Currently, the rich & upper middle class pay poorer people to take care of their kids while they work in good-paying jobs where their main function is to figure out ways to screw the working class.

Lower their wages, raise ours, that'll fix it.

The growth of the servant class is a sure sign of rising inequality. Think Victorian England.

The US servant class disappeared in the post-war prosperity. I thought it was forever, but the parasites always return.