I’ve petitioned the White House to offer equal benefits to SAHP’s when proposing childcare credits

ElizabethBernstein

The Obama administration has recently asked Congress to increase the childcare tax credit to $3000 per child.

I agree with supporting families, but I don’t think the proposal should stop at helping parents who are paying for childcare. Just as some families have to go out of pocket for the cost of childcare, families with a stay-at-home parent are also making do with less money by living on one income. 

If a couple with two young children could manage to have a parent stay home with the assist of a $6000 tax break, I think it’s wrong to have a policy in which the government says “Sorry, but if you both go to work we can give you that $6000 for childcare costs.”

I’ve started a petition at the White House website asking that families with stay-at-home parents be offered benefits equal to what other families would get for purchasing childcare.

Lots more signatures are needed, so please go to the link, sign, and spread the word!

Two things for the record:

(1) This discussion is about families which do have income. The White House proposal is for a non-refundable tax credit, which is only helpful to families which have enough earnings to owe federal income tax. Support for very low-income or unemployed parents would be a separate discussion.

(2) I’m not in line for any tax break myself. My children are in their twenties and I don’t have grandkids.  I’m doing this because I was a stay-at-home mother and I care about equal respect and support for stay-at-home parents.

snp605

I disagree for a lot of reasons. I don't hate on SAH parents and had plans to be one myself before the bubble burst. There are some issues I have with your reasoning. First of all I live in a decently LCOL area and my daycare until the kids were well into school was WAYYY over $6000 per year per kid. If I remember correctly it was closer to $12000 and my friends who live up north have mentioned $15-23K per year in daycare. I remember the first year of my last daughter it was a partial year of daycare so we spent $9K and our credit after all of the formulas was $134 measly dollars. Ugh.

Second of all families where there is no SAH parent are paying taxes on both incomes and bringing money into the economy. There are things like paying the salaries (thereby taxes) of daycare workers. More often than not families with more than one income have *some* measure of more disposable income so that  gets spent and put into the economy. Just to be honest, as a result of working so much and having such a crazy schedule we spend more in general for gas, convenience items, paying people things we don't have time to do ourselves etc. It hurts us but is good for the overall economy if more people do that.

Finally, if you've looked at the studies of what a stay at home parent is worth, it's A LOT financially. They've found a way (and yay them!) to provide services families need without having to earn the taxable income that they would use to pay someone to do those things. It's not as easy to measure financial benefit to a family for WOH vs. SAH but it's pretty much not without some tangible gain. A sah parent allows the other parent freedom to work overtime or travel thereby securing higher wages for their time. They don't have to regularly use sick time/pto for the common ailments most children get. They don't have to have reduced hours for doctors appointments or teacher workdays, etc. There is more opportunity have fresh cooked meals using inexpensive ingredients.There is more time to do things at inexpensive times or time to do frugal things like coupon. All of this brings value to the household but results in no tax penalty like any other sort of gain would. Add on the bonus of being able to invest in your kids time wise in a way that many other families would die to be able to and I think you'll find that families with SAH parents have some advantages. You can't makes apples to apples comparisons and try to level the playing field in cases like this because some of the gains and losses are not tangible, measurable gains and losses on paper.

Incentives that drive people to work are good for the economy whether that feels good or not. In the case of single parent households, this incentive could be the thing that allows them to finally get over the hump to where working is actually a gain vs. potential benefits  provided due to having no income.

Sisugal

You need to remember that the government WANTS you to be employed - as you will then pay more in taxes, Social Security etc.
They are trying to encourage more 2 parent families with both employed - thus the $6000 child care credit.

EIC has an increased income limit so more families will qualify for that.

BlueBirdMB

snp605 said:

I disagree for a lot of reasons. I don't hate on SAH parents and had plans to be one myself before the bubble burst. There are some issues I have with your reasoning. First of all I live in a decently LCOL area and my daycare until the kids were well into school was WAYYY over $6000 per year per kid. If I remember correctly it was closer to $12000 and my friends who live up north have mentioned $15-23K per year in daycare. I remember the first year of my last daughter it was a partial year of daycare so we spent $9K and our credit after all of the formulas was $134 measly dollars. Ugh.

Second of all families where there is no SAH parent are paying taxes on both incomes and bringing money into the economy. There are things like paying the salaries (thereby taxes) of daycare workers. More often than not families with more than one income have *some* measure of more disposable income so that  gets spent and put into the economy. Just to be honest, as a result of working so much and having such a crazy schedule we spend more in general for gas, convenience items, paying people things we don't have time to do ourselves etc. It hurts us but is good for the overall economy if more people do that.

Finally, if you've looked at the studies of what a stay at home parent is worth, it's A LOT financially. They've found a way (and yay them!) to provide services families need without having to earn the taxable income that they would use to pay someone to do those things. It's not as easy to measure financial benefit to a family for WOH vs. SAH but it's pretty much not without some tangible gain. A sah parent allows the other parent freedom to work overtime or travel thereby securing higher wages for their time. They don't have to regularly use sick time/pto for the common ailments most children get. They don't have to have reduced hours for doctors appointments or teacher workdays, etc. There is more opportunity have fresh cooked meals using inexpensive ingredients.There is more time to do things at inexpensive times or time to do frugal things like coupon. All of this brings value to the household but results in no tax penalty like any other sort of gain would. Add on the bonus of being able to invest in your kids time wise in a way that many other families would die to be able to and I think you'll find that families with SAH parents have some advantages. You can't makes apples to apples comparisons and try to level the playing field in cases like this because some of the gains and losses are not tangible, measurable gains and losses on paper.

Incentives that drive people to work are good for the economy whether that feels good or not. In the case of single parent households, this incentive could be the thing that allows them to finally get over the hump to where working is actually a gain vs. potential benefits  provided due to having no income.

Ding ding ding.  Also, just a philosophical reason against this: Any time the government gives you money, even tax credits, they suddenly have control over how you spend that money.  I'm a homeschooling advocate, and this is the main argument against tax credits for homeschoolers.  The moment they give you money, they can control.  The less government control the better.  I'm all for tax cuts, but not for specific tax credits such as these.

MommyLiberty5013

Yay. There's never a "no strings attached" approach when it comes to money from the government. We home school too.