Honest maths on raising a kid. Direct spend across the eighteen years, plus the compound on what you do not get to save. Then divide by the moments of joy.
What you actually spend each year on the kid.
Indirect costs that scale because of the kid.
Extra rent or mortgage from needing one more bedroom and so on. Spread across the eighteen years.
The opportunity cost of money spent rather than invested.
Direct spending plus 33-year opportunity cost at 5% real
Illustrative figures only. The compound term assumes a 33-year window from each year to the parent's retirement (15 years after the child turns 18). For your specific situation, consult a qualified adviser.
Worth carries the lifetime maths into household planning. Childcare years, the dip, the university bill, and the trajectory beyond. Join the waitlist.
Pre-school childcare is the highest line item by far in most family budgets. UK city families often face fifteen to twenty-five thousand a year per child; US cities similar. Once kids hit school age, after-school costs are typically a third to half of that. The early years are the expensive ones.
Lower. Hand-me-downs, a single bigger-house premium, a single bigger-car premium, sometimes a sibling discount on childcare. Often around sixty to seventy per cent of the first-child cost. The cost of a third or fourth child drops progressively per child but never approaches zero.
Because the money spent is money that could have compounded for decades. A unit of currency spent on childcare in year one cannot become four units in retirement. The compound term shows the long-run shape of the trade. It is informational, not prescriptive.
Not as a should-I-have-a-child input; nobody decides that on a calculator. As a scale-of-cost input: what budget do you need to be planning for, how much does the childcare year dominate, when does the after-school dip start. Useful before the first kid, useful again before the second.