Birkin Bags and the Cost of Child Care

Is Chance changing his mind?

If you missed a couple of episodes, the best way to binge-read Scrambling for Voice, Choice, and Agency is to use the Table of Contents links to previous posts.

Episode #20

From: Chance
re: Made a decision yet?
To: Kerry sent - Gmail at 10:55 PM

Hi Kerry—

I wanted to get back to you again tonight before I headed to bed. Everything is swirling around in my mind, and I had a hard time concentrating on my lesson plans for tomorrow. I keep second-guessing my decision about managing the day care at Rich’s. If I took the job offer, I could learn what I need to know to do the job….and maybe I could get Rich to see the gross inequity he has created for the teachers.

I can’t get it out of my mind that Rich has created a fantastic and highly profitable company. In some ways, and for some people, I can see why it would be a dream to work there……and yet, in a major way, he is contributing to inequality and socio-economic disparities on a grand scale.

In my mind, I keep hearing those women who were talking about buying a ridiculously expensive Birkin Hermes purse.

I am also thinking about the people he is hiring to work in the day care. He is paying them minimum wage because that is what the going wage is for child care workers.

In order to successfully function in their high paying jobs, the people who work in the company and also have children are totally dependent on caring and competent child care workers. Do you think it even occurs to them to advocate for lower wages for themselves so that child care workers don’t earn poverty level wages?

How can we live in a country where in the same company some people can buy expensive cars and Birkin bags and other people have to get food stamps to feed their family because their job is caring for young children?

How does such a thing happen? Is it any wonder that democracy is imperiled? We honor and compensate for capitalism and greed over working with children. Why don’t people care about the next generation of voting citizens?

Structural disadvantage is built into the system. When we have more love and respect for cars and purses than we have for people, it is no wonder that “of the people, by the people, and for the people” is really only for some of the people.

Sorry…I am just on a rant, and I should stop. I am powerless to do anything….

I should be figuring out how I am going to teach 5th graders about supply and demand, scarcity, and how it impacts the economy. The lesson I tried today was either a total failure or a brilliant example of teacher flexibility along with the willingness to let the kids learn something that was not in the curriculum.

I thought the lesson sounded great because it would teach something that is totally abstract…but it was probably beyond the developmental level of 5th graders.

I removed half of the student chairs in the classroom, and I asked the kids to come up with a solution to the problem. It was a no brainer for them. The kids without chairs banded together and decided that they would rather sit on the ground than figure out a compromise. Most of the kids with chairs thought that sitting on the floor was a great idea, and they moved their chairs to the back of the classroom with the confiscated chairs.

Ten minutes into the lesson, most of the kids were sitting on the floor and a few were sitting in chairs. It was not a lesson about inequality and socio-economic disparities…but maybe (??) it did become a lesson about everyone working together towards the common good.

…or to put it another way, a few could buy a Birkin purse and an expensive electric car and the rest were not at all motivated to work towards meaningless material wealth.

Chance

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From: Kerry
Re: Made a decision yet?
To: Chance sent - Gmail 6:12 AM

Hi Chance—

So, is that it? Are you sticking with teaching?

Kerry

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From: Chance
re: Made a decision yet?
To: Kerry sent - Gmail at 7:02 PM

Hi Kerry—

Not an easy question….on the one hand, the answer is yes, I want to teach….on the other hand, I still have Stan and Ernie’s mom and her angry band of parents to contend with….

Some days, the prospect of working in a quiet adult environment is appealing…where none of the people I would be working with would have angry parents in the background….and I would not have to stop critically important work to administer standardized tests……

Chance