The costs (and rewards) of parenting

I met my daughter's third child, Keira, for the first time last summer. My fifth grandchild. I watched her walk for the first time and felt just like I did when her mother walked for the first time. What a rejuvenator!

One of the joys of being a grandfather is the opportunity to climb up into the geneological pulpit and dispense Wisdom.

Studies show that a middle-income family will spend $160,140 to raise a child to 18 years old. Is it worth it? How do children stack up as a “return on investment”?


$160,140 translates into $8,896 a year, $741 a month, $171 a week, $24 a day, $1 an hour. What do you get for $1 an hour?

Well, for $1 an hour, you never have to grow up, because

• You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under refrigerator magnets, and collect spray-painted noodle wreaths for Christmas, handprints set in clay for Mother’s Day, and cards with backward letters for Father’s Day.

• You get to fingerpaint, carve pumpkins, play hide-and-seek, and never stop believing in Santa Claus.

• You have an excuse to keep reading the adventures of Piglet and Pooh, watching Saturday morning cartoons, going to Disney movies, and wishing on stars.

What else do your get for your $1 an hour?

• Glimpses of magic every day.

• Giggles under the covers every night.

• More love than your heart can hold.

• Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm cookies.

• A hand to hold, usually covered with jam.

• A partner for blowing bubbles, flying kites, building sandcastles, and skipping down the sidewalk in the pouring rain.

• Someone to laugh yourself silly with no matter what the boss said that day.

For $1 an hour, you get to be a hero

• Just for retrieving a Frisbee off the garage roof, or taking the training wheels off the bike.

• For removing a splinter, filling a wading pool, or coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs.

• For coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated to ice cream afterwards.

• You get a front row seat to history to witness the first step, first word, first date, and first time behind the wheel.

• You get to be immortal. You get another branch added to your family tree.

• You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.

• In the eyes of a child, you are all-knowing and all-powerful.

• You have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them without limits, so one day they will, like you, love without counting the cost.

Seems like a pretty good investment to me. What do you think?