Raising a child can break the bank
Print Edition
Now that many couples are allowed to have a second child (if they themselves are only children), will there be a rush to have more babies in this country that so famously dotes on children?
Hardly.
Though many Chinese like the idea of two and those who are rich can easily afford another few (from live-in ayi to high fashion to Harvard University), most people say it’s just too expensive to raise a child, especially in a big city.
And it’s a huge and stressful undertaking — starting with planning for the child’s adult future before or during the mother’s pregnancy.
Spending 10,000 yuan (US$1,647) a year or more on kindergarten is not unusual for many Shanghai families. Persuasive gifts to get their children into the better schools are common. The cost of education through university is enormous.
Nowadays, from the cradle everyone who can buys expensive imported baby milk powder because domestic powder is widely considered inferior. At one Walmart store in Beijing in August, a 900-gram tin of foreign milk powder was on sale for 368 yuan (US$60) — a comparable product in the UK at Tesco sold for the equivalent of US$18.
According to the China Chain Store and Franchise Association, families spent US$187 billion last year on children under the age of 12, according to a report in July by China Radio International after visiting a baby expo in Shanghai.
And of course, there must be enrichment courses and activities of all kinds from the time a child is a toddler.
Rankings of the cost of raising a child are floating around the Internet; they are largely self-reporting and very unscientific. According to one of these, in Beijing it costs 2.76 million yuan to raise a child from pregnancy to college graduation; in Shanghai it costs 2.47 million yuan, in Shenzhen, it’s 2.16 million yuan, and so on.
It’s commonly said among upper middle class people in Shanghai that a million yuan is a reasonable estimate for raise a child from infancy to college admission.
Of course, there are great variations, but child rearing has become a huge financial burden for urban couples.
A survey by the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences and the Shanghai Women’s Federation of 2,000 families with children below 12 years old found 35 percent of interviewed couples called child rearing “a big burden.”
Nearly 10 percent said more than half of the family’s disposable income is spent on their children and 7 percent said 40-50 percent of their income is spent on raising their child.
In addition to the cost, around 30 percent of families said taking care of children is very stressful. In Shanghai, parents usually take their children for early education and courses such as English, math, chess, piano, painting and other subjects for enrichment — and for extra points on admission to primary, middle, high schools and college.
Shanghai Daily interviewed five couples to see how they spend on their children and why.
Wealthy families declined to be interviewed and describe how they spend on their little emperors and empresses, though press reports tell stories of distasteful excess. One woman did admit she bought a 10,000-yuan Chanel handbag for her six-year-old daughter.
Even well-off families denied that they lavished money or gifts on their children — it’s all about education and spiritual enrichment, rearing responsible children, they asserted. They wouldn’t want to indulge and spoil a child.
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