It looks like people are comparing childcare, which is easy to put a price on, to parenting which is not. Childcare centers, even the good ones, don’t even come close as a substitute for attachment parenting. A dedicated and special nanny could approximate the role of a parent, but sooner or later the kid realizes he or she isn’t having much of a relationship with their biological parents and will be harmed, to at least come degree, by the lack.
I don’t have time to expand in this post but I will say that parenting at least as valuable as what the bread winner is doing….in the case of couples who make that type of breadwinner/stay at home choice, along whatever gender lines.
