The U.S. Department of Agriculture prepares an annual report about families’ expenditures on children for use in developing state child-support and foster-care guidelines. Annual child-rearing expense estimates ranged between $12,290 and $14,320 for a child in a two-child, married-couple family in the middle-income group, which is defined as a before-tax income between $59,410 and $102,870.

… A child born last year to someone in the lowest income group would cost $212,370 over 17 years, compared to $490,830 for highest earners.

The biggest share of the expense in raising a child, according to the report, is housing at 30%, followed by child-care and education at 18%, food at 16%, transportation at 14% and health care at 8%.

The report has been compiled since 1960, when adjusted for inflation, a middle-income two parent household would have spent around $192,000 over 17 years in 2011 dollars to raise a child. The biggest change over 50 years is the share of expenses going to child-care and education, which was just 2% in 1960.

via Cost to Raise a Child: Around $300,000, Not Including College – Real Time Economics – WSJ.

The US higher education system is a scam and a ripoff. The highest cost Ivy League schools, especially Harvard, produce paid shills and hitmen for the Wall Street mafia, while everybody else becomes a debt slave to the massive criminal student loan scam. There is no chance of reform. The criminals control the system and run it for their own benefit. The 1% run it. The next 10% run their errands. The 90% are fodder… toast.

Say good night, Gracie.

– Lee Adler