What this calculator does
It prices the years that decide the answer instead of averaging across eighteen. The published cost-of-a-child totals divide everything evenly, which flatters the hard part and exaggerates the easy part. In practice the cost is front-loaded and concentrated in the pre-school years, when childcare behaves like a second rent and then stops.
It also applies the three offsets that genuinely change the number: the sibling discount most nurseries give, the dependent care FSA, and the child tax credit. Each is applied where it lands rather than smoothed across the whole period.
Why the second child costs less
Most of the one-off spending has already happened. The pushchair, the cot, the car seat and the clothes exist. Housing usually does not change. What repeats in full is childcare during the years the children overlap, which is why the answer turns almost entirely on how far apart they are and how long both are in paid care at once.
What each input means
- Household income. Gross, before tax, since the offsets are worked against your marginal rate.
- Childcare cost. The monthly figure for your area, which varies more than any other input on this page.
- Months until school. How long full-time care is needed. This is the single biggest driver of the total.
- Sibling discount. What your nursery actually gives, defaulting to 10%.
- Dependent care FSA. Whether you use it, and how much of the $5,000 allowance.
Frequently asked questions
Why not just use the average cost of raising a child?
Because nobody experiences the average. The published totals spread the cost evenly across eighteen years, and the actual difficulty is concentrated in the years before school when childcare is a second rent. A family that survives those years is rarely troubled by the later ones, so an average answers a question nobody is asking.
Why is a second child cheaper than the first?
Several costs do not repeat. You already own the pushchair, the cot and the car seat, clothes and toys are handed down, and housing usually does not change. Many nurseries also apply a sibling discount, commonly around 10%. What does repeat in full is childcare for the years the two overlap, which is the expensive part.
What is the dependent care FSA worth?
Up to $5,000 of childcare paid with pre-tax money, which saves you your marginal rate plus payroll tax on that amount. It is one of the few offsets that arrives while the costs are at their worst rather than at tax time the following year.
Does the child tax credit cover much of this?
It helps and it does not close the gap. At $2,000 a year it is worth roughly $167 a month against childcare that frequently runs many times that during the pre-school years.
Should I include the cost of a bigger house?
Only if you would actually move. Many families add a second child without changing house, which is why housing is not assumed here. If a move is genuinely part of the plan, price it separately with the home affordability calculator, because it is usually the larger of the two decisions.
What about one parent stopping work?
That is the alternative worth pricing properly, because a salary that mostly covers childcare is not obviously worth keeping and not obviously worth losing either. The real hourly wage calculator handles that side of it, since childcare paid in order to work is a job cost.
Read more
The full write-up, including why the childcare years decide the answer and what the monthly figure looks like at different incomes, is in how much income you need to support another child. If a bigger house is part of the same plan, the home affordability check. And if you are weighing whether a second salary is worth keeping through the childcare years, the real hourly wage calculator treats childcare as the job cost it is.
A planning estimate from the figures you enter. Childcare costs vary enormously by area, and your own quotes will beat any national figure.