About us

    CS

    Charles Smith

    Founder & author, nannyvsdaycare.com

    Charles is a working parent who spent too many evenings bouncing between spreadsheet tabs, forum posts, and conflicting articles just to answer a simple question: "What will childcare actually cost us, and is a nanny or daycare the better fit for our budget?" He built this site so other families could get a clearer, faster starting point—without needing a finance degree first.

    Why this website exists

    Childcare is one of the largest line items in a family's budget, yet pricing is opaque. Hourly nanny rates, center tuition, waitlists, payroll taxes, and tax credits all interact in ways that are hard to compare side by side. Charles wanted a single place where parents could plug in their hours and number of children and see a good-faith comparison—not as a substitute for quotes from providers or advice from a CPA, but as a structured way to orient the conversation at home and with caregivers.

    The thing that makes the comparison genuinely hard is that the two options are priced on different units. A daycare charges per child, so your bill roughly doubles with a second one. A nanny is paid per household, so a second child costs almost nothing extra in wage terms. That single difference is why the answer flips for so many families between their first child and their second, and why a national average is close to useless for any individual household.

    What this site is, and is not

    It is a calculator and a set of reference guides, written by one person who checks the numbers against published federal and state sources. It is not a marketplace, an agency, or a lead generator: we do not sell your details, take referral fees from providers, or run affiliate links. The site is funded by display advertising, and advertisers have no say in what gets published.

    It is also not advice. Nobody here holds a CPA or a childcare licensing credential, and the calculator cannot see your state's licensing rules, your provider's fee schedule, or your tax position. Where a figure is an estimate rather than a published statistic, the page says so. Our editorial policy sets out exactly which sources sit behind the numbers and how corrections are handled.

    What we believe

    Every family's situation is different. There is no universal "right" answer—only the option that best balances cost, logistics, and what your children need. Cost is the part that is easiest to model and the part most sites get vague about, so that is where this one puts its effort. The rest—whether your child does better in a group, whether you can absorb a closure day, whether you want another adult in your home—is yours to weigh, and no calculator should pretend otherwise.

    Get in touch

    Questions, corrections, or ideas? Reach Charles at nannyvsdaycare@gmail.com.