As a father of three children, I will very soon be receiving a monthly 1,000 zloty allowance for TWO of my children. The equivalent of around 225 euro, or approximately 250 dollars, this might not sound like much. According to my inadequate research just before writing this letter, families with one child receive as much as 3,846 US dollars in Luxembourg, and slightly less in Australia.
Before the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party in Poland announced this allowance, all families got was a 225 euro one-time payout per child.
In Finland, that land famous for saunas, heavy metal bands and “wife carrying races” – where buff men lob their wives on their backs and run in 15 minutes more distance than I’ll cover this year – children are given cardboard boxes to nap in.
Now before you get ideas of hobo children forces to sleep rough, the tradition is quite a sweet one. “For 75 years, Finland's expectant mothers have been given a box by the state,” the BBC wrote in a recent article. “It's like a starter kit of clothes, sheets and toys that can even be used as a bed. And some say it helped Finland achieve one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates.”
Impressive, if I might say so myself.
I would never have imagined that something as mundane as a bit of corrugated brown paper would do so much for a cold country whose shortest day – during the winter solstice – is a mere three hours long.
Well then, if that most modest of office supplies can raise those kind of results, what would a fat cheque in your pocket every month do to raise the country’s morale. In fact the very aim of the government is in the words of my learned colleague to “avoid a demographic crisis”, and in cruder terms, to encourage Poles to have more babies. Perhaps giving everyone a bottle of wine, and a spa voucher would have the same effect, but what do I know? I’m no politician!
Anyway. Let’s break down the costs. Yes a thousand złoty will help out, but it won’t cancel out the costs of having children in today’s day and age. Because children are EXPENSIVE. All in caps lock. A recent article in the UK’s Telegraph said that it costs a whopping 230 thousand pounds to raise a child. Excuse me while I week.
Now I understand that those prices are in the UK and not in Poland, where the cost of living is significantly lower, but still. I’m lucky that my children are still young and they are over the moon when they get a Kinder egg, but it will soon be like “daddy, I want a new pair of Nike shoes”, “Our class is going on a skiing trip to the Alps”, “Daddy we want a new Playstation”, and a little later: “Daddy can you lend us some money because we want to go clubbing with our friends”. Oh, the joys of parenthood.
Well, the gauntlet has been thrown down, and the government will bend over backwards to pay up, even if it means putting the economy in serious economic perils. Still, it’s a step in the right direction. I read somewhere that this is the first time Polish parents will be getting any kind of allowance since the fall of communism in 1989. So, Bravo.
However, if a simple cardboard box can have a similar effect, is it fair to question whether the choice was the right one?