Thank god we don’t live in Sweden. AIBU?

[sw1v]

I was just reading in another thread that in Sweden, you are basically forced to send your babies into day care settings at the age of 1. Apparently 50% of 1 year olds are in full- time nurseries (very long days inc. parents’ commutes) and 95% by the time they are 2! Plus (unlike in the U.K.) there is apparently no minimum ratio for staff to children.

But what if you are a mother who simply doesn’t want to do this (or father)? I personally, would hate this. So how is it acceptable for ‘the state’ to be interfering in people’s personal spheres and family lives by making this ‘the societal norm.’ Is it because they are a high tax society and want more tax? Is this it? Well, it seems like an infringement on personal liberties to me (without wanting to sound too dramatic).

AIBU?

I lived in Sweden for a year by all accounts the childcare was excellent - they have very strong social conditioning though, people are very compliant and conservative, so if society expected them to put their kids in childcare from the age of 1, that's what they'd do - no further compulsion needed. They came across as people who were inclined to diarise which nights they had sex every month - spontaneity is a swear word.

There are more children in childcare at 1 in Sweden because its subsidised and actually affordable. For a lot of people in the UK paying childcare costs more than their wage, so they don't work and don't put their child in childcare. That's not necessarily a good thing

If someone where to post, ‘Thank god I don’t live in England and have to send my kids to school in a uniform aged 4,” I’d think, fair enough. I’m not British anyway and this is still a little peculiar to me.

I'm not sure you understand the difference between the state making people do things and societal pressure.

@sw1v

“A quick google would have given you the stats : 50.5 percent of one-year-olds attended preschool, 90.6 and 94.0 percent respectively of two- and three-year-olds and 95.3 percent of all four- and five-year-olds according to the statistics database of the Swedish National Agency for Education. May 2021”

Thanks. There you go then... it’s true!

That doesn't say they go full time.

You'd see me and DS "out and about" in the week - if it was a Friday. Because I don't work Fridays, so he doesn't go to nursery. Almost all mums I know were back at work by the time their child was 2 - I'm not sure the stats would be that different in some parts of the UK tbh.

If you look across Europe, the countries with the highest percentages of children in daycare are those with heavily subsidized childcare. Usually the more socialist high tax ones, it’s similar in Denmark and The Netherlands. What horrible countries, giving women a genuine choice if they want to return to work and not lumbered with being the default parent and domestic help due to typically lower wages. OP I honestly don’t get your problem at all. How many times do we see on MN women trapped at home by eye watering child care costs.

I live in Copenhagen but British and up in Stockholm for a few days. Scandi societal norm is for women to work and they make it viable to do so. Lots work part time too as even full time childcare is about £200 a month - whereas in uk it’s a bit all or nothing to afford childcare —Scandinavia is amazing in many ways if you have a young family (we don’t)

Go visit Sweden and see the toddlers rolling round in the snow all day in winter, and out and about exploring nature in the summer. Davis looks great fun!

My Swedish friends - when the want a laugh - always ask me to tell them again how much childcare and housing is in this country. For many living here working hard just trying to survive it is not funny.

Dagis, not Davis. That’s what nursery is called in Sweden

Is this something you just 'read on the internet' and if so it would probably just be a cultural difference, not 'forced' upon, just their way of life

I feel as if I'm understanding some of the great Swedish poetry for the first time. Here's the Song of the Mother, on her baby being forced into nursery:

Memories (memories)
Good days (good days)
Bad days (bad days)
They'll be (they'll be)
With me (with me)
Always (always)
In these old familiar rooms, children would play
Now there's only emptiness, nothing to say

"Why are over 90% if 2 year-olds in daycare in Sweden when they are not in the U.K.? What is different and what underlies this?"

From what friends/family living in Sweden (and from what PP on this thread have said....it's the access to good quality, subsidised/affordable childcare. And also employers being more "family friendly" out there.

I had to go back to working FT when my youngest was 6months old. I managed to get set days at work (Thursdays to Sundays) and paid around £65 a day for her nursery fees (Thurs/Fri). I'm a nurse, and even a long day in nursery didn't cover the start/finish times of my shifts (nursery = 7:30-6:30, long day shift = 7am - 8pm). So I had to rely on others to pick her up/drop her off. At the weekends, I found a CM who was willing to have my 2DC from 6:30am to 8:30pm. Each weekend cost me £440. Total weekly childcare cost was £570, and I paid that for a year until I could figure something else out. Way more than I earned (and it took me a long time to pay back a lot of the debt I got myself in), but I needed to work to support my family and to keep my NMC registration. I would have loved to have just needed to pay a maximum of £150 per month!!

I would love for the UK to have a similar system to Sweden, to enable people (particularly women) to work/study and be able to afford childcare. You hear of so many people not returning to work because childcare costs are prohibitively expensive, and then not being able to continue with NI contributions, pension contributions etc. Also not being able to rejoin their profession at the level that they were in. Fast forward a few years and if they split with partners/spouses, then they're up shit creek because their earning potential has gone down the pan.

Sweden has high levels of children in nursery because childcare is actually affordable (unlike here) giving more women the choice to go back to work. Maternity leave is shared between both parents and is longer, and better paid than it is here, which means that the secure attachment with parents is built on a more steady foundation than many children in the UK. Which means nursery is likely more enjoyable for children in Sweden, because they have safe attachments.

Is that really so awful so you?

‘It's worth realizing that subsidized childcare can create some choices but can take away others.’

Thanks for your very interesting post, Lobster.

Also -

‘Sweden has one of the most generous parental leave (föräldraledighet) systems in the world. Parents are given 480 days of leave per child, and 390 of these days are paid at a rate of 80% of your salary up to a capped limited of 1006 SEK a day.’

Sounds good.

I'm glad I don't live there. There are so many creepy murders. Or at least that's what Netflix tells me.

I would move to Sweden in a heartbeat - any nordic country for that matter, people use childcare a lot more, yet these countries are far more family friendly than here. In the UK we are frowned upon for taking time off work to care for sick children, women are penalised for having maternity leave and men are looked down on for taking parental leave or taking days off for emergency childcare, we're actively encouraged to go to work when we're ill, you're pulled apart for being either a working mother or a SAHM it's shit, no wonder we have a mental health crisis in the UK!

It's a tricky business being a SAHP as you've put yourself behind in the workforce, you're not building up a pension pot or paying NI and often these things aren't factored in to the decision to stay at home, more often than not it's 'I can't afford to put my kids into childcare'

@sw1v

“I am Swedish.

Swedish policies have for many years been to encourage women to remain in the work force. One of these ways is to heavily subsidise daycare/preschool, but not subsidise families where one parent wishes to stay at home - simply because that parent pretty much always ends up being the mother and it's detrimental to women's careers, wages and in the end pensions and so on to be SAHP:s. We have ended up with a culture where pretty much all children go to daycare/preschool from about 18-24 months old. The care is very good, normally, and trained preschool teachers are employed.

It is true that one consequence is that parents who stay home with their children will find themselves a bit lonely. The playgrounds are a bit empty alright, and the "open preschools" where parents with small kids can go to hang out do a sort of "preschool light" thing tend to be occupied with parents on parental leave ie with very small children. Not much to do for older kids! However from the age of three children are entitled to a place in daycare/preschool for up to 525 hours/year, whether the parents are working or not, so older children will meet other kids that way (most children do go). “

Thankyou.

If someone where to post, ‘Thank god I don’t live in England and have to send my kids to school in a uniform aged 4,” I’d think, fair enough. I’m not British anyway and this is still a little peculiar to me.

But this is what I mean by cultural norms as nobody really questions it here. If you are out and about in the week with a 4/5 year old, people might well be thinking “why is that child not in school? Are they ill?”

But where I live is literally pram-jam and toddler-central in the week. It would be very weird if all the children were in daycare and a mum with a toddler would be the exception out and about.

Maybe see that pram-jam as composed of unhappy women who felt they had no choice but to quit the workforce because of high childcare costs, and who would not be seen for dust at toddler playgroups if a Swedish-style subsidised childcare model not only allowed but encouraged working motherhood as the norm? And yes, maybe people would wonder what on earth motivated you to be a SAHM if you were wandering around conspicuously solo? Would that be such a bad thing? Do you really need to be bolstered up by feeling you’re the norm to make your own choices?

Goodness I had no idea. Is there some sort of childcatcher who rolls through the streets of Stockholm, catching errant one year olds in a giant net?

It’s not being state mandated! I don’t hear many Swedish women actually complaining about this….the opposite! The Nordic countries are hailed as good models for enabling women who want to return to work being able to.
Mother’s in Britain have poor pensions, lower earnings, lower prospects of reaching senior management and much stems from our lack of affordable childcare. We should be ashamed of ourselves in the UK.

@sw1v

I’m hardly saying babies are being carried off by the state.

But if it is true that 95% of children are in full-time day care at age 2, that means there can’t be many left out and about. So if you were looking for stuff to do with your two-year old (toddler groups or even just friends etc), it would be a nightmare because all the kids are in this daycare! So you would feel like an outlier and this is subtle societal pressure.

Hysterically laughing at this!

The worst thing is how bloody happy the Swedish are. Ranked 7th in the world. Fucking happiness. I'm glad I live in 17th-placed UK.

@kwiksavenofrillsusername

Goodness I had no idea. Is there some sort of childcatcher who rolls through the streets of Stockholm, catching errant one year olds in a giant net?

Love this 🤣

What I think is especially interesting about Sweden is how few women choose to stay at home when childcare is affordable and accessible.

I think OP has read a little too much of Xenophobia today! Give it a rest OP, there's nothing wrong with sending young children to nurseries, and they most certainly aren't forced! It's a cultural norm, just like we have here in the U.K.

I would have put mine in from 1 month if it meant saving my sanity and independence.

@RickJames….you need to distinguish between reality and Nordic-noir fiction 😂. …..I think they’ve a much lower statistical crime rate than the UK.