MickygreenMust say that link you provided was very interesting -...

Mickygreen

Must say that link you provided was very interesting - lots has changed since then.

The 7 times income was calculated based on median price is cheap suburbs rather than all suburbs so the 3.5 is probably a bit low so more likely 4-4.5 I guess.

Challenge is often when two wages become one - my wife and I both worked until we had our first child. She had the early days off whilst I worked. Then I took time off while she went to work/study and then we swapped roles again. Similar thing with our second child. But we always had one of us at home because we did not want to put a baby in child care.

The early childhood years are key to later development and for this reason many people do not want to use childcare. Someone referred to the ex CEO of ABC, Eddy Groves, as a "mulletted milk sales guy" on another thread today. Do you think quality of child care was his main concern or how many millions he could make from paying his staff as little as possible and squeezing every last dollar out where he could? For this reason, many of us choose to have only one working parent. In our case it was shared, though my wife had more time off. Sometimes it is mainly the father. Usually, it is only the mother. In our case we could not survive for an extended time on my wife's salary but we could on mine, thus the choice. So my point about having only one working parent does not mean I'm saying women should get back in the kitchen, it is a point that many families with children do not want both parents at work but the cost of housing often makes this a difficult, or sometimes impossible choice.