Blog 1

• expenditure - the method that totals spending on goods and services produced by residents (www.economist.com/research/economics


• capiti income - income per person in a population (http://www.investorwords.com/)


• Pew Research Center - a nonpartisan "fact tank" that provides information on the issues, attitudes, and trends shaping America and the world (www.pewresearch.org/about)

Everyone chooses how they want to spend their money. They can spend their money taking care of family, going shopping, going to the casino, going to the movies, etc... Some of the choices people make do not affect the rest of us, but our economic system depends on a consistent supply of family care. Taking care of elders and children in one's family can be very expensive. Medicare and Medicaid help pay for some of the bills, but not for long time care. Sending children to child care is now a basic essential as well as sending them off to college is. Parents still feel the need to send their children off to child care or school no matter what their job status is. "The trends in family income, however, are never adjusted for changes in the cost for caring for dependents, because we have not developeda comprehensive Dependent Price Index. The Department of Agriculture regularly estimates family expenditures on children, but ignores both the costs of college and the value of parental time." What I think will happen next is some of the things President Obama mentioned in his State of Union Address 2010. I also think families will still be vulnerable because it is still very hard to find a job now a days and everything cost so much that people can not afford anything.

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/01/how-much-do-we-spend-caring-for-family/