- Megan, a 28-year-old mom, quit her job after having her second child.
- In addition to caregiving, she had to get a part-time job to help support her family.
Megan, a 28-year-old Missouri millennial, is doing whatever she can to avoid returning to work full-time.
Her solution involves a part-time job and two side hustles, but at least she feels some ownership over her time.
Prior to 2020, Megan worked remotely, full-time, as a homeowners insurance claims adjuster while also caring for her son. When her daughter was born last June, she knew she wouldn't be able to balance full-time work and caretaking, she told Insider. Megan asked that her last name be withheld for privacy reasons.
While she says she "loved" her job — which paid roughly $3,000 per month — she decided to quit. Megan says it would cost a combined roughly $1,600 per month to put both her children in daycare. The cost and the time she would lose with them while working wasn't worth it.
Just three months later, however, she and her husband took stock of their finances and "quickly realized" she needed to get a job for them to get by. Their mortgage payment of roughly $1,880 per month was, in particular, straining their finances. Insider viewed Megan's documents to verify her income and mortgage payments.
In October, she started working 15 to 20 hours per week remotely in an insurance role for a different employer that pays roughly $1,600 per month — and continued caring for her now two-year-old and eight-month-old. She's also tacking on extra income posting what she calls "mom/lifestyle" social media content and reselling items on Facebook Marketplace.
Megan is one of the over 22 million Americans working part-time voluntarily, according to Labor Department data. That's more than five times the number — 4.1 million — who were part-time but wanted a full-time gig, the highest ratio of voluntary to involuntary part-time employment in two decades. In part, this data speaks to the strong US labor market, but there are also many Americans not pursuing full-time gigs due to health issues, childcare responsibilities, and burnout. And some, like Megan, are being pulled into the workforce to help their families make ends meet due to high inflation and cost of living.
"If I'm being honest, we are barely making ends meet," she said. "We are doing some reselling on the side and my social media strictly to survive. I will basically do whatever it takes to not return to work full time."
Trying to balance everything can be "so stressful"
To try to supplement the family's income even more, Megan said she's making $150 per month on average from her social media content so far — all from Facebook and Instagram reels bonuses or brand deals. This takes up about 10 hours per week, she said.
She and her husband have also tried buying tools, electronics, and baby items from the online auction house Equip-Bid and reselling them on Facebook Marketplace — she says they've made up to $600 per month doing this but that it "varies greatly" month-to-month.
"I can't afford to put both kids in daycare, so this is the best option for us now," she said.
Megan is among the many US parents struggling to find and afford childcare. In 2018, the left-leaning Center for American Progress found that over half of Americans lived in an area where childcare was sparse, and the shortage only grew worse during the pandemic. When families do find childcare, it's often expensive. National childcare costs average between $9,000 and $9,600 annually, per the advocacy organization Child Care Aware, and the cost could shoot even higher as federal pandemic funds dry up.
While Megan is fortunate enough to receive some childcare support from her husband — who works from home two days per week — and a $135-per-month preschool program her son attends for two-and-a-half hours twice a week, she says managing all her responsibilities can be very stressful.
"Trying to balance two little ones, preschool drop off, naps, cooking meals, good quality time and working, can be so stressful," she said.
Megan says the challenge of balancing everything is "definitely not for everyone," and that in an ideal world, she wouldn't work — other than as a mom — at all. That said, the time she's able to spend with her children makes it all worth it.
"I know I'll never get this valuable time back with my kids," she said. "I can spend the rest of my life working if I want, but my kids are only kids for so long."