“We are like items to them; they can’t go without us.”

April 29, 2020 2:50 AM

Nannies Tell the Truth About Working During the Coronavirus (SL The Cut) "A lot of nannies from the Caribbean have died. We have a nannies group, and they would post the people. It’s about ten to 15 from the Caribbean. A lot of them had to go into work, and that’s one of the reasons why I think so many of them lost their lives. We know that money is important, but I would have really not gone into work. Because if you have the money and you lose your life, what sense does it make?"
posted by daybeforetheday (18 comments total)

...............
posted by Fizz at 4:58 AM on April 29, 2020 [3 favorites]

It's not really the most important part of the piece, but I couldn't help notice that the illustrations (which were drawn by a man) both showed pampered or evil-looking women as the employers. I guess these families are all single-mother households and that's why male employers were not shown?
posted by Ralston McTodd at 5:16 AM on April 29, 2020 [65 favorites]

It's unconscionable that people who can afford a nanny aren't simply paying them to stay home and looking after their own children and households themselves during the pandemic. We have a relationship with housekeeper who comes in weekly to deep-clean, dust and vacuum. We're by no means rolling in dough, but didn't hesitate in mailing her a big check and saying she should stay home and be safe. We'll be sending more until it's pretty safe to travel around NYC. I wonder, however, how many of her clients are either asking her to come in or stiffing her on the money.
posted by slkinsey at 6:46 AM on April 29, 2020 [20 favorites]

It's not really the most important part of the piece...

Perhaps not, but it IS an important part of the piece. Thanks for pointing it out.
posted by Silvery Fish at 6:48 AM on April 29, 2020 [7 favorites]

It's unconscionable that people who can afford a nanny aren't simply paying them to stay home and looking after their own children and households themselves during the pandemic. We have a relationship with housekeeper who comes in weekly to deep-clean, dust and vacuum. We're by no means rolling in dough, but didn't hesitate in mailing her a big check and saying she should stay home and be safe. We'll be sending more until it's pretty safe to travel around NYC. I wonder, however, how many of her clients are either asking her to come in or stiffing her on the money.

We can't afford a nanny, but it's what we're doing with our daycare (which isn't open and isn't requiring us to pay); one of the parents organizes a Go Fund Me for the teachers out of work every few weeks. Obviously, there are people at the daycare who are ALSO out of work, but we're not and it seems like the least we can do.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:16 AM on April 29, 2020 [4 favorites]

Not everyone who can afford a nanny can still pay them if they, too, are now out of work. But these super rich Hamptons living 1%ers certainly can.

It must not be the revolution, yet...
posted by jacquilynne at 7:55 AM on April 29, 2020 [6 favorites]

This is one of the many reasons that we need a basic income. So that no one has to nanny for rich assholes ever again.

Those poor kids.
posted by wires at 8:10 AM on April 29, 2020 [6 favorites]

Mr Moon & I are both doctors, so still working during this time; we're not frontline, though, so are on a more limited schedule. We try to have our nanny come as little as possible but since preschool is closed if we're both working we need her to come; we still pay her full time and don't have her come on days where one of us can stay home. One of us goes to pick her up & take her home so she doesn't have to take public transportation; when things get busier we may have to do a lyft or similar, which is not ideal, but she is very careful. I feel bad about her having to work (and be exposed to us, though both our hospitals have good PPE) but we try to mitigate her risk as much as possible.
(FWIW we do not have our house cleaner come but still pay her her full pay as well)
posted by n. moon at 8:27 AM on April 29, 2020 [10 favorites]

Childcare workers are shat upon because childcare has been deemed women's work. But that doesn't mean that female childcare workers can hope for allyship from female employers, any more than poor black people can expect allyship from black cops.
posted by splitpeasoup at 9:52 AM on April 29, 2020 [17 favorites]

Amazing how all of the ESSENTIAL HEROES, are paid as if they didn't matter and are replaceable.
posted by evilDoug at 10:27 AM on April 29, 2020 [3 favorites]

"Because if you have the money and you lose your life, what sense does it make?"

I don't know, maybe this is the depression talking, but this sounds like the kind of tone-deaf asshole thing you hear from somebody who's never known what it's like to try to survive in grinding, systemic poverty.

Shit and fuck, our bodies and our very lives are sometimes the absolute only resources we bloody have to leverage against the black hole of suffering without the basic necessities. Would I rather live? Sure. But not under absolutely any conditions. If you've never known what it's like to suffer physical illness that makes just getting from minute to minute a full-time fucking job with no relief in sight, if you've never known what it's like to starve or see your family go without medicine or sanitary living conditions, if you've never been homeless or trapped or abused or marginalized out of good options, maybe stop moralizing about what other people have had to do to get by. Of course the people who lost their lives would have rather had ways to support themselves and their families that didn't involve risking their lives. On good days I have a flicker of hope that we'll come out of this as a society where that's not a choice people have to make. But until that happens, Jesus Fucking Tap-Dancing Christ on a Triscuit, don't heap your self-righteous blame on the grunts at the bottom.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:42 AM on April 29, 2020 [2 favorites]

Just for clarity, the quote is from one of the nannies, describing her own decision to stay home despite not getting paid, and a friend of hers who died from the virus after continuing to work.
posted by LobsterMitten at 10:50 AM on April 29, 2020 [30 favorites]

Amazing how all of the ESSENTIAL HEROES, are paid as if they didn't matter and are replaceable.

Hero is synonym for Fungible Commodity.
posted by srboisvert at 11:52 AM on April 29, 2020 [4 favorites]

Amazing how all of the ESSENTIAL HEROES, are paid as if they didn't matter and are replaceable.

Market full time Nanny compensation is something like 45-55k off the books in NYC. I.e. in cash. Increasingly common for the employers to contribute to healthcare and transit costs as well. Usually two weeks paid vacation as well.

Worth every penny and a really hard job. And nothing reveals peers personalities like how they treat their Nanny. But it's not as low compensated as you imply.
posted by JPD at 3:41 PM on April 29, 2020 [1 favorite]

A full-time-at-least job that doesn't pay into Social Security or unemployment insurance and only brings in $50K in Manhattan effectively pays a little more than $20/hr., which is only $5 above the current city minimum wage. It's pretty low-compensated.
posted by praemunire at 7:04 PM on April 29, 2020 [4 favorites]

(Although some Manhattan employers do have the basic moral fiber to pay their people on the books.)
posted by praemunire at 7:04 PM on April 29, 2020

Redo your math on the hourly pay. It's wrong. Making 55k after tax in NYC is roughly 72k nominal which for 50 weeks a year 50 hours a week is 29/hr pre-tax
posted by JPD at 8:51 PM on April 29, 2020

I have a friend who needed to keep her nanny as she is the sole earner in her home and has a 1 year old. She has no other childcare option and can’t take off the entire pandemic. She feels so incredibly guilty but has no other option.
posted by affectionateborg at 1:14 AM on May 1, 2020