LA Times uncovers diaper crisis

Enough of your Atlantic and New Yorker articles that are fodder for thread topics, Dick Whitman and YF.

The LA Times is giving a hard-hitting look at the disposable diaper crisis among the poor.

It's a silent epidemic, folks.

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-diaper-need-20130729,0,1515372.story

 

Well, shit.

 

Luckily we buy ours at a regional warehouse chain. $20 for a box of generic diapers that lasts two weeks. When our toddler was an infant, a $20 box lasted a month.

For those without access to a Costco or Sam's Club, and buy name-brand, those prices skyrocket.

 

Not to be unsympathetic, but people could go the old-fashioned way and go back to cloth diapers. I am kind of surprised this wasn't addressed in the story.

If a baby shower I went to last week was any indication, cloth diapers are actually making a comeback. The mother-to-be received two large packages of them, at her request. It's something some people are going back to for both environmental and economical reasons.

I can take it from my mom's experience with her six kids -- disposable diapers were just becoming all the rage by the time the last two (twins) came around -- and trust that cloth diapers are much less expensive over time.

 

Cloth diapers are often not an option because they require frequent and expensive trips to the laundromat.

 

Son is going on four and still can't get potty training down. Reaalllly sick of spending the money.

 

That is the joy of being poor. Constantly having to make bad long-term decisions because you can't afford the short-term start-up costs.

 

Probably quite a bit less expensive than boxes and boxes of disposable diapers, though. And who says all these people would go to a laundromat? None of them wash their clothes at home? I'd doubt it.

The other issue these days, from what I see, is that many kids are not toilet-trained in a timely manner -- i.e. as soon as possible.

All six of us kids in our family were completely toilet-trained by the time we were 2 years old. No kidding. Nowadays, hat seems to be the exception rather than the rule. It's almost unheard of for kids to be potty-trained before they are three or even four or more years old now.

I believe this is partly due to the much greater numbers of mothers working outside the home now. But I also believe there is a large element of just plain lack of discipline/commitment/effort involved. Parents are letting the kids eventually "figure it out," instead of actively and consistently teaching them.

 

I doubt most lower-income apartments have washer/dryer hookups.

 

Your point was that the story did not address the matter of cloth diapers.

 

They usually have sinks and running water though.

 

I did not see that it did. I read the story, but not closely enough, I guess. I will look again. If the line you referenced was the only one, then I'd say it didn't address the possibility and the apparent return of cloth diapers enough.