TIL about babysitting co-ops. “The premise is simple: Families in the co-op provide each other with free childcare. A point system…ensures that everyone contributes their fair share. Every half an hour is worth one point…”
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Yep! Worked great for us in Park Slope when our kids were little. Requires some hefty documentation if you're working with relative strangers, but overall everybody needs the help so most folks stay committed. Made some good friends that way as well.
I was introduced to the concept in a Paul Krugman article using it as a model for an economy. It explained how a lack of liquidity could cause a recession and how stimulus could help address it. https://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/babysit.html
Thank you for posting this! The wikipedia article is also good. I knew friends in the Capitol Hill co-op. The economics were sometimes peculiar, as were some of the personalities involved.
Our family joined a baby sitting co-op in Concord MA in 1970 !!! I wonder if one still exists? I still live there. I’ll look into it
I love this idea, but wonder about the logistics for single parents of young children (with older children, as the article demonstrates, this is probably more doable). My coupled friends who were part of one always had one parent babysit while the other stayed home with their own children to do bedtime, because so much of the demand was in the evenings.
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