Stay at home parent or return to work calculator
The pay looks fine on paper. Then you take off tax, childcare, the extra petrol, the convenience food on the nights nobody has the energy to cook — and the number that's actually left can be a shock.
This calculator works out what returning to work is really worth, expressed as an hourly rate. Then you can weigh that against a year at home, which is the honest comparison.
Why an hourly rate
Because that's the number you can actually judge.
"$65,000 a year" doesn't tell you anything useful when childcare is taking $400 a week. "$9 an hour, after everything" does. It might still be worth it for your career, your sanity, your KiwiSaver, or because you want to, but at least you're deciding with the real figure in front of you.
What gets taken off
Tax, on the second income at your household's marginal rate
Childcare, minus what you can claim back through FamilyBoost
Getting there — petrol, parking, another vehicle if it comes to that
The convenience tax — takeaways, cleaners, anything you pay for because you're short of time
What doesn't show up in the calculation
The maths is only ever half of this decision, and it's the half that's easiest to overstate.
Your earnings aren't just this year's. Time out of the workforce affects progression, and the gap tends to compound. A year that looks marginal on an hourly basis might still be the right financial call over a career. Or it might not, and the calculator won't tell you.
KiwiSaver keeps ticking. No income means no employer contribution and no government contribution, and at compounding rates over thirty years that's worth more than it looks.
And the things that aren't financial at all. Being there. Or needing something that isn't being there. Whether the job is one you'd struggle to get back into. Whether you'd resent either choice.
I'm not going to pretend a spreadsheet resolves that. What it can do is take the money question off the table so you can think about the rest of it clearly.
For more on making that decision, I wrote an article here.
Before you decide, check what you can claim
Two things worth working out first, because both change the number:
FamilyBoost payments — up to $120 a week back on early childhood fees, and the income limit is higher than most people assume.
Paid parental leave — what you'd receive and for how long.
And if you're job hunting, ads quote pre-tax income while your budget works in what arrives:
Check out the pre-tax income calculator that works out the gross pay required to bring in a particular take-home figure.
Want to talk it through?
This is one of the more consequential money decisions a household makes, and it usually gets made in a rush somewhere near the end of parental leave.
Get in touch for a free 30 minute chat. Independent, commission-free.