Over the years, I’ve read many tales of adoption, both here and elsewhere. But they uniformly say that adoption is very expensive. Now, I know that children are a significant expense anyway, but these were stories of people spending thousands before adopting the child, not after.
This does not compute. Surely it’s in the State’s interest to see that a child that’s up for adoption is adopted as quickly as possible? And impoverishing would-be parents isn’t exactly a good idea either, is it? Particularly when they’ve likely spent lots on fertility treatments.
I have never adopted a child but my aunt has adopted two. The costs for most people generally range from $5000 to $40000. That sounds like a lot but there are also a lot of people involved. There may be an official adoption agency, lawyers, as well as social workers and psychologists to make sure the child is going to a good home. If the child is coming from another country, there may be travel expenses for the family to meet the child and then another one to take him or her home. Those costs add up very quickly. Of course, you can adopt a family member child for much less than that.
Clearly I missed that, but I’d like to keep this GQ-worthy so this thread doesn’t get shat like that one.
I suppose we should distinguish between orphans who are wards of the state and private adoptions. In the latter case, surely it’s simply a matter for the two parties, with the State as a facilitator or keeper of the records? The former is slightly more complex, with the State owing the orphan a duty of care (because the orphan is a citizen) but otherwise similar. So where do these huge costs come in?
As Shagnesty said, there are a lot of people involved, and they need to be paid. First of all, the state won’t let just anybody adopt – you need to have a thorough background and psychological check. People who do those workups need to be paid. Then there are more checks – your financial state, the state of your home, are you ready to include a child in your household, etc.
And then there are the lawyers, which are usually involved to make sure that none of the state’s requirements have been forgotten, and to make sure that the paperwork is all filled out properly to ensure that the child’s parents are officially the adopting people.
And then the adoption agencies themselves – the people who try to find a child for you to adopt – ask for their own cut, if you go that route.
We had about 40 hours worth of a social workers time - assume that a loaded labor cost for a social worker with a Master’s degree is around $50 an hour (she doesn’t make that much - its the loaded cost). That right there is $2000. That was just the time we spent with her - it wasn’t the time she spent typing it up, going through our paperwork, reviewing our background checks.
We passed both a local police background check and an FBI background check - those are worth a couple of hundred dollars each.
We paid more than our own homestudy costs, because the agency that we worked with offers sliding scale fees and discounts for those willing to take special needs kids - those are partially funded by charging people who are looking for healthy infants and have six figure incomes a little more.
Additionally, there are the legal costs of adoption (its a legal process) and costs involved working with Homeland Security Immigration.
Our paperwork was sent to Korea. There were costs of processing in Korea as well, but the major costs on the Korea side are:
Birthmother care. The agency we worked with provided birthmother homes. Women waiting to give birth are allowed to live there. Living expenses and educational expenses are covered.
Medical care. Both pre-and-post natal. My son spent a month in a hospital (low birth weight).
Foster care. The remaining five months before he came home he was in a foster home. In Korea foster parents are paid for taking care of such children until permanent placement is made and all his expenses (formula, diapers) were covered.
Orphanage care for kids that aren’t adopted. Korea doesn’t adopt out all its children, and some remain in institutions long term. These institutions are funded by the adoptions of kids who do leave.
Travel fees. Airfare to and from Korea isn’t cheap.
For domestic adoptions, some states permit payment of birthmother expenses (some adoptive parents buy CARS and finance APARTMENTS for their birthmothers - and there is some reason to believe that a certain amount of unethical shakedown happens - I know, you are shocked). Usually bigger lawyers fees. Costs of advertising to find a birthmother.
For many international adoptions, there is also a certain amount of unethical corruption and graft in the business - bureaucrats who make a significant amount of their income in bribes - and the bribes need to be paid or the child doesn’t leave.
International adoptions are heavily scrutinized, and countries where the corruption gets bad are closed for adoption by the U.S. State Department - particularly if allegations of baby selling seem supportable.
I’ll add something - not all adoptions ARE expensive. My sister in law adopted a son years ago through private adoption. Total cost was less than $3k. Because they had a birthmother identified, they only needed to get a homestudy done and pay a lawyer. Because the birthmother had her own insurance, there weren’t any medical costs, and because the birthmother didn’t expect (or want) living expenses (which I think may be illegal to provide here in Minnesota anyway), there were no costs there. If you can find a private adoption quickly on your own, and find a licensed social worker to do your homestudy for cheap, and an attorney willing to to the paperwork pro-bono, it doesn’t have to be expensive.