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Stay-at-home wife worth a million bucks The Washington Post It's a good thing Dad doesn't have to give Mom a salary. He'd have to fork out $508,700 a year, according to a study by Fairfax, Va.-based Edelman Financial Services Inc. The study analyzed salary data supplied by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, trade groups, human resources organizations and staffing services for a number of the tasks a mother does throughout the year. The salary figure is based on 17 occupations that mothers typically perform and each job's median salary, including: Animal caretaker, $17,000. Executive chef, $40,000. General office clerk, $19,000. Registered nurse, $35,000. Child-care worker, $13,000. Psychologist, $29,000. Bus driver, $32,000. Ric Edelman, chairman of Edelman Financial Services, said this figure is still below what the actual income for a mom would be. "We're not including Social Security, 401(k) and other retirement benefits," he said. "Mom should be paid about a million a year." To be a stay-at-home mom is a decision that can't be based on finances, said Marian Gormley, public-relations director for Mothers at Home, a Vienna nonprofit group that supports at-home moms. The mothers who decide to stay at home "knew it would be a struggle (financially) but are determined to make it work," she said. One part of the study that alarmed Edelman and others was that the child-care worker salary of $13,000 is the second-lowest salary, just above housekeeper, at $9,000. "It's quite a commentary on our society that we pay dog walkers more than we pay child-care workers," Edelman said. "The reason the child-care-worker pay is so low is that they do for a living what women do for free at home," said Ellen Bravo, director of 9to5, a Milwaukee-based nonprofit organization for working women. "There is a lack of value for women's work." Today's Business Index Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA