Stephanie Kizer’s guide: Wished: A Toddler’s Private Assistant. Cowl design by Jillian Rahn/Sourcebooks.
Courtesy: Stephanie Kizer
Stephanie Kizer got here to New York in 2014 as a recent faculty graduate hoping to change into a screenwriter. As a substitute, she spent the subsequent seven years as nanny for wealthy households.
Kiser is new memoirs“Wished: A Toddler’s Private Assistant: How the Nanny for the 1% Taught Me the Myths of Equality, Motherhood, and Upward Mobility in America,” particulars her sudden profession detour.
Her seven years as a nanny noticed her escort a shopper’s daughter to $500-a-lesson literacy tutors on the Higher East Facet, drive Porsches and Mercedes for errands, and live-in with a household residence within the Hamptons in the course of the Covid-19 pandemic. Her shoppers embody households of dynastic wealth in addition to these in high-paying jobs corresponding to docs and attorneys.
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Kiser’s first babysitting job paid her $20 an hour, way over the $14 an hour she estimates she would make as a short-term manufacturing assistant. As well as, she usually needed to work time beyond regulation.
“It often ended up being about $1,000 every week with every part I did,” Kiser mentioned.
This primary job opened doorways to increased paying positions via nanny businesses. In Kiser’s final 12 months as a nanny in the course of the pandemic, she estimates she took residence about $110,000.
“Though I had the least respectable job of my associates, I positively made essentially the most,” mentioned Kizer, now 32 and dealing at an promoting expertise firm in New York.
CNBC spoke with Kiser about among the monetary classes she discovered throughout her time as a nanny, and why she finally left the position.
(This interview has been edited and shortened for readability).
No job progress prospects: ‘I used to be very sedentary’
Scarlett Johansson on location for The Nanny Diaries on Could 1, 2006 on the Higher East Facet in New York, New York, United States.
James Devaney | Wireimage | Getty Pictures
Ana Teresa Sola: After I first noticed this guide, I considered The Nanny Diaries, a novel printed within the early 2000s after which tailored into a movie. What made you resolve to show your story right into a memoir as an alternative of a novel?
Stephanie Kizer: I learn The Nanny Diaries once I began my first job. It positively hit residence on the time, however I felt prefer it was one thing of a satire. I did not need to insult both the wealthy or the poor as a result of I’ve folks on either side that I really like very a lot.
The intention of my guide was to make a social commentary. I hoped that I may bridge that understanding between the 2 sides just a little bit, as a result of there’s this concept that poor folks simply do not work sufficient and wealthy persons are simply inherently dangerous.
I do not suppose that is essentially true, however I feel that the people who find themselves wealthy, who rent these individuals who actually need these jobs, have the privilege and the chance to both make somebody’s life higher or dangerous.
The nanny contract is vital as a result of there isn’t any HR.
ATS: You point out that you simply could not afford to work professionally in New York as a result of the pay was a lot lower than what you have been getting as a nanny. Did you are feeling trapped?
UK: When my final boss learn this guide, she felt unhappy and mentioned, “I did not know you have been so sad whereas doing the job.” I mentioned, “No, I wasn’t sad whereas doing the job. I cherished your youngsters a lot, however this wasn’t the job I needed.
I felt trapped. I felt like there was nothing else I may do and it bought just a little worse as time went on.
All my associates grew up in these jobs and gained extra expertise on their resumes, however I did not. I used to be very nonetheless on this place.
It wasn’t an excellent feeling to really feel like there was nothing else I may do. I’ve one other job now and that is the primary 12 months I’ve made greater than I did as a nanny, which is nice, however the first two years after nannying have been positively very tough financially, making this variation.
“No HR … the contract is absolutely all you may have”
ATS: A household provided you a wage of $125,000, plus full well being and dental, a month-to-month subway go, and an annual bonus. However you went with one other household for much less pay. You talked about you have been ready for a contract. Why is that this so vital in enterprise?
UK: The nanny contract is vital as a result of there aren’t any human sources; there aren’t any legal guidelines to guard you. Your employers are solely chargeable for every part and so they decide every part. [New York State does have a “Domestic Workers Bill of Rights” with a few protections.]
At a daily job, you’ll be able to say to your self, “I’ve already labored 60 hours this week and I am not going to work any extra.” You may’t do this right here [with a nanny position.]
The contract actually is all you may have and never getting it was actually regarding. You have been going to be this household’s nanny all of your life. And I used to be leaving jobs the place that was actually laborious, I felt like I wasn’t actually human, and I did not need to take a job the place that was the case.
Stephanie Kizer’s guide: Wished: A Toddler’s Private Assistant. Cowl design by Jillian Rahn/Sourcebooks.
Courtesy: Stephanie Kizer
ATS: Are you able to describe the variations between an Au Pair and a Nanny?
UK: An au pair is allowed to work a sure variety of hours, for instance as much as 30 hours every week or 40 hours every week, however there’s a clear restrict as they usually work for an company. The company that despatched them made it very clear to you that they cannot do greater than that.
They get a really small stipend, however they get particular lodging, possibly they’ve their very own room. They’ve paid meals, transport. An au pair has extra issues to do to verify she would not reap the benefits of them. Nannies usually haven’t got these protections.
The nannies who come from businesses are just a little extra protected and often they get contracts. However these are the most effective of the most effective nannies; these are profession nannies who’ve been doing this for 50 years; they’ve raised so many youngsters and have superb testimonials. Or it is a younger nanny who simply bought right here after graduating from a terrific college and has about 10 abilities to supply. So it is a luxurious to be trustworthy.
ATS: You additionally describe the uncertainty related to this job. It looks like a nanny job might have a low barrier to entry, with the potential for wage progress, however there are all these different dangers.
UK: I do know nannies who bought pregnant and instructed their boss. No “We’ll pay you three months of maternity depart.” no, “We’ll allow you to go on the eighth month so you’ll be able to relaxation.” There may be none of that.
You may by no means actually really feel safe in a job. You probably have a medical emergency if one thing goes incorrect – I am positive there are exceptions, however for essentially the most half you are simply out of luck. It is a actually dangerous profession in that sense.
“That is how they’re wealthy”
ATS: In line with the Pew Analysis Middle, about 47 p.c of childless adults below 50 in 2023 mentioned they have been unlikely to ever have youngsters. What would this imply for nannies?
UK: I’m wondering if this is applicable to the folks I write about. I’m wondering if this can be a decline for them that we are going to see or if they’re some form of outlier.
If that’s the case, I feel this can be a actually significant issue. There are lots of people in New York who come right here and so they want one thing to babysit, possibly that is their job after work and that is how they do it. Or there are people who find themselves undocumented who’re actually restricted in what they’ll do, and a variety of occasions housekeeping and nannying is the one possibility.
ATS: On the finish of the guide, you write that you simply acquired a proposal to be a private assistant to a CEO with a wage of $90,000 and advantages. Was that start line beneath what you have been incomes as a nanny on the time?
UK: For positive. As a nanny I had made $110,000… So it was a major discount.
I needed to work very quick and really laborious to get promoted. I used to be a private assistant and I used to be an government assistant, I switched corporations final July and have become a senior assistant and that was the position the place I lastly earned greater than I did as a nanny. And I do not suppose I may have accomplished this, made this transition, if my scholar mortgage funds hadn’t been stopped due to Covid.
ATS: You write in your guide that some households present their wealth by having many youngsters. I’m curious to listen to extra about it.
UK: I take into consideration the place I used to be born and the place I come from, and each time there was a household that had 5 or 6 youngsters, it was form of like, “Nicely, that is sensible, as a result of they weren’t wealthy.” And you then come to New York and also you see somebody on Park Avenue, who has 5 or 6 youngsters, and it is like, “That is how they’re wealthy.”
Right here, if in case you have three youngsters, you begin sending them to preschool at $40,000 a 12 months, after which they go to those elite kindergarten via twelfth grade faculties which might be $60,000 a 12 months, and you then ship them at Harvard for 4 years.
And it is not even simply the tutoring, more often than not you ship three youngsters to this college, then rent a full-time nanny after they’ve personal guitar classes.
ATS: What would you say to girls of their 20s who have been in your footwear a couple of years in the past?
UK: Do issues in parallel. I do not suppose I might have been completely happy if I had solely been doing the nanny. I could not survive on writing alone, however I feel by doing that in parallel, issues labored out precisely as they have been speculated to for me.
Nanny was so vital to me as a result of not solely was I in a position to earn cash to stay, however it allowed me to get a basis. After I moved to New York, I had nothing. Now I’ve a totally furnished condominium, issues it’s essential to be a totally functioning grownup. I’ve a canine, I can care for him and I’ve a automotive. These are issues I would not be capable of do with out being a nanny.
