As of November 26, 2008.
Current total out of pocket expense I paid for baby: $1,176.31
Current total out of pocket expense Thom paid for baby: $327.00 (includes bus trip to visit baby)
Current total medical charged amount of baby (includes mommy's hospital stuff): $34,302.46
*** - This is the amount of medical I would have had to pay, if not for insurance.
Approximate value of gifts to baby from friends, family, etc: $475.00
Total expense for baby, not including amount paid by insurance: $1,978.31
Total charges for baby, including medical: $35,843.77
Total expense for baby, including medical: $11,987.65
(keep in mind, insurance has contract for prices, HMO, so they paid less than actual charges. Approximately less than 1/3 of actual charges)
So, while non-insurance contributions from myself and others only totaled $1,978.31, had I not had insurance, the total would have been $35,843.77 since I, as an individual, do not have contracts with the doctors on how much I'll pay them for services.
Since little Joseph will be 12 weeks old tomorrow (Thanksgiving), I can safely say that he has cost $164.86 per week. That only includes items bought for him, not other things such as his portion of shelter, utilities, etc. As you "should" know, each person you add to the family raises costs of water, electric, etc. So, multiply that by 52, and you get $8,572.68 for a year. Obviously, this is not exact, because as the baby gets older, he will need more things. For example, he does not have a crib yet, so that will be a major purchase, plus Christmas presents. Plus, he'll grow out of his clothes, as he already has. Obviously, he can no longer wear his newborn outfits. It won't be long before he grows out of the 0-3 month outfits, maybe a week or two.
As a side note, had I been responsible for the entire medical bills, he would have cost $2,986.98 per week. Since that includes initial hospital billing, it's not feasible to calculate that for a year. However, if I did calculate for a year, the per week allotment would go down since I only calculated this according the 12 weeks he has blessed me with his presence. Okay, so, just for the hell of it.. I went ahead and calculated it... By adding what I would have paid for medical, if I didn't have insurance for the year, the total would be $824.52 per week for a year. Or... $42,875.14 for the first year for all costs, including non-medical stuff. Or... $3,572.93 per month.
Either today or tomorrow, I plan on categorizing the purchases and creating pie charts to show "where" the money is going. Maybe I can analyze the water bill to see how much of that can be attributed to the baby. That won't be so easy tho, but I can at least approximate. As for electricity, at the moment, the only possible portion that could be attributed to the baby at this point, would be the extra time the lights are on in the middle of night for feedings, so it's almost immeasurable. It won't be until he's older that I would actually be able to attribute electricity charges to him for things like plugged in electronics, extra TV time he might use, etc.
So, in closing, I hope that someone, somewhere, finds this bit of information at least a little useful. I find it rather interesting, and almost fun to track.
UPDATE: Here's the pie chart I promised.
