Grandma Sues Absent Parents 140K RMB for “Grandson Caretaking Fee”

Grandparents taking on the role of the main caretaker of young children seems to be quite normal in China, considering a lot of parents especially in the rural area can’t find reasonably paid job in local market and are forced to work in bigger cities in order to make a living. Some parents even leave their newborn baby with their grandparents until they are adults and are only able to visit during public holidays. This “tradition” has been going on for generations until recently Grandma Wang from Sichuan Mianyang voiced her opinion and won a lawsuit against the absent parents asking for 140k RMB “grandson caretaking fee”. As a result of the court decision, the absent parents were ordered to pay 70k RMB to Grandma Wang.

During an interview, Grandma Wang told the journalist that her grandson is 9 years old now and she has been exclusively taking care of him ever since he stopped breastfeeding. All the expenses up until now, including living expenses, medical expenses, and education expenses were all paid by her. Only, all her understanding and hard work didn’t pay off the way she expected. The young couple decided to file for divorce earlier in April. The devastated lady finally decided to take the matter into her own hand and filed a lawsuit against the young parents asking for compensation. As a result, the court ordered the young couple to pay 70k RMB for caretaking their son all these years.

September 17th, the judge who was responsible for the case said: “It is quite common for the older generation to take care of their grandchildren while young parents work in other cities, especially in rural China. However, the minimum requirements for these parents are to support all the relevant expenses. After all, grandparents like Grandma Wang has no responsibility to raise or act as the main caretaker of the young child.

After this report was released, the hashtag #grandparentschargecaretakingfee soon became the #1 topic on social media discussion boards. Chinese netizens are debating if grandparents should be taking care of the younger generation and should they be paid for that.

Many netizens believe that the grandparents deserve to enjoy their own life and it is not their responsibility to raise their grandchild.

Another popular belief is, grandparents should be paid for their work. They may not want it but it would still be a nice gesture to offer which also shows your appreciation. A grandparent should not be young couple’s free babysitter solution.

More comments:

快乐的小小芋头:

Grandparents should stop helping young parents to “release their pressure” and take care of everything in the family. Having a child and raise the child is such a natural thing which as a parent it is a shame not to experience it. It binds the family together.

so so:

Why do I feel this is a conspiracy against her daughter in-law, so she can get more money from her once they divorce?

文亮哥哥:

She deserves it! Her daughter in-law should have paid monthly from the start anyway.

似水流年:

What, so it is not enough for her to raise you and now she has to raise your kid too?

Caspar_輝児_

I support the grandma! Young couples now should be more responsible towards their own child.

海苔君儿:

After getting married, there comes the never-ending question: “when are you going to have a baby?”. After guilting young couples to have a child when they are not ready, while offering to take care of the baby, now asking for compensation? Sure, in this case, the wife should ask for a full custody of the child and change his family name.

快到我碗里来洪基欧巴:

She obviously took the role willingly. Otherwise, she could have refused from the start.

尼鸭妮鸭:

I don’t plan on asking any of our parents to help. So, don’t nobody dare to ask us to have a child when we are not equipped to have one!