Adoption cost private vs foster?? opinions?

Question

if the price for adopting a child from foster care vs a private agency was the same..would most foster parents still do foster care?

Answer 1

It depends on their motivations involved. Research shows that successful foster parents choose to foster because they want to help the community and do something for families not as fortunate as themselves. Foster parents tend to be very selfless people and it is much more difficult process. I imagine some would choose private adoption, but those who are fostering for reasons of permanancy for children, etc. would probably continue to foster.

Answer 2

I had thought of adopting for many years.  I had no idea that foster care adoption was free, and my limited knowledge of the adoption process led me to believe that if I were to pursue adoption, I would somehow have to save up about twice as much as my annual income (at the time, it probably would have been three or four times my annual income).  When I found out that foster adoption was free, I completely FREAKED, and my husband and I spent the next two years talking about it, researching it, and making decisions.  We knew with absolute certainty that this was what we wanted to do.  We probably would never have pursued any other kind of adoption just because it doesn't fit with our vision of what we want our family to be.  I remember my first words upon talking to my husband, and both of us deciding this was the path we were meant to take:  "Let the rich people have the babies!"  (Keep in mind that at this time, I still had the mindset that "more deserving" parents (i.e. rich AP's) should get the babies of "less deserving", young mothers...y'all would have eaten me alive!).

So, I think the answer is no, people wouldn't probably want to adopt through foster care if it was as expensive.

I see you asked "would most foster parents still do foster care?", and I'm wondering if you mean to say that if people had to PAY to be foster parents, would they?  If that is what you're asking, I think no.  Most foster parents that I know of are far from rich, and they wouldn't be able to pay out of their own pockets in order to foster children.

Answer 3

I think a lot of people think that foster parents do so just for the money from the state, when in reality that money barely covers the need for a child.  True foster parents are wonderful people.

Answer 4

We didn't consider the costs of the adoption in our decision. We considered that we wanted to adopt children and that we wanted to adopt siblings....  We actually had no idea that adopting foster children was nearly free...

Our interest in adopting children from foster care was so that we could take care of children waiting in the USA for families and that we had what they needed in our life and home....

So...it would not have had any impact on our decision...

We actually could afford to adopt children any way or any place.... money isn't even a thought to us and never was... If the cost had been $100,000 dollars to adopt our children we would have written the check... As we believed children needed more then to be "housed".

We however had Zero interest in adopting an infant and wanted to adopt two children age 6-8ish much to my distress we were placed with a one-year old...which was quite the surprise....

As for Foster Parents.... many people DO NOT Foster with the intention of adopting children and the Good Foster Homes I know of provide Foster Care because they are interested in helping children....some do so for the pathetic paycheck but that is a whole different story....

Prior to 1996 Many states actually had laws that would NOT allow Foster Parents to Adopt children they cared for as this WAS considered to be a conflict of interest in the area of Reuinification plans.... Look forward to changes in this area as the reprocustions of Foster Parents doing so with only the intention of adopting a baby are really hurting the system....