The high cost of child care is well-documented. However, the cost born by parents who leave the workforce is less understood. The Center for American Progress developed a tool to highlight how families are affected economically when a parent leaves the workforce to become a full-time caregiver. When parents leave the workforce, they often assume that they are losing their annual wage. The reality is that when lost wage growth and lost retirement assets are taken into account, time out of the workforce costs much more than just an annual wage. This calculator shows total financial impact, including lost retirement assets and benefits, lost wage growth, and lost wages for the years that someone spends out of the workforce. (author abstract)