An Unpopular Opinion


I know what you're thinking. Before you close this tab or fire off an angry comment, hear me out. I've been on both sides of this equation—I've donated breastmilk, I've seen the desperation in parents' eyes when they can't produce enough, and I've watched formula prices skyrocket to absurd levels. And I'm here to say something that might make you uncomfortable: breastmilk shouldn't be free.

The Problem with "Liquid Gold"


We call breastmilk "liquid gold" with a wink and a smile, acknowledging its incredible value while simultaneously expecting women to give it away for nothing. Meanwhile, formula companies charge premium prices for a product that, while nutritious, is literally manufactured in factories. The cognitive dissonance is staggering.


A can of premium formula can cost $30-50 and lasts maybe a week. Over a year, that's thousands of dollars. Yet we expect mothers to pump, store, and donate their milk—a biological product that requires their time, energy, calories, and physical labor—for free. We've normalized the idea that women's bodily production should be charitable while corporations profit enormously from the alternative.

The Hidden Costs Nobody Talks About


Producing breastmilk isn't free, even if we pretend it is. Consider what goes into it:


Time: Pumping sessions take 20-30 minutes, multiple times a day. That's hours of a mother's life spent attached to a machine.

Equipment: Quality pumps cost hundreds of dollars. Storage bags, bottles, cleaning supplies—it all adds up.


Physical toll: Producing milk requires extra calories (around 500 per day), increased water intake, and can be physically uncomfortable or painful.


Opportunity cost: Time spent pumping is time not spent working, sleeping, or caring for other children.


When we treat breastmilk as something that should be freely given, we're essentially saying all of this labor is worthless. We're saying a mother's time, effort, and bodily resources have no monetary value.

The Oversupply Myth


Let's address the elephant in the room: the assumption that women with oversupply are swimming in extra milk with nothing better to do than share it. This couldn't be further from the truth.


Here's what people don't understand about oversupply—having "more than enough" doesn't mean we're pumping for leisure. Most of us actively dislike pumping. It's not the sweet, bonding experience that nursing can be. It's mechanical, time-consuming, and isolating. Every exclusively pumping mom I know has the same dream: to build up enough of a freezer stash that we can stop pumping before our baby stops needing milk. We call it "feeding to the freezer," and it's a race against time.


When you have even a modest oversupply, you're not thinking "oh good, extra milk to give away." You're thinking "maybe if I pump enough now, I can reclaim my body and my time in six months instead of twelve." You're planning your exit strategy while you're still in the thick of it. Every ounce that goes into storage bags represents a future day of freedom, a future evening where you're not hooked up to a machine while your family eats dinner without you.

The expectation that women with oversupply should donate because they "have more than enough" fundamentally misunderstands what we're doing. We're not producing excess out of abundance—we're producing extra out of necessity, banking against the future, working toward the day we can stop. Yes, many of us still donate because we're compassionate and we understand the struggle. But let's be clear: it's still our time. It's still our labor. It's still a sacrifice of our own goals and comfort.


When someone with oversupply donates milk, they're not giving away their excess. They're giving away their freedom date. They're extending their sentence on the pump. And we really need to start acknowledging that.

The Equity Argument


Here's where it gets really uncomfortable: who can afford to donate breastmilk for free? Typically, women who have the time, resources, and privilege to produce excess milk. Women working multiple jobs, single mothers struggling to make ends meet, those without access to hospital-grade pumps—they're already disadvantaged.


If breastmilk had recognized monetary value, it could provide income to mothers who need it. It could be a legitimate side income for stay-at-home parents. It could help offset the astronomical costs of raising children. Instead, we've created a system where only those who can afford to give it away do so, while everyone else either buys expensive formula or goes without.

What Compensation Would Actually Mean


I'm not suggesting we create a free-for-all market. But imagine a regulated system where:


Donors are fairly compensated for their time and effort

Milk banks can operate sustainably without relying entirely on charity

Quality standards are maintained through proper compensation for screening and processing

Parents who need donated milk can access it through insurance or assistance programs, just like they might access formula through WIC


We already pay for plasma donation, egg donation, and surrogacy. We compensate people for their biological contributions in numerous medical contexts. Why is breastmilk the exception?


The Formula Industry Loves This Status Quo


Here's an uncomfortable truth: formula companies benefit enormously from breastmilk being "free." As long as donated milk is positioned as charity rather than a legitimate product, formula remains the primary commercial alternative. There's no competitive pricing pressure. They can charge whatever the market will bear because the alternative is hoping someone will give you their milk out of the goodness of their heart.


If breastmilk had recognized market value, it might actually drive formula prices down through competition. It might force formula companies to justify their markup. It might create an actual economic incentive for the kind of infrastructure that would make donated milk more accessible.


The Bottom Line


I'm not saying every nursing mother should charge their baby for milk. I'm saying that when we produce excess milk for others, that labor has value and should be recognized as such. When formula costs a small fortune, we need to ask why the biological original is expected to be free.


Treating breastmilk as a commodity might feel wrong because we're so conditioned to see women's reproductive labor as something that should be given freely. But that conditioning is part of the problem. Until we recognize the true value of breastmilk—in dollar terms, not just platitudes—we'll continue to have a system that exploits maternal labor while corporations profit.


Maybe it's time to put our money where our mouth is. If it's really liquid gold, let's treat it that way.