4 ms·

It is not the fact that nobody needs them. It is rather that members of such societies delay this step (to an uncertain extent) due to having a large amount of

It is not the fact that nobody needs them. It is rather that members of such societies delay this step (to an uncertain extent) due to having a large amount of possible/alternative life choices, which sadly a negative consequence of such a blossoming society.

eli_gottlieb 11y ago
It's not that people delay having children, it's that society punishes having children. My fiancee's pregnant coworker was told (we live in the USA, unfortunately) that she would have six weeks of unpaid leave after giving birth, followed by two weeks of short-term disability insurance, and then she could return to work or lose her job. This is for a salaried, postdoctoral scientist at a biotechnology company. In a related matter, the same HR employee who explained that policy says that he opposes the very idea of paternity leave -- and he's a male homosexual. Likewise, the largest wage gap between men and women isn't actually a gap between men and women, it's a gap between men and mothers. It takes two incomes to support a household these days, and yet society punishes women for childbearing as if it only took one. What did they expect would happen under these conditions, that people would stop responding to economic incentives "because babies"?
- beachstartup 11y ago
  i'm a business owner operating on thin margins and no outside funding. why should i be forced to pay for leave if one of my employees decides to have a baby? what if i'm a small company that simply can't afford it?
- beachstartup 11y ago
  apparently all the benefits that exist in europe and asia still don't work, so i'm not really sure what your point is here, other than you want some free money for having a baby. society doesn't 'punish' you for having children, having children is simply an expense somebody has to pay for, and nobody wants to do it. you clearly don't want to pay the opportunity cost, as evidenced by your post, so what makes you think the employer wants to do it either? or the taxpayer?
  - lagudragu 11y ago
    His / her point is that de facto the industry takes a point of view biased on an economical perspective towards the situation. (Your answer ironically does reflect this as well). The benefit of having children is to have a family and to, in a more biological sense, have offspring which ensures your dna remains within the society. Having a family takes time and enforcing a young parent (especially a person with such a background) to start working in a relative short amount of time is very taxing on their personal life. A better possible solution would be to let the young parent have the ability to work home for a couple days, rather than just giving the option to be fired.
  - eli_gottlieb 11y ago
    Let me brag a little bit. Myself and my fiancee don't have children yet. However, you may kinda want us in society's gene pool. After all, I've got a damned resilient immune system, she's wonderfully empathetic, and we're both ferociously clever and hardworking individuals who valued our educations and actually want to contribute to society. Hell, we're even proud of paying our taxes, we both volunteer for things in our spare time, and we consider time spent on civic or community affairs to be well-spent. I'd be fine paying the "opportunity cost" myself, but you see, I'm not the one with the uterus. Really, if we could get by and support a kid on one income per couple, we could easily just make some sacrifices of Nice Things, but we can't. Yes, we actually are stuck between living as fiscally responsible adults in the Dual Income No Kids class, and the precarity of the so-called "middle class" nowadays, in which one layoff or unexpected medical emergency can throw the whole family into poverty. It's become: housing, children (with the entailed college funds, housing cost of good public schools, etc.), responsible preparation for a rainy day -- pick any two. Elizabeth Warren was lecturing people about this a decade ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GHg3GAeQ1Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GHg3GAeQ1Y
beachstartup 11y ago
i think "having other options" is a pretty good definition for "not need".

eli_gottlieb 11y ago

It's not that people delay having children, it's that society punishes having children. My fiancee's pregnant coworker was told (we live in the USA, unfortunately) that she would have six weeks of unpaid leave after giving birth, followed by two weeks of short-term disability insurance, and then she could return to work or lose her job. This is for a salaried, postdoctoral scientist at a biotechnology company. In a related matter, the same HR employee who explained that policy says that he opposes the very idea of paternity leave -- and he's a male homosexual. Likewise, the largest wage gap between men and women isn't actually a gap between men and women, it's a gap between men and mothers. It takes two incomes to support a household these days, and yet society punishes women for childbearing as if it only took one. What did they expect would happen under these conditions, that people would stop responding to economic incentives "because babies"?

beachstartup 11y ago
i'm a business owner operating on thin margins and no outside funding. why should i be forced to pay for leave if one of my employees decides to have a baby? what if i'm a small company that simply can't afford it?
beachstartup 11y ago
apparently all the benefits that exist in europe and asia still don't work, so i'm not really sure what your point is here, other than you want some free money for having a baby. society doesn't 'punish' you for having children, having children is simply an expense somebody has to pay for, and nobody wants to do it. you clearly don't want to pay the opportunity cost, as evidenced by your post, so what makes you think the employer wants to do it either? or the taxpayer?
- lagudragu 11y ago
  His / her point is that de facto the industry takes a point of view biased on an economical perspective towards the situation. (Your answer ironically does reflect this as well). The benefit of having children is to have a family and to, in a more biological sense, have offspring which ensures your dna remains within the society. Having a family takes time and enforcing a young parent (especially a person with such a background) to start working in a relative short amount of time is very taxing on their personal life. A better possible solution would be to let the young parent have the ability to work home for a couple days, rather than just giving the option to be fired.
- eli_gottlieb 11y ago
  Let me brag a little bit. Myself and my fiancee don't have children yet. However, you may kinda want us in society's gene pool. After all, I've got a damned resilient immune system, she's wonderfully empathetic, and we're both ferociously clever and hardworking individuals who valued our educations and actually want to contribute to society. Hell, we're even proud of paying our taxes, we both volunteer for things in our spare time, and we consider time spent on civic or community affairs to be well-spent. I'd be fine paying the "opportunity cost" myself, but you see, I'm not the one with the uterus. Really, if we could get by and support a kid on one income per couple, we could easily just make some sacrifices of Nice Things, but we can't. Yes, we actually are stuck between living as fiscally responsible adults in the Dual Income No Kids class, and the precarity of the so-called "middle class" nowadays, in which one layoff or unexpected medical emergency can throw the whole family into poverty. It's become: housing, children (with the entailed college funds, housing cost of good public schools, etc.), responsible preparation for a rainy day -- pick any two. Elizabeth Warren was lecturing people about this a decade ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GHg3GAeQ1Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GHg3GAeQ1Y

beachstartup 11y ago

i think "having other options" is a pretty good definition for "not need".