4 ms·

Anecdotally, most millenials I know who are waiting to start a family are doing it because they can't afford to, not by chose.

by throwaway2016a 10y ago

elmerfud 10y ago
All the comments show my point. These are the values that were taught by the boomers. Ask a boomer, were they ready for a family when they got one? No, but it was the thing to do, so they did it, made it work, and life was hard. Go back and look at the old childhood photos and you'll see what I mean. These people clearly weren't ready for kids in our modern sense of being ready. This is a quite complex subject, but the simple view is priorities. There is a priority of short term thinking with millennials focused around instant gratification. That's not to say that it's wrong but it is a priority which has and effect on how life plays out. An easy example of this is how everything is described as a "hack" and not a "grind". Boomers, whether they knew it or not, were more long term focused. Part of it was a function of the world of the time. You had to wait for the Sears catalogue to come in the mail. You don't have a credit card so you make layaway payments etc... You just had to focus farther out. They scarified a lot of short term and gained a long term benefit. Sadly most, including this article, equate education with motivation. It's not the same thing. Going to college because you don't know what to do next and mom says go doesn't mean that the education will give you a leg up in life.
- candiodari 10y ago
  Do you think a focus on instant gratification is anything new ? I mean you clearly do, but it seems such a weird point to make.
  - tmuir 10y ago
    The internet has shown us how wonderful instant access to the world's information can be, and we've decided that everything is better with internet. Its an extremely coherent point to make, in my opinion.
  - elmerfud 10y ago
    The focus on it isn't new, but the ability to realize it in a way never before is.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
aczerepinski 10y ago
Agreed. Pre-school costs $15k/year where I live. There are an awful lot of careers in which that would be a tough pill to swallow. Maybe one parent stays at home with the kid... but then you're a single income family and housing prices are no joke either.

Anecdotally, most millenials I know who are waiting to start a family are doing it because they can't afford to, not by chose.

elmerfud 10y ago

All the comments show my point. These are the values that were taught by the boomers. Ask a boomer, were they ready for a family when they got one? No, but it was the thing to do, so they did it, made it work, and life was hard. Go back and look at the old childhood photos and you'll see what I mean. These people clearly weren't ready for kids in our modern sense of being ready. This is a quite complex subject, but the simple view is priorities. There is a priority of short term thinking with millennials focused around instant gratification. That's not to say that it's wrong but it is a priority which has and effect on how life plays out. An easy example of this is how everything is described as a "hack" and not a "grind". Boomers, whether they knew it or not, were more long term focused. Part of it was a function of the world of the time. You had to wait for the Sears catalogue to come in the mail. You don't have a credit card so you make layaway payments etc... You just had to focus farther out. They scarified a lot of short term and gained a long term benefit. Sadly most, including this article, equate education with motivation. It's not the same thing. Going to college because you don't know what to do next and mom says go doesn't mean that the education will give you a leg up in life.

candiodari 10y ago
Do you think a focus on instant gratification is anything new ? I mean you clearly do, but it seems such a weird point to make.
- tmuir 10y ago
  The internet has shown us how wonderful instant access to the world's information can be, and we've decided that everything is better with internet. Its an extremely coherent point to make, in my opinion.
- elmerfud 10y ago
  The focus on it isn't new, but the ability to realize it in a way never before is.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

aczerepinski 10y ago

Agreed. Pre-school costs $15k/year where I live. There are an awful lot of careers in which that would be a tough pill to swallow. Maybe one parent stays at home with the kid... but then you're a single income family and housing prices are no joke either.