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I have elementary school age kids, so I know lots of parents. Anecdotally, there is a big jump between having two kids and having more than two. I've had a lot

I have elementary school age kids, so I know lots of parents. Anecdotally, there is a big jump between having two kids and having more than two. I've had a lot of conversations with friends on their third pregnancy about having to upgrade to a bigger car because with the size of car seats, you can't fit three of them in one row of a typical sedan. And I've likewise had conversations with parents who decided (like my wife and I did) to stop at two, and many of the reasons are fundamentally about logistics and resources. Transportation is a real component of that. If you take a step back, it does make sense. The difference between zero kids and one is a major qualititative lifestyle change. It's the transition from parent to non-parent. It means not easily going out at night, schooling, etc. Everything changes. The transition from one to two kids is a qualitative change for the kid because it means going from no siblings to siblings. That transitively makes it somewhat of a qualitative change for parents. It means the kids always have a playmate and someone their age on vacations. But for parents, it's mostly a change in degree. More work, more cost, more time parenting, but the overall lifestyle is basically unchanged. The transition from two to three is really just quantitative. 33% more space in the house for sleeping, 33% more food costs, 33% more car space for transportation, etc. So the decision about when to stop is mostly just "how much of this experience do you want?" The transportation overhead here in the US where you do a lot of driving is a pretty big piece of that.

ashtonkem 6y ago
I absolutely buy the step-wise argument, especially for housing, but I do not buy it for cars. Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids (or no kids). The idea that car size is a meaningful barrier to the number of children one has, especially compared to housing and education costs, simply does not pass the sniff test to me. From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. All of which have been growing much more rapidly than the cost of cars or gasoline.
- thrower123 6y ago
  Even in a full-size SUV, you can't fit three car seats in one row of the back seats. Combine that with requirements to keep kids in various car seats and booster seats until they hit arbitrary age and weight limits, which stretch out longer and longer all the time, and it's still a problem.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    Here is a list of car seats that'll fit 3 across in a F-150. https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/3-across-installations-f-150/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/3-across-installations-... Several on that list will fit children up to 57-62" in height and up to 120lbs. This (https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/diono-radian-r120-review/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/diono-radian-r120-revie...) seat will fit 3 across in my Subaru Forester, a Honda CRV, or a Fiat 500L, and support a kid up to 57" tall and 120lbs in weight. It might be more convenient to have a three row SUV with three kids, but the idea that you can't fit 3 seats in these cars is nonsense.
- simmonmt 6y ago
  It's probably a mistake to put "SUVs and trucks" all in one bucket. Can you even fit a third car seat in a crew cab pickup, assuming two adults in the front? See https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/the-rise-of-the-crossover-the-segment-thats-really-driving-the-auto-industrys-sales/ https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/the-rise-of-th... That massive green chunk is for crossovers, which typically have space for two adults and two car seats. Fitting a third means graduating to a full-size SUV (or minivan), which means a significantly more expensive vehicle (assuming similar trim levels, etc).
  - cstejerean 6y ago
    I’ve never tried but I’d be shocked if I couldn’t easily get 3 car seats across into my F350. The rear bench is much wider and can fit 3 adults across comfortably.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids Having had two kids in the age where they needed large car seats, trucks are no help at all and even fairly decent sized SUVs don't handle more than two well. Car seats for young children are a significant issue, and I suspect almost anyone whose had two or more children under the current safety regime would both recognize that fact and likely consider it before intentionally having a third. > From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. Young children don't necessarily have a big impact on housing costs (they can share some easily), often because of the structure of health insurance costs don't have much impact on healthcare costs after the first, and education costs are largely deferred if you aren't going private/homeschool. Day care costs / career impacts are probably more significant than any of those given the frequency of two-working-parent families, but car transportation logistics are quite palpable. (“Source”, have two kids under 5.)
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    > Having had two kids in the age where they needed large car seats, trucks are no help at all and even fairly decent sized SUVs don't handle more than two well. Nonsense. They don't fit your seats maybe, but that's not the same as it not being possible. 15 seconds of Googling finds tons of lists with car seats that'll fit 3 across, including tests for a Honda Civic. Some on the list include convertible ones that'll work up to 120lbs. Bigger SUVs might be more convenient, especially when loading and unloading, but the idea that you can't fit three car seats into a larger vehicle is simply not grounded in reality. > Young children don't necessarily have a big impact on housing costs (they can share some easily), often because of the structure of health insurance costs don't have much impact on healthcare costs after the first, and education costs are largely deferred if you aren't going private/homeschool. Day care costs / career impacts are probably more significant than any of those given the frequency of two-working-parent families, but car transportation logistics are quite palpable. My understanding, at least from people I know with 3 or more children, is that daycare and career costs dominate, depending on your location. All my colleagues had to decide between paying out the nose for city daycare, punching an even longer gap in someone's career (obviously reducing earnings), or simply not having a third. Well, except for that one colleague who had five. According to him logistics got very expensive very quickly. Even "cheap" flights for a family of seven hits the $1K mark very quickly.
- munificent 6y ago
  > Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids (or no kids). Trucks are a mostly useless metric here. Many of those are work trucks, and most won't fit car seats for three kids. While Americans buy lots of SUVs, many Americans do not have one, and for those, transporting three kids is indeed a challenge. > From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. Housing definitely comes into play, but I don't think the other two end up being major factors in the decision because they are so far out. In the US, you literally cannot leave the hospital with your baby if you don't have adequate transportation and an approved car seat. So Americans are made acutely aware that they need to have a transportation solution for their family right now before choosing to have a baby. Healthcare is a non-issue for many because their employer-provided insurance covers as many kids as they have. Education is somewhat far down the road and fairly fungible so it's less likely to be a showstopper.
drfuchs 6y ago
"Going from two kids to three, you have to switch from one-on-one to zone defense."
- _carbyau_ 6y ago
  :-) I only have one. And we think we'll have a second and leave it at that. Partly for the reason of not wanting to be outnumbered. But also partly from a social/environmental point. Two kids means we replace ourselves when we die.
  - mensetmanusman 6y ago
    But you don’t replace your bachelor uncle, which is why on average the population replacement rate is greater than 2. :)
    - _carbyau_ 6y ago
      Yeah. But the population has to stop growing sometime. And could do with coming down a bit. We take care of ourselves, let others do the same. If they choose NOT to have kids, then the numbers come down.
arwhatever 6y ago
> The transition from one to two kids is a qualitative change for the kid because it means going from no siblings to siblings. That transitively makes it somewhat of a qualitative change for parents. It means the kids always have a playmate and someone their age on vacations. ... Or fightmates, as my mother herself warned me. :-)
lucretian 6y ago
> The transition from two to three is really just quantitative. not from the perspective of the women who bear the health risk.

ashtonkem 6y ago

I absolutely buy the step-wise argument, especially for housing, but I do not buy it for cars. Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids (or no kids). The idea that car size is a meaningful barrier to the number of children one has, especially compared to housing and education costs, simply does not pass the sniff test to me. From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. All of which have been growing much more rapidly than the cost of cars or gasoline.

thrower123 6y ago
Even in a full-size SUV, you can't fit three car seats in one row of the back seats. Combine that with requirements to keep kids in various car seats and booster seats until they hit arbitrary age and weight limits, which stretch out longer and longer all the time, and it's still a problem.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  Here is a list of car seats that'll fit 3 across in a F-150. https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/3-across-installations-f-150/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/3-across-installations-... Several on that list will fit children up to 57-62" in height and up to 120lbs. This (https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/diono-radian-r120-review/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/diono-radian-r120-revie...) seat will fit 3 across in my Subaru Forester, a Honda CRV, or a Fiat 500L, and support a kid up to 57" tall and 120lbs in weight. It might be more convenient to have a three row SUV with three kids, but the idea that you can't fit 3 seats in these cars is nonsense.
simmonmt 6y ago
It's probably a mistake to put "SUVs and trucks" all in one bucket. Can you even fit a third car seat in a crew cab pickup, assuming two adults in the front? See https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/the-rise-of-the-crossover-the-segment-thats-really-driving-the-auto-industrys-sales/ https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/the-rise-of-th... That massive green chunk is for crossovers, which typically have space for two adults and two car seats. Fitting a third means graduating to a full-size SUV (or minivan), which means a significantly more expensive vehicle (assuming similar trim levels, etc).
- cstejerean 6y ago
  I’ve never tried but I’d be shocked if I couldn’t easily get 3 car seats across into my F350. The rear bench is much wider and can fit 3 adults across comfortably.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids Having had two kids in the age where they needed large car seats, trucks are no help at all and even fairly decent sized SUVs don't handle more than two well. Car seats for young children are a significant issue, and I suspect almost anyone whose had two or more children under the current safety regime would both recognize that fact and likely consider it before intentionally having a third. > From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. Young children don't necessarily have a big impact on housing costs (they can share some easily), often because of the structure of health insurance costs don't have much impact on healthcare costs after the first, and education costs are largely deferred if you aren't going private/homeschool. Day care costs / career impacts are probably more significant than any of those given the frequency of two-working-parent families, but car transportation logistics are quite palpable. (“Source”, have two kids under 5.)
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  > Having had two kids in the age where they needed large car seats, trucks are no help at all and even fairly decent sized SUVs don't handle more than two well. Nonsense. They don't fit your seats maybe, but that's not the same as it not being possible. 15 seconds of Googling finds tons of lists with car seats that'll fit 3 across, including tests for a Honda Civic. Some on the list include convertible ones that'll work up to 120lbs. Bigger SUVs might be more convenient, especially when loading and unloading, but the idea that you can't fit three car seats into a larger vehicle is simply not grounded in reality. > Young children don't necessarily have a big impact on housing costs (they can share some easily), often because of the structure of health insurance costs don't have much impact on healthcare costs after the first, and education costs are largely deferred if you aren't going private/homeschool. Day care costs / career impacts are probably more significant than any of those given the frequency of two-working-parent families, but car transportation logistics are quite palpable. My understanding, at least from people I know with 3 or more children, is that daycare and career costs dominate, depending on your location. All my colleagues had to decide between paying out the nose for city daycare, punching an even longer gap in someone's career (obviously reducing earnings), or simply not having a third. Well, except for that one colleague who had five. According to him logistics got very expensive very quickly. Even "cheap" flights for a family of seven hits the $1K mark very quickly.
munificent 6y ago
> Americans buy way more large SUVs and trucks than the rest of the world, even those with fewer than three kids (or no kids). Trucks are a mostly useless metric here. Many of those are work trucks, and most won't fit car seats for three kids. While Americans buy lots of SUVs, many Americans do not have one, and for those, transporting three kids is indeed a challenge. > From a pure financial standpoint, I'd look more to the cost of education, healthcare, and housing. Housing definitely comes into play, but I don't think the other two end up being major factors in the decision because they are so far out. In the US, you literally cannot leave the hospital with your baby if you don't have adequate transportation and an approved car seat. So Americans are made acutely aware that they need to have a transportation solution for their family right now before choosing to have a baby. Healthcare is a non-issue for many because their employer-provided insurance covers as many kids as they have. Education is somewhat far down the road and fairly fungible so it's less likely to be a showstopper.

drfuchs 6y ago

"Going from two kids to three, you have to switch from one-on-one to zone defense."

_carbyau_ 6y ago
:-) I only have one. And we think we'll have a second and leave it at that. Partly for the reason of not wanting to be outnumbered. But also partly from a social/environmental point. Two kids means we replace ourselves when we die.
- mensetmanusman 6y ago
  But you don’t replace your bachelor uncle, which is why on average the population replacement rate is greater than 2. :)
  - _carbyau_ 6y ago
    Yeah. But the population has to stop growing sometime. And could do with coming down a bit. We take care of ourselves, let others do the same. If they choose NOT to have kids, then the numbers come down.

arwhatever 6y ago

> The transition from one to two kids is a qualitative change for the kid because it means going from no siblings to siblings. That transitively makes it somewhat of a qualitative change for parents. It means the kids always have a playmate and someone their age on vacations. ... Or fightmates, as my mother herself warned me. :-)

lucretian 6y ago

> The transition from two to three is really just quantitative. not from the perspective of the women who bear the health risk.