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The financial planning bit is meant to come before one has a list of expenses to "figure out" (like home+leased car+children).
by atatatat 5y ago
The financial planning bit is meant to come before one has a list of expenses to "figure out" (like home+leased car+children).
- UncleMeat 5y ago"Just don't have kids" is, IMO, one of the most incredibly insensitive approaches to this problem. It reminds me of all the people telling gay people to "just don't have a relationship". Having an entire class of people who work hard but are too poor to raise children is a failure of society - not a failure of financial planning.
- refurb 5y agoNo. Not raising kids in poverty is a matter of social responsibility. I would also argue that most people don’t want kids until they have a certain level of financial security.. That’s why family planning was so successful in decreasing birth rates.
- baq 5y agoSo what do you recommend to people who are in a poverty cycle but want to feel they’re free humans, not economic slaves?
- mcguire 5y agoYou mean they're poor and they think they're real human beings!? /s
- baq 5y agoI know people to whom the /s doesn't apply...
- godfreyantonell 5y agoSad but true.
- atatatat 5y agoRun, don't walk, to a farm community, and away from expensive fancy cities.
- refurb 5y agoThat’s a loaded question if I’ve ever heard one. Having a companion animal is also something a free human does. Should we tell people to get pets they can’t take care of? You premise that people are owed the opportunity to have children is a silly one. It’s not the parent that is the priority but the child.
- baq 5y agoI don't see why it is silly. I believe an opportunity to have children is an opportunity to have a purpose (not the purpose, note). I'm not saying that people who can't support children should have them - I'm saying that the society (i.e. other people) should help individuals to find their purpose. If making money and being rich is it for some, fine, no issue with that.
- ixacto 5y agoSterilization is usually covered by health insurance. What we are talking about here is having kids when you can’t afford them. This is mostly due to a nation-wide lack of education on the subject and rising cost of living. It does not make sense to have kids before having a stable job/house/car. Adoption/abortion is a much better option at that point, as politically incorrect to say your whole life and income-generating capacity will be ruined. This country has so much opportunity and no one seems to take advantage of it, it is very strange. I filled out the fafsa and had to get tax returns from my parents because they were poor immigrants, spammed a bunch of local organizations to get scholarships. This was not easy but it was taking personal responsibility for my situation and I managed to graduate debt-free. Contrast that to the predatory-lenders (colleges) that let 18 year olds take out 50k in student loans, which can and will perpetuate the cycle of intergenerational poverty, but for some reason that isn’t really talked about because the reality is that not all college degrees are remotely equal.
- clownpenis_fart 5y agowish your parents took advantage of that
- atatatat 5y agoSorry — everyone unfortunately does not have the human right to have a family of 5 in Manhattan. Everyone does (IMO) have the human right to live off of the land without destroying it permanently for the next family.
- throwaway3699 5y agoChildren are not a luxury product like a sports car or yacht. They are a basic function of human life.
- gruez 5y agoAll the kid free couples out there beg to differ.
- hnfong 5y agoIt may be optional for individuals, but as a society, if a significant portion of people cannot afford to have children, that society will go "extinct" very quickly.
- atatatat 5y agoYes, humans being too sparse is headline news weekly.
- sofixa 5y agoWith regards to developed countries? It actually makes the news occasionally.
- c22 5y agoThere are 8 billion people on the planet, but if we stop having kids the situation is unlikely to sustain itself for more than 100 years or so (just stopping for 40 or 50 years is long enough to pass the point no return).
- baq 5y agoWrong. There are people who chose to not have kids and don’t deny that. They chose to give up this part of humanity on their own. Other people probably rationalize this differently because they can’t admit to themselves they’ve given up anything.
- 5y ago
- teachingassist 5y agoWhere are you supposed to live meanwhile?
- dang 5y agoPlease don't start flamewars on HN. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27246064 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27246064.