The problem isn't primarily the cost of babies, it's primarily creeping credentialism. Women are fertile from 18 to 40 (legally and safely). If the years to 28

The problem isn't primarily the cost of babies, it's primarily creeping credentialism. Women are fertile from 18 to 40 (legally and safely). If the years to 28 are taken up with getting credentials (degrees and post-grad quals) and then from 28 to 34 or so establishing a career and forming a household, the're isn't much time left to have babies. And the thirties are much lower fertility than the teens and twenties biologically speaking. Credentialism and housing costs. Not direct childcare costs. Housing is a zero-sum Red Queen race. Increase someone's income, they'll want to live in a "better" neighborhood so the time taken to form a household is the same or longer. TLDR: the problem is not lack of money but lack of time.