5 ms·

Let me guess, it's because it's too expensive to have them.

RestlessMind 2y ago
Wrong guess, probably, given that it's the poor who have more kids than the rich - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_most_recent_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fer...
mlinhares 2y ago
* too expensive; * not enough daycare even if you do have money; * not enough space at home; * cities that are not made for parents and small kids; * atomized communities with very little help;
- lumost 2y ago
  The last one can be brutal. It's tough to maintain friendships with people who don't have kids, it's doubly tough to form friendships with new people who have kids. Although it's mildly easier to build acquaintances.
  - D13Fd 2y ago
    This is so true. It's socially isolating. We don't have the support structures we had even back when I was a kid, let alone 20 or 40 years before that, when society was really built around families having kids. I can only wonder what it will be like in another 20 years, when my children are grown up.
  - mlinhares 2y ago
    While unfortunate we were able to make friends with other people with kids so there's some sharing of responsibility (send receive kids at home when they need to be watched over) but this doesn't seem to be the norm here. Feels like most people are raising their kids by themselves.
  - kilolima 2y ago
    Because people with kids won't stop talking about how wonderful their kids are.
- tonymet 2y ago
  it's always been more expensive. daycare traditionally was only for aristocrats. multigenerational families lived in smaller apartments and cabins than single people do today. Cities used to be filled with sewage, horses and smoke. I'll concede the point on communities and I think that's a bigger contributor than economics.
  - mlinhares 2y ago
    Couldn't care less about what people did or lived like 100 years ago. I live today and I'm either going to provide my kids a good live and have a good life myself or not have kids. I don't need to have kids for them to be my labor, that's not how this works anymore.
    - tonymet 2y ago
      then it's not about economics it's something else
    - locococo 2y ago
      agree, the argument that the economy needs more warm bodies is not exactly inspirational.
      - tonymet 2y ago
        you're right, people aren't having kids because they are not inspired. that is one of the main reasons. but that's not economics, it's philosophical and theological
    - darth_avocado 2y ago
      Exactly. Even 50 years ago, you could not even go to the high school and afford a middle class lifestyle for your kids. Not the case anymore. There’s no point comparing today with history.
  - taylodl 2y ago
    You don't have to go back to the 19th century to make your point things are different today. Just go back to the 20th century - what did the Boomers do? - They had latchkey children - no daycare required! - "Free range" children was a thing and nobody got arrested for it! - There were such things as "Block Parents", people in the neighborhood who looked out for all the kids. Obviously this was before "stranger danger." - Everybody looked after everybody else's kids, even in tenement buildings. - People lived close to where the grew up and generally had relatives nearby to help out when all of the above failed. Nowadays, most of this is gone. In short, in just a mere 40 to 50 years, the cost of having children has skyrocketed. Add in the cost-of-living expenses have skyrocketed for younger people and you get the result that fewer people are having children and those who are having children are having them much later.
- darth_avocado 2y ago
  * too expensive * not enough daycare even if you do have money - again too expensive to hire a private nanny * not enough space at home - too expensive to buy a bigger home * cities that are not made for parents and small kids - too expensive to move to cities that are Again, I think almost everything can be reduced to "it just is too expensive".
- araes 2y ago
  Some that aren't quite so idealized: * Don't care - children are not a priority (often "I am the priority") * Get wealthy - children oppose money gaining * Get famous - children correlate poorly with rapid fame rise * Get sex - children correlate poorly with being a player * Work less - children take work (if not already wealthy) * America - https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/americans-feelings-about-politics-polarization-and-the-tone-of-political-discourse/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/americans-fe... * Sinking ship - enshitification everywhere, murder stats on all news, why have kids in a latrine? * Success correlation - wealth and success correlated with starting wealth. why have kids? * Negative wage slave experiences - hey kids, here's your collar, just like mine. * Abortion access - americans would fight to the death other over abortion access. wait, they already do. "a gift to Jesus on his birthday." * Health care (not specifically kids) - 10x all other locations. * Food - pointlessly expensive. so much land it's nonsense humans starve. they fight to squander it all.
  - autoexec 2y ago
    > Sinking ship - enshitification everywhere, murder stats on all news, why have kids in a latrine? Don't forget climate change! The latrine is also on fire.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
"Middle-class households with a preschooler more than quadrupled spending on child care alone between 1995 and 2023, according to an analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics and Department of Agriculture data by Scott Winship at think tank the American Enterprise Institute. Yet only about half of the increase is due to rising prices for the same quality and quantity of care. (Child care prices are up 180% overall since the mid-90s, according to BLS data.) The remaining half is coming from parents choosing more personalized or accredited care for a given 3- to 5-year-old, or paying for more hours, Winship says." It's gotten more expensive. We're also parenting harder, though it's unclear to what degree there is a selection effect in play.
- AnimalMuppet 2y ago
  Could it be that in 2023, both parents were more likely to return to work than in 1995? (Probably because it was essential for the family's economic survival, but perhaps just because that was more the expected norm.)
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > in 2023, both parents were more likely to return to work than in 1995 Dual-income households were less prevalent in 2017 (54.4%) than 1998 (56.5%) [1]. Looking at just families, it went up from 2022 to 2023, but I don't see data for 1995 [2]. [1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2020/article/comparing-characteristics-and-selected-expenditures-of-dual-and-single-income-households-with-children.htm https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2020/article/comparing-characte... [2] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/famee.pdf https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/famee.pdf
- sandworm101 2y ago
  I wonder how much does special needs care factor into this increase. That class of care is now radically more expensive.
MattGaiser 2y ago
The article discusses this heavily and it is a "kinda yes, but" > The remaining half is coming from parents choosing more personalized or accredited care for a given 3- to 5-year-old, or paying for more hours, Winship says. Basically parents are unwilling to have kids unless they can give them an ideal and heavily invested in life as well as in many cases buy their way out of many of the hassles.
johncessna 2y ago
I think the expense aspect doesn't dig deep enough. There are plenty of poor countries (and folks) having children. Additionally, being rich and having lots of kids don't usually go hand in hand (admittedly stereotypical) Not wanting to be poor, or more likely, trading the yearly trip to $insertPlaceHere, eating out on the weekends, or the daily Starbucks, for a new kid, isn't a bad, but 'too expensive' doesn't really describe that situation accurately.
- floatrock 2y ago
  So the ol' millennials are having too much avocado toast trope?
  - johncessna 2y ago
    They, and anyone else, is welcome to have as much avocado toast as they'd like. Just don't say that XYZ is unaffordable because their money went to other financial choices.
    - meowfly 2y ago
      I'm an older DINK and I tell people I think having a kid is like buying a boat. It's a luxury good that has variable returns on happiness. If someone was trying to get me to buy a boat I'd tell them I can't afford it. It's a shortcut to, Why would I spend money on something for "the economy"
- MattGaiser 2y ago
  It would be more correct to say that people only want to have kids they can ideally fully provide for, such as with top notch daycare (an example from the article). I won't have kids if I cannot pay for their post-secondary education. That is clearly not a requirement in poorer countries.
- schmichael 2y ago
  > There are plenty of poor countries (and folks) having children. Does having children impact their earning potential? The US offers a relatively high earning potential, and having children really directly interferes with that. If you don't have high earning potential, having kids may not have an appreciable impact. Childcare alone can easily cost over $1k/mo. Daily Starbucks and eating out is nothing compared to having kids.
alsetmusic 2y ago
Which could only be because “no one wants to work anymore.” /s
autokad 2y ago
I am not sure that's a fair thing to say. Because people have no problem spending tons of money on other things, so what it really comes down to is people value material possessions more than having babies. What is kind of baffling to me is a lot of people are still not having kids, but anthropomortising their pets, paying 10s of thousands a year in health insurance and bills for their pets, taking them to day care, and not traveling when they can't find sitters, etc.
- autokad 2y ago
  to all those above: The essentials of childcare have merely gone up with inflation since the 1800s. Thus, 'its too expensive' doesn't jive, as people were having lots of kids back then. A prime example is housing. People seem to think if they have a kid, they NEED a 4 bedroom 2 bathroom house with a yard, or you simply can't have a kid at all, game over if you don't own that. Meanwhile my 1920s home was more than enough for families back then, it was a 2 bedroom 1 bath. As far as pet care, people are spending 40,000$ on operations on their pets, and thousands a month on pet health insurance. People are spending 20/hour for dog walkers, the average Seattle dog owner spends up to 9,000$ / year on their dog (source wagwalking.com). No one says you have to pay nannys and private schooling. thats on you. that's about on par with a child, and someone pointed out a dog only lives 20 years, that just means your 'investment' is less well spent and support my claim pets are expensive. Also noting: you dont owe your kid anything after 18, they should be grown adults capable of making their own money and decisions after that point.
- LUmBULtERA 2y ago
  >people value material possessions more than having babies Eh, for people in my area at least, childcare for one new baby could is easily $20k-$45k/year, whereas I don't know of anyone personally who spends anywhere near that much a year on non-necessity material possessions. Plus all the other costs of a baby. Just another 1 room in an apartment could also be another $500-$1000 a month. Plus all the other baby-related costs. You could easily be talking about an order of magnitude difference in child-cost vs. typical spending on non-necessity material possessions per year.
  - 2y ago
jmclnx 2y ago
I believe this is 100% correct. Reminds me of England in the Middle Ages. Someone told me most people in England (and maybe W Europe) has a ancestor that was a King or Queen. If true, seems we may be heading in this direction with our "Aristocracy". Seems only the very wealthy can afford more than 1 child. I do remember Musk is trying to get rich people to have many Children. He had a WEB site about it but I cannot find it. The site has a picture of Blond Blue-eyed parents and their children. But a search did come up with this: https://people.com/elon-musk-wants-smart-people-to-have-kids-executive-he-welcomed-twins-with-says-new-book-7967996 https://people.com/elon-musk-wants-smart-people-to-have-kids...
com2kid 2y ago
There is also opportunity cost. If a couple has 20k+ to spend a year on child care, that means they have enough free money that they can do a lot of other enjoyable things instead. Airplane fares keep decreasing, destination vacations are becoming more and more affordable, and "everyday luxuries" keep being pushed down into becoming more affordable. Or to put it another way, having a kid means a serious drop in QoL compared to being a DINK. 60 years ago this didn't matter, even the upper middle class wasn't jetting off around on a regular basis. Also it wasn't as socially acceptable, all your friends were having kids and if you didn't have kids you were missing out. Compared to now when there are basically two parallel societies, families with kids and families without kids, and one can choose which group to be a part of.
Connector2542 2y ago
[flagged]

Wrong guess, probably, given that it's the poor who have more kids than the rich - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_most_recent_year https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fer...

mlinhares 2y ago

* too expensive; * not enough daycare even if you do have money; * not enough space at home; * cities that are not made for parents and small kids; * atomized communities with very little help;

lumost 2y ago
The last one can be brutal. It's tough to maintain friendships with people who don't have kids, it's doubly tough to form friendships with new people who have kids. Although it's mildly easier to build acquaintances.
- D13Fd 2y ago
  This is so true. It's socially isolating. We don't have the support structures we had even back when I was a kid, let alone 20 or 40 years before that, when society was really built around families having kids. I can only wonder what it will be like in another 20 years, when my children are grown up.
- mlinhares 2y ago
  While unfortunate we were able to make friends with other people with kids so there's some sharing of responsibility (send receive kids at home when they need to be watched over) but this doesn't seem to be the norm here. Feels like most people are raising their kids by themselves.
- kilolima 2y ago
  Because people with kids won't stop talking about how wonderful their kids are.
tonymet 2y ago
it's always been more expensive. daycare traditionally was only for aristocrats. multigenerational families lived in smaller apartments and cabins than single people do today. Cities used to be filled with sewage, horses and smoke. I'll concede the point on communities and I think that's a bigger contributor than economics.
- mlinhares 2y ago
  Couldn't care less about what people did or lived like 100 years ago. I live today and I'm either going to provide my kids a good live and have a good life myself or not have kids. I don't need to have kids for them to be my labor, that's not how this works anymore.
  - tonymet 2y ago
    then it's not about economics it's something else
  - locococo 2y ago
    agree, the argument that the economy needs more warm bodies is not exactly inspirational.
    - tonymet 2y ago
      you're right, people aren't having kids because they are not inspired. that is one of the main reasons. but that's not economics, it's philosophical and theological
  - darth_avocado 2y ago
    Exactly. Even 50 years ago, you could not even go to the high school and afford a middle class lifestyle for your kids. Not the case anymore. There’s no point comparing today with history.
- taylodl 2y ago
  You don't have to go back to the 19th century to make your point things are different today. Just go back to the 20th century - what did the Boomers do? - They had latchkey children - no daycare required! - "Free range" children was a thing and nobody got arrested for it! - There were such things as "Block Parents", people in the neighborhood who looked out for all the kids. Obviously this was before "stranger danger." - Everybody looked after everybody else's kids, even in tenement buildings. - People lived close to where the grew up and generally had relatives nearby to help out when all of the above failed. Nowadays, most of this is gone. In short, in just a mere 40 to 50 years, the cost of having children has skyrocketed. Add in the cost-of-living expenses have skyrocketed for younger people and you get the result that fewer people are having children and those who are having children are having them much later.
darth_avocado 2y ago
* too expensive * not enough daycare even if you do have money - again too expensive to hire a private nanny * not enough space at home - too expensive to buy a bigger home * cities that are not made for parents and small kids - too expensive to move to cities that are Again, I think almost everything can be reduced to "it just is too expensive".
araes 2y ago
Some that aren't quite so idealized: * Don't care - children are not a priority (often "I am the priority") * Get wealthy - children oppose money gaining * Get famous - children correlate poorly with rapid fame rise * Get sex - children correlate poorly with being a player * Work less - children take work (if not already wealthy) * America - https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/americans-feelings-about-politics-polarization-and-the-tone-of-political-discourse/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/americans-fe... * Sinking ship - enshitification everywhere, murder stats on all news, why have kids in a latrine? * Success correlation - wealth and success correlated with starting wealth. why have kids? * Negative wage slave experiences - hey kids, here's your collar, just like mine. * Abortion access - americans would fight to the death other over abortion access. wait, they already do. "a gift to Jesus on his birthday." * Health care (not specifically kids) - 10x all other locations. * Food - pointlessly expensive. so much land it's nonsense humans starve. they fight to squander it all.
- autoexec 2y ago
  > Sinking ship - enshitification everywhere, murder stats on all news, why have kids in a latrine? Don't forget climate change! The latrine is also on fire.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

"Middle-class households with a preschooler more than quadrupled spending on child care alone between 1995 and 2023, according to an analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics and Department of Agriculture data by Scott Winship at think tank the American Enterprise Institute. Yet only about half of the increase is due to rising prices for the same quality and quantity of care. (Child care prices are up 180% overall since the mid-90s, according to BLS data.) The remaining half is coming from parents choosing more personalized or accredited care for a given 3- to 5-year-old, or paying for more hours, Winship says." It's gotten more expensive. We're also parenting harder, though it's unclear to what degree there is a selection effect in play.

AnimalMuppet 2y ago
Could it be that in 2023, both parents were more likely to return to work than in 1995? (Probably because it was essential for the family's economic survival, but perhaps just because that was more the expected norm.)
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > in 2023, both parents were more likely to return to work than in 1995 Dual-income households were less prevalent in 2017 (54.4%) than 1998 (56.5%) [1]. Looking at just families, it went up from 2022 to 2023, but I don't see data for 1995 [2]. [1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2020/article/comparing-characteristics-and-selected-expenditures-of-dual-and-single-income-households-with-children.htm https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2020/article/comparing-characte... [2] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/famee.pdf https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/famee.pdf
sandworm101 2y ago
I wonder how much does special needs care factor into this increase. That class of care is now radically more expensive.

MattGaiser 2y ago

The article discusses this heavily and it is a "kinda yes, but" > The remaining half is coming from parents choosing more personalized or accredited care for a given 3- to 5-year-old, or paying for more hours, Winship says. Basically parents are unwilling to have kids unless they can give them an ideal and heavily invested in life as well as in many cases buy their way out of many of the hassles.

johncessna 2y ago

I think the expense aspect doesn't dig deep enough. There are plenty of poor countries (and folks) having children. Additionally, being rich and having lots of kids don't usually go hand in hand (admittedly stereotypical) Not wanting to be poor, or more likely, trading the yearly trip to $insertPlaceHere, eating out on the weekends, or the daily Starbucks, for a new kid, isn't a bad, but 'too expensive' doesn't really describe that situation accurately.

floatrock 2y ago
So the ol' millennials are having too much avocado toast trope?
- johncessna 2y ago
  They, and anyone else, is welcome to have as much avocado toast as they'd like. Just don't say that XYZ is unaffordable because their money went to other financial choices.
  - meowfly 2y ago
    I'm an older DINK and I tell people I think having a kid is like buying a boat. It's a luxury good that has variable returns on happiness. If someone was trying to get me to buy a boat I'd tell them I can't afford it. It's a shortcut to, Why would I spend money on something for "the economy"
MattGaiser 2y ago
It would be more correct to say that people only want to have kids they can ideally fully provide for, such as with top notch daycare (an example from the article). I won't have kids if I cannot pay for their post-secondary education. That is clearly not a requirement in poorer countries.
schmichael 2y ago
> There are plenty of poor countries (and folks) having children. Does having children impact their earning potential? The US offers a relatively high earning potential, and having children really directly interferes with that. If you don't have high earning potential, having kids may not have an appreciable impact. Childcare alone can easily cost over $1k/mo. Daily Starbucks and eating out is nothing compared to having kids.

alsetmusic 2y ago

Which could only be because “no one wants to work anymore.” /s

autokad 2y ago

I am not sure that's a fair thing to say. Because people have no problem spending tons of money on other things, so what it really comes down to is people value material possessions more than having babies. What is kind of baffling to me is a lot of people are still not having kids, but anthropomortising their pets, paying 10s of thousands a year in health insurance and bills for their pets, taking them to day care, and not traveling when they can't find sitters, etc.

autokad 2y ago
to all those above: The essentials of childcare have merely gone up with inflation since the 1800s. Thus, 'its too expensive' doesn't jive, as people were having lots of kids back then. A prime example is housing. People seem to think if they have a kid, they NEED a 4 bedroom 2 bathroom house with a yard, or you simply can't have a kid at all, game over if you don't own that. Meanwhile my 1920s home was more than enough for families back then, it was a 2 bedroom 1 bath. As far as pet care, people are spending 40,000$ on operations on their pets, and thousands a month on pet health insurance. People are spending 20/hour for dog walkers, the average Seattle dog owner spends up to 9,000$ / year on their dog (source wagwalking.com). No one says you have to pay nannys and private schooling. thats on you. that's about on par with a child, and someone pointed out a dog only lives 20 years, that just means your 'investment' is less well spent and support my claim pets are expensive. Also noting: you dont owe your kid anything after 18, they should be grown adults capable of making their own money and decisions after that point.
LUmBULtERA 2y ago
>people value material possessions more than having babies Eh, for people in my area at least, childcare for one new baby could is easily $20k-$45k/year, whereas I don't know of anyone personally who spends anywhere near that much a year on non-necessity material possessions. Plus all the other costs of a baby. Just another 1 room in an apartment could also be another $500-$1000 a month. Plus all the other baby-related costs. You could easily be talking about an order of magnitude difference in child-cost vs. typical spending on non-necessity material possessions per year.
- 2y ago

jmclnx 2y ago

I believe this is 100% correct. Reminds me of England in the Middle Ages. Someone told me most people in England (and maybe W Europe) has a ancestor that was a King or Queen. If true, seems we may be heading in this direction with our "Aristocracy". Seems only the very wealthy can afford more than 1 child. I do remember Musk is trying to get rich people to have many Children. He had a WEB site about it but I cannot find it. The site has a picture of Blond Blue-eyed parents and their children. But a search did come up with this: https://people.com/elon-musk-wants-smart-people-to-have-kids-executive-he-welcomed-twins-with-says-new-book-7967996 https://people.com/elon-musk-wants-smart-people-to-have-kids...

com2kid 2y ago

There is also opportunity cost. If a couple has 20k+ to spend a year on child care, that means they have enough free money that they can do a lot of other enjoyable things instead. Airplane fares keep decreasing, destination vacations are becoming more and more affordable, and "everyday luxuries" keep being pushed down into becoming more affordable. Or to put it another way, having a kid means a serious drop in QoL compared to being a DINK. 60 years ago this didn't matter, even the upper middle class wasn't jetting off around on a regular basis. Also it wasn't as socially acceptable, all your friends were having kids and if you didn't have kids you were missing out. Compared to now when there are basically two parallel societies, families with kids and families without kids, and one can choose which group to be a part of.

Connector2542 2y ago

[flagged]