3 ms·
My take on this as someone who swings left is that desire for children isn’t meaningfully lower among the left, but would-be parents want to provide quality of
by cosmic_cheese 3mo ago
My take on this as someone who swings left is that desire for children isn’t meaningfully lower among the left, but would-be parents want to provide quality of life that is as good or preferably significantly better than that of their own childhoods. This rolls in several other assumptions, such as reasonable assurance of financial stability, low housing and relationship drama, capacity to take unexpected disaster in stride, all while having enough headroom for occasional travel and vacation.
If clearing that bar isn’t feasible, starting a family is delayed until it is.
The problem is that many will never achieve that before aging out of the opportunity, due to it becoming increasingly difficult to climb that ladder. Many millennials for example only got to a point where they felt like they could stand on their own two feet in their 30s, which is the starting line for providing the desired quality of life for children.
I don’t think this is a bad thing to desire. People like this tend to be good, thoughtful parents if they manage to endure the marathon and reach the finish line in time. It’s just out of reach for many, and nobody cares to even try to fix that.
- throw-the-towel 3mo agoI'm Russian, my generation was raised in the ruins of socialism when wages often went unpaid for months (if not years) and people had to grow their own veggies. We're now doing better than our parents in every way, yet children still get delayed.
- cosmic_cheese 3mo agoIt's a complex, multi-pronged issue, of which finances are just a single aspect. A wide variety of circumstances can lead people to feel that they'd be unable to give their children a good childhood.
- throw-the-towel 3mo agoWhat other aspects do you have in mind, then?
- mike_hearn 3mo agoProviding a childhood that's as good as their own should be easy given the general increase in wealth, improvements in medical care and other technology, fall in violent crime and so on. Being better than your own childhood is the default even if you aren't more successful in a relative sense than your parents.
- watwut 3mo agoThere was no general increase in wealth except among wealthiest.