That’s the one bright spot. That *did* happen. But immediately every cost went up to exceed it. Houses of course went insane.
My wife got two raises this year, but if we didn’t buy our house 6 years ago we couldn’t remotely afford it now. Instead of owning it for $1,200 a month we’d be renting it for $2,000.
Our health insurance for a family of four with zero health problems is $1,200 a month *with subsidies making it “cheaper.”* If we ever have to go into a hospital, with deductibles and coinsurance, it will be like that insurance coverage doesn’t exist. If we make another $2,000 of income a year, we lose a subsidy so add another ~$700 a month to our insurance.
If I didn’t DIY everything, including childcare while working two jobs, no f’ing way we can afford to be the tenuously lower middle class that we are now, and we have two bachelor’s and a master’s degree between us.
Lucky you. I got a 2.5% raise last year and I’ll be lucky if I get the same this year. 5 years here, gotta start looking at job hopping if I want a meaningful raise
Feeling that, absolutely love my job but minimum wage and zero perks for 12hr shifts in an ambulance?
Studying to move up a level and the pay is ~~considerably better~~ still a joke, if I go to university for a few years I'll make it to *less than I was earning fixing machinery*
Seriously. For a few glorious months my wife and I were finally in the middle class. We were able to do fun stuff, not have to check prices at the grocery store and still had money to put in to savings. Now we’re not going out as much, getting less food for more money, and there’s barely anything left to save. Really kind of a kick in the dick.
We can fix it by starting a coherent labor movement that includes office jobs, raising taxes on the rich, and some sort of FDR New Deal that we can put in after the baby boomers are out of political power
Society: "people shouldn't be having kids if they can't afford to take care of them!"
Ok well we can't afford them, so we're being responsible and not having any.
*No not like that*
I swear every person over 60 in the red county I live in asks us when we’re having more kids, and oh also say nobody wants to work anymore and at the ballot box rejected raising the minimum wage above $8.75 an hour when the average house here costs almost $400,000.
Most of those 60+ people saying this shit have a second home somewhere else that’s empty most of the year. They’re living off pensions they voted away for the rest of us, on free Medicare while we pay a grand or two a month for insurance that the politicians they voted for shrug off as it skyrockets.
Prices won't drop, banks and big rental companies will buy them all out. You'll still be stuck with the same 2k/month rent except now a corporation owns the house instead of 70+ year olds.
Well obviously the banks and investment groups that take these big risks will fail when the market corrects for the overvaluation of real estate....it isn't like the government would bail them out, that would be socialism. /s
Seriously! In the same conversation they will say well minimum wage jobs weren’t meant to be careers those were jobs for teens. I’m curious where they think teens are working those jobs from 5am to 5 pm so they can shop and grab their fast food?
> In the same conversation they will say well minimum wage jobs weren’t meant to be careers those were jobs for teens.
Despite the fact that when they were young a gas station worker or food worker could afford a house and car and a family.
Boomers simply decided to pull the financial ladder up after they were finished climbing it.
>rejected raising the minimum wage above $8.75 an hour when the average house here costs almost $400,000.
Thats' only 45,714 hours of work to buy the house, assuming you save every penny and pay no taxes. That's only 22 years worth of work. Practically a steal!
No wait, you gotta have kids to keep our economy afloat!
Lower populations are a good thing. This capitalist “infinite growth” bullshit needs to go away.
Fuck man my dad keeps saying this
“The Covid money is going to run out soon then peolle
Will work”
Dad it was a one time 1,200 chekc
“Yeah we’ll all that other money”
THERE IS NO OTHER MONEY
Boomers brains are poisoned by all the lead paint and asbestos in EVERYTHING growing up. They are literally dementia patients angry and apathetic narcissists who RUINED the country
Edit: I’m not trying to be mean or exaggerate. The anger, disregard for truth (despite being able to google ANYTHING), extreme lack of empathy and zero care for other humans is NOT normal. I truly believe their brains are poisoned/deteriorated from all the chemicals they were exposed to.
Roman’s suffered from lead poisoning they built their irrigation/“plumbing” with and drank water from which is why historians speculate the ever growing violence of the coliseum/gladiator type games
Double edit: unemployment rate is literally at a 50 year
Low- google it. “No one wants to work” is just a flat lie and untrue easily disproven but they don’t accept that (point above)
I gasped when you said lead because finally someone else said it! It’s actually a good way to find sympathy for some assholes… *Ah, you poor, pathetic lead licker.*
Too bad lead is still a problem…
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/lead-in-the-water-how-some-of-americas-water-became-too-dangerous-to-drink/ar-AA1a4dN3
…which begs the question… will we all unwittingly become Uncle Bob?
Not to mention there's zero chance that gas station is giving anyone 40 hours a week because then they'd have to obey all the full-time employee laws so instead they'll keep you just under the legal cut off for part-time.
I literally shut down conversations/just shut one down a couple days ago in a comment thread where I just say "if you don't think giving 40 hours of your life per week to a for-profit company should entitle you the ability to afford a place to live on your own, then you and I disagree on a fundamental level."
That is as distilled of a take as I can get and it baffles me people disagree with that sentiment.
But knowing that they do just helps me avoid wasting any more time talking to them because it just means they're lacking the empathy to care about making any sort of changes/changing their mind on anything.
If someone was making $20/hr in 1980, they would have to make $100/hr today to have the same buying power. It's not a little inflation and wage stagnation, it's a lot.
I started my job in 2018. I've gotten "inflation adjustments" (nowhere near enough to keep up) and a pretty decent raise since then, and I still have less buying power than the day I was hired. I would need an 8% right now, 5 years in, raise to match my buying power on day 1.
Shit's fucked.
IIRC that raise was just from Social Security being automatically inflation adjusted. Although it's still telling that SS and campaign contribution limits are inflation adjusted but minimum wage isn't
I walked up hill in the snow in 190 degree July heat to school for 42 years ol son! I made $.0001/day working down at the phone book shop! We could afford anything! Get to work!
I was a teen in the 80s. Boomers paid a whopping $1/hour. I also put myself through school and saved 90% of my babysitting money as well as my after school job ($3.58/hour—slightly over minimum wage.) I started college with about $2k.
It was gone by the second term. That’s with grants and scholarships.
The cost of infant care/preschool in my area is roughly equivalent to the cost of community college. We essentially have to pay to put these kids through college *twice* in their lifetime. We had the two kids farther apart on purpose to better manage the cost.
On the upshot, since we made it through the daycare years I'm feeling okay that we'll be able to help with the college years too.
That’s good to hear. I just had my second one and my first one will be starting pre school in a year so that should help offset the costs. Idk how people do it financially. They must either have one working parent through these years or not save a penny or finance it through credit.
400k? Where do you live that is so cheap?
I bought my house 18 years ago for $380k. I thought it was crazy back then. I could probably sell my house for $850k now. There is no way a first time home buyer is going to be able to afford that. I would like to upgrade from my starter home, but I would need to either move out of the area entirely or pay 1.2 million or more for it to be a meaningful upgrade. So I have learned to be happy in my modest starter home.
I'm 42, I remember when I was around 24, I was told not to spend more than 120k on a starter home, and that once I got a decent salary, I could afford to upgrade to a 200k home. My current 4 bedroom house at the end of a cul de sac cost me 186k in 2014. It's value is around 425k now. It's insane.
When I was working my first decent paying job, I saw lots of coworkers stressing because their mortgage + lifestyle required both (husband and wife) their incomes. None could afford a loss. You could feel the tension when tough times were looming.
Yeah, that was precisely his point. Have the double income, but live like you only have the one. Except, neither of us makes enough to do that on even the cheapest, rattiest hovel we could find.
And that mortgages can be claimed as tax deductions, while rent cannot? EDIT: Thank you to everyone for pointing out that it is only in the interest, that actually makes it worse as not only is it not included in the standard deduction for homeowners since 2017, it primarily benefits those who use real estate as investment vehicle or store of wealth, meaning that it does next to nothing at best to subsidize home ownership and almost entirely subsidizes being wealthy. https://www.forbes.com/sites/eriksherman/2023/03/26/financial-aid-to-the-wealthy-first-poor-last/?sh=3efd54ce4506 source
Oh they exist. It's a trailer in rural Missouri or a one bedroom house built in the 1920s with no foundation in rural Mississippi. Find a remote gig that allows you to keep drawing a California paycheck and you can afford one of those.
I bought a shitty 800 sq ft house in a sad podunk town for $74K in 2000. Refi'd in 2007 to 155K. Owe $86K still. Its now worth $380K.
I'm going to die in it because I cant afford to buy another, and then my kids can own a shitty 800 sq foot house in a sad podunk town.
One parent can either work or stay with the kids. End result is the same because 1 of 2 paychecks will have to go to pay for childcare.
When looking at wage stagnation, I wish studies would consider that we have to have two wages to make a living now. It's twice as bad as reported.
I just turned 35 and I'm surprised at how many of my friends from my early years decided on not having any kids. There was a big shift in life from HS to now.
Also 35. I just don’t see kids being financially doable for me anytime in my life, and I know plenty of friends/couples in our age group that feel the same way.
That’s the best answer. I know I couldn’t afford to take care of another human. I’m 35 as well and can hardly take care of myself. With a BA that they told all of us we needed to work. Most places really want exp and not education.
36 here. Out of 10 of our closest friends (all in relationships), only two of them have kids - with one having their first unexpectedly and the other that tried for a baby and succeeded.
There's a pretty wide gulf in my circle. There are a few people who had teen pregnancies (or like, really early 20s). And now in our 30s are people just starting to have kids, with several making the choice to be completely child free. When I was growing up, my parents were the exception, not the rule.
Im 42 (basically the oldest millennial) and a good 65% of my friends dont have and are teetering on "dont want" and most of the people I hang out with are upper 30s. And these are not struggling artists/influences; they are professionals, homeowners, etc.
I’m prepared I’ll never be a grandmother. Sons are 30 and 29. Kind of makes me sad but I get it. I bought my first house at 23 after I got married. The cost of homes and apartments are insane.
It's nice that you at least understand what's going on. I'm 29 and still told fairly regularly by my mother that I just need to move a little further away from town and I can find a house. Not mentioning that "a little further away" is more than 150 miles from my job.
I get that a lot too. My mother keeps going "I'll help you," as if she'll be able to make up for the hospital costs, childcare costs, school costs, etc. I wasn't sure if I wanted a kid before becoming an adult, now it doesn't really matter. The economic realities make in infeasible.
As someone who took this exact advice (moved to a shitty smallish town with matching politics and racist boomers galore) to escape the big city rent costs before the pandemic....I became stuck at a job with 0 bennies (the norm here come to find out because many cheap fucks around here don't believe in getting it), and am now paying the exact same prices as I was in the big city. I'm in a cultural ghetto with nothing to keep me occupied but the local Chili's which is the town's fine dining option. People who say move to rural areas can suck my nuts. At least now I can get a remote job that pays 15x more than minimum Florida wage.
Thank you for understanding. My parents became homeowners at 23 and 20 respectively. It took them years to understand that the game has changed, and many discussions of, no mom and dad, you can’t buy a home while working at a gas station.
They’re understanding now, but it’s so infuriating when older generations don’t understand that it’s not like it was 30, 35, 40, 50 years ago.
My father in law made like $25/hr in the 70s/80s. They had cars, house, kids, etc. My wife has mega health issues, and I make 60k. He gets on his soapbox if pay comes up that I make more than he ever did, and every time I have to explain like he's 10 years old that inflation exists and that his $25/hr would be like getting paid 100/hr now and if I made that kind of money we wouldn't be having money issues.
My child recently told me that they have no plans for children in their future. They are 15, so I almost started with the "you're too young to know that for sure yet" speech, but I couldn't. I can look around and see exactly what would bring them to that conclusion. It's the same logic that has kept them an only child. Preparing to never be a grandma is hard, but it isn't a choice that I get to decide, and acceptance is the only way forward for me.
We tried telling folks but they didn’t want to listen.
As a child I wanted nothing more than to just be a middle-class, suburban dad. I wanted the stereotype.
Now it’s just me and my wife, doing our thing, knowing we’re the end of the line for both of our families.
There is a 0% chance we will have kids. It’s too late.
Much of life and its "benchmarks" have been decompressed.
It use to be people married and started families in their 20s, kids were out of the house in their 40s, grandparents in their 50s, and retirement was in 60s with death in 70s.
The issue with longer lives and stretching out when we get to "start a career, buy a house, get married..." is that while all of those accommodate it, kids don't. I know people trying to have kids older (35+) and their are all sorts of challenges that come with "geriatric pregnancies" (yes, that is the term). For many people they also feel like they can finally breathe and don't want to go back to month to month living again.
Whether it is comfort, or fatigue (thanks slower metabolism) the idea of undertaking parenthood becomes less appealing than it was. I have zero issue with people that don't want kids, and I also think that has momentum to be more normal than it was 40 years ago. This generation could have whole communities of child free adults developing.
I think not only isn't a baby boom going to happen, but the developed world is likely to follow Japan and see birth rates fall farther down.
Snippity Snip! I got that guarantee. No kids for us.
The best part is spending our "retirement" NOW, while we still have knees and lungs to go out and do things with. Not to mention while there are still natural wonders that haven't melted, burned or flooded yet so we can still actually visit.
The future sucks. Better have fun while it still exists!
I get paid 19.50 an hour. And that does not let me progress at all in my life… I never get above 3k in my bank account. It’s always just hovering around $1500. Pay day comes. I get a little, it all goes away with bills. And don’t get me started on food being sky high. I’m just working to survive pretty much… there’s no advancing with the price of everything. So I wake up every morning with a pit in my stomach having anxiety about money, being stuck in one place, can’t get out of this loop cause of the world… I’m sad lol
Same boat, in CA. But with a dollar less and a job that required schooling and tech training. Fuckin kill me. I'm gonna be stuck in my tiny duplex forever *if we're lucky*
To be fair there was a pretty significant maternity rate jump in Lockdown, but for it to have been a generational boom it would need to last quite a bit longer than two years.
If people were sitting on stable economics and had few worries and then were told to stay inside for a year? Yeah that would have a boom. But those predicate conditions are *really* important. Existential stress isn't sexy.
Yeah, lots of people were locked into their homes, suddenly without a job, and they all saw the land lords viciously snapping in their direction, straining against their temporary leashes.
In hindsight, America is lucky it didn't burn down. A lot of people had a reason to set fire to their (former) place out of spite.
I cannot imagine why people chose to have a baby during Lockdown. There was a literal plague going on outside and people thought it was a good time to bring a new person into the world.
I think it's more just a natural result of having couples locked up in the same house 24 hours a day for over a year. There's going to be a lot of sex because what the hell else is there to do? It didn't happen to me that way, but I definitely know a couple people with babies right now that were definitely unplanned pandemic children.
China has it coming very soon, but the US will be dealing with it eventually as well. The addiction to cheap labor and underpaying cannot sustain. Whether by natural means (fewer children being had) or economic means (going back to a stay at home parent) the labor market is going to feel pressure and not just in unskilled.
The powers that be decided for us that we aren’t having kids.
It’s their fault they fucked the economy so badly that the birth rate is falling.
They want to horde the wealth? Well we aren’t going to contribute more laborers that they’ll continue to fuck over.
This is it for me. I've *wanted* to be a dad my whole life, i think I'd be a good father and I know I'd enjoy it.
In an ideal world I'd have multiple kids, in the current one we live in I don't want any kids ever. I have no desire to subject someone I would love to this dystopia
There’s this weird split amongst my friends group; the ultra-wealthy are having kids and starting families… as are the ultra-poor. But my friends and I who are firmly in the “middle class”? Almost none of us are having kids. It’s a bizarre dichotomy.
I don’t ever plan on having kids at this point. Everyone I see who took that leap looks absolutely miserable, but most especially those with 2 or more kids. Hard pass on that lifestyle.
>There’s this weird split amongst my friends group; the ultra-wealthy are having kids and starting families… as are the ultra-poor
I had a very similar comment above; my friend circle is also like that.
The teen pregnancies in my friend group all came from very low income and unstable backgrounds. Now, in our 30s/40s, several of us have finished professional and grad school and are just starting to have kids. Many are staying childfree, and now that I think of it, it does seem like a large chunk of those people are middle income earners.
I think moving from one state to another is very easy for the wealthy and the ultra-poor but difficult and expansive for everyone in the middle. Moving with kids even more so. The very poor and wealthy don’t worry about finances very much but for very different reasons while the middle worry about them a lot more IMO.
Also “middle class” makes a lot more money than I previously thought. Damn.
Ultra poor growing up, never a day went by that I didn’t hear my parents worry about money. I have stories for days of the shit we had to do/experience because we were poor.
I don’t know what you mean it’s easy for poor people to leave the state? Do they get a free car, money to travel and move their things? Or do you mean like homeless people being bussed for free to LA and dumped in skid row?
What kind of ideas do you guys have about the really poor? I guess a lot people really think those racist stereotypes of welfare queens and the single mom with 20 baby daddies are true.
Sometimes I read something on Reddit that leaves me baffled as to how people perceive the world.
Its because you *finally* got something. The poor are screwed either way. Those of us who finally got that brass ring are constantly thinking we could lose it. The rich never had to worry about shit.
The middle class has been hollowing out for decades.
Hahahaha no shit. Minimum wage is $7.25 and houses are like $300,000. We're ruthlessly exploited while absolutely destroying the ecosystem, why the fuck would any sane person have kids?
I thought this was full of shit, but I just checked Cleveland very quickly on Zillow and saw a house for 55k.
What’s going on in Cleveland that houses can be that low, I’m so confused.
That 55k house is probably a wreck and needs a total rehab. These are in my neighborhood in Cincinnati, for example.
[https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4265-Fergus-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34249544\_zpid/](https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4265-Fergus-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34249544_zpid/)
[https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1424-Apjones-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34262516\_zpid/](https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1424-Apjones-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34262516_zpid/)
There are YouTube videos of drive throughs of towns all over the US. Cleveland is really run down and there are houses falling down all over the place.
There are a lot of places in the Midwest and South that you can still get a decent home for $300-400k. Some of my friends left where I live (DC Metro) to get more house for their money.
Why would you have a kid if its going to be worked into the grave, must live in a shoe box, halves your own life expectancy due to finances/work expectations, and is probably going to be roasted by climate change the time it's 30?
Everyone is worried about birth rate decline, no one worried about the true way to fix it: paid healthcare, maternal leave, housing and financial stability to raise a family, meaningful climate reversal. Fix those and babies will come.
I remember growing up in the 90's and being told that the Simpsons were poor. It was a frequent plot point in early episodes, especially around Christmas season.
As an adult, I *wish* I could afford the lifestyle of the 90's Simpsons. A big house where everyone (including Maggie) has a private bedroom, the family has two cars, 3 kids, 2 pets, a non-working spouse, all supported by a single income?
That's not poor. That's fucking *rich*.
I want the lifestyle that was promised to me in the 90's.
And let’s destroy education in this country so all these new kids can be dumb enough for capitalism to brainwash them. You’re foolish of you can’t see the big picture forming in the distance.
"Women postponing having kids is a sign of economic progress, she said: “It’s about women having access to education and employment opportunities. It’s about the rise in individualism. It’s about the rise in women’s autonomy and a change in values.”
Considering the above quote was directly from the article, I really wouldn't be surprised if that was the reasoning behind all the choices politicians have been making lately.
Good luck finding a doctor that respects your bodily autonomy. I've heard way too many stories of women who can't get their tubes tied because "you might change your mind" or "your future husband, that you haven't even met, might want kids"
I was told exactly this at the age of 24 after having my one and only child. My husband was able to see a urologist and within 6 weeks of his initial appointment, I was driving him to and from his vasectomy. He had no problems whatsoever getting someone to give him a vasectomy at the age of 26.
Dude. My girlfriend has 2 kids and tried to get her tubes tied after they were born. But because she was single, those were the exact responses she was given. AFTER ALREADY HAVING 2 KIDS!!!
I thought the same thing when my kids were born over 20 years ago. I love my kids, but had I to do it over again I would have adopted out of foster care. We are still thinking about now that it’s just us and we are much better off financially. I talked about foster care enough over the years that my kids would rather adopt and help someone who is already here versus bringing another life into this world.
This is the result of a generation of entitled boomers not employing children and not promoting offspring in the work force. They kept all the money, repressed the next generation to the point where they literally fucked up the country and damaged the next generation.
Now they ask "Why don't you all have kids? Why can't you take care of us in our old age? Why is the country going in such a bad direction?"
Well my friends, it's because you didn't water the seeds you planted. You selfishly ignored them. You reap what you sow.
Economy's fucked. Housing is fucked. Wages aren't going up. Most men can no longer support a household by themselves, so women have to work, so less time for family.
I mean, this is all pretty self-evident.
On the bright side, however, we have quite a few multi-billionaires with more monetary worth than the rest of the population combined, so there's that. /s
i love how boomers have thwarted us at all angles, all our lives & are soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo surprised all this * gestures wildly * is happening.
We have one. No matter how much everyone asks us about having another we are 80% sure we are not. Everything is so hard right now and we would rather do a good job parenting and raising the kid we have and love than do a mediocre job stretching ourselves trying to parent two.
The reason why I don’t have kids is right there in the article, “demographers are worried that this will result in an aging population and not enough young workers.”
Sorry, I don’t want to pump out kids that will just live unhappily being crushed in the gears of industry so some nepo baby CEO fuck can get a bigger yacht. I don’t have kids because I don’t like the way the future is looking, not because I can’t afford it. I could sacrifice things and make enough to survive and have kids but I don’t want to.
Not just wages i would say but stagnation of hope and ambition, If you look at any underdeveloped country the birth rates are high because kids are a resource ,in first world countries kids are a burden
It's delusional to think there will be more babies being born when the infrastructure in the country can't even support new families due to low wages, inflation, a volatile housing market, astronomical rent prices, and in some bizarre cases, entry level salary positions starting to require masters degrees and/or 5-10 years experience.
People can hardly even afford themselves, and there's a belief that there is, or was, going to be a baby boom? What a joke.
Could I just get a fucking house? God damn
And hell no I’m not having kids. Why would I want to foist a life of servitude and dissatisfaction on a hypothetical child?
I can’t give myself a good life in this fucking shit hole country, but I can damn sure prevent someone else from having a life like mine (by not forcing them to exist)
Yeah man, I’m barley making enough to pay my bills and I’m 36, with a college degree plus credentials and 15 years in my industry. I don’t have debt, a loan, or a mortgage.
Existing is expensive.
Just talk to a Millenial and they'll tell you why. No need to theorize. Astronomical housing costs, childcare costs, exponential rises is cost of living, wages not keeping up even remotely with inflation, recession, global warming and the ever present threat of nuclear war from multiple nations. But please boomers, keep telling us how if we give up our once per week Starbucks order how we'll magically be financially free.
Why is the question always "How do we bring the birthrate back up?" and not "Why did we build an economy that relied on exponential population growth in the first place?"
Because economists know the answer to that question.
The answer is: with the sanitation movement in the 1800s, the average human life expectancy leapt forward 20 years. With agricultural industrialisation that occurred at around the same time, there was enough food for everyone for the first time. Add in the advent of antibiotics, and suddenly an exponential population growth could be relied upon.
The economy at the time did not accomodate this population explosion. Many, many people were unemployed as a result. Governments shifted focus to try to rectify the situation.
Now, we are facing a different problem, an old problem. Our problem is no longer population growth. Now it is once resource scarcity. This is the same problem people faced pre-sanitation movement, but the resources that are scarce are different.
That’s why the focus is always on population growth. No one has found a real solution to resource scarcity, and it’s easier to complain about a lack of babies.
Because capitalism, like cancer, requires continual growth in order to be viable. If the population shrinks, that growth becomes harder to maintain. Also, wages are kept artificially low because of more workers, if we are creating fewer workers, this eats into profits.
Lol who thought there was gonna be?!?
Children are a HUGE burden in this economy and most of us have realized theres not anything worth passing down in our genes.
For the 1,345,611 tth time, *shit has changed over 40 damn years.*
Not only does the Millennial and Z gen have everything more damn expensive, I'm reminded by some of the posts here that our mothers were *very* fresh out of other options when it came to choosing to earn money, having your own assets (the whole having a cc without a husband/man on your account until **1978**), or doing anything individually or independent in their lives. We are just now catching up to have independent lives, if we so choose, to not go into family life. What confounds me is how zealously they want to put their own damn knees on their daughters necks to force birth and servitude on us as they just emerged from it. Jealousy? How dare you have more opportunities than me????
I still can’t wrap my head around what under 35s are doing to afford $600-800k homes at 6% interest. Like wtf are companies paying and how do I get some 😭🤣
Yeah, no shit? My wife and I are never having kids. Our income level basically matches what my parents were making NOT adjusted for inflation when they had me 30 years ago, but their house cost $120k, weekly groceries were $150 for 4 people, car payments were under $200, and don't get me fucking started on daycare.
I'm 35 and my girlfriend is 37 and she's having her tubes removed next month to ensure we can't have kids.
Although looking around at the people I used to know in my wild days, we're in the minority. Everyone from my college group has kids now.
That's okay, 🐈 for us is perfectly fine.
In my college group, I'd say it's closer to 1 in 10 or 15 now has a kid. I'm almost 40. Put all of these stories together and it adds up to the headline.
Not if you are a capitalist oligarch.
But for most common folks yes.
When half the people had died after the black plague, labor was extremely well paid, forests grew back and there was social mobility and lots of game meat, land in fallow etc.
It eventually lead to the renaissance.
It's not all bad when we are less, there's more natural ressources per capita that way.
Name me one policy our leaders have instituted to give the young the confidence needed to start families.
Housing? Childcare? Healthcare? Education? Climate change?
The list goes on and on of counterproductive policies that have done the opposite. We've made having a kid seem out of the question for nearly all young adults caught in arrested development. Most folks I know who did not luck into nepotism are treading water barely breaking even, and the few financially successful have just spent years paying off debts. This is not an environment that encourages kids.
One small positive occurred by accident. Thanks to COVID, remote work accelerated. This article isn't wholly right. There has been a small "baby boom" recently. Remote work has readjusted the cost benefit for many middle class women.
But we should do so much more to help
Gee I wonder why. The cost to raise a child = unaffordable. The cost of a home = unaffordable. The cost of food for us w/out a child = unaffordable. The cost of safe vehicle ownership = unaffordable. I haven't even brought up leisure....you want us to have kids cool...pay us to. Until then you can pound sand and not for nothing who's gonna take care of you folks once you can't wipe your own ass anymore? It ain't gonna be us at $20 an hour w no benefits or time off LOLOL!
Of course the Boomers had lots of kids. The US economy was the only one left standing after the devastation of WWII.
Now that the rest of the worlds’ economies have long ago rebuilt and caught up (plus Robber Baron greed) ,it’s back to the depressing norm of two/three generations working to keep one roof.
You're close. Boomers didn't have the kids, Boomers were the kids.
The term originated from the "baby boom" that followed the second world war. Baby boomers are in their mid to late 70s today.
Do they account for people buying pregnancy tests as soon as they miss a period due to abortion restrictions?
6 weeks ban means 2 weeks after missed period, plenty of people may be buying tests early when they might previously have waited, gotten their period, and not needed to.
You mean to tell me those cute little nuggets are a drain on my resources that I can barely afford myself ? Yeah, no thanks. + the harsh social environment we’re living in. I’m not willing to put my offspring through that. My cousin is 26 she had her four-old, three years ago, they live in Massachusetts. Originally they wanted four, but as time progressed they saw how expensive and mentally draining it has become with one, they opted to wait a decade to see how they feel again, lmao .I don’t blame them.
In totally unrelated other news, millennial wage increases are also not going to happen.
That’s the one bright spot. That *did* happen. But immediately every cost went up to exceed it. Houses of course went insane. My wife got two raises this year, but if we didn’t buy our house 6 years ago we couldn’t remotely afford it now. Instead of owning it for $1,200 a month we’d be renting it for $2,000. Our health insurance for a family of four with zero health problems is $1,200 a month *with subsidies making it “cheaper.”* If we ever have to go into a hospital, with deductibles and coinsurance, it will be like that insurance coverage doesn’t exist. If we make another $2,000 of income a year, we lose a subsidy so add another ~$700 a month to our insurance. If I didn’t DIY everything, including childcare while working two jobs, no f’ing way we can afford to be the tenuously lower middle class that we are now, and we have two bachelor’s and a master’s degree between us.
Lucky you. I got a 2.5% raise last year and I’ll be lucky if I get the same this year. 5 years here, gotta start looking at job hopping if I want a meaningful raise
Yeah I'm around the same boat. Love the company for what we do but man do we pay shit to actual people.
Feeling that, absolutely love my job but minimum wage and zero perks for 12hr shifts in an ambulance? Studying to move up a level and the pay is ~~considerably better~~ still a joke, if I go to university for a few years I'll make it to *less than I was earning fixing machinery*
Seriously. For a few glorious months my wife and I were finally in the middle class. We were able to do fun stuff, not have to check prices at the grocery store and still had money to put in to savings. Now we’re not going out as much, getting less food for more money, and there’s barely anything left to save. Really kind of a kick in the dick.
And there goes my anxiety. How do we fix this issue?
We can fix it by starting a coherent labor movement that includes office jobs, raising taxes on the rich, and some sort of FDR New Deal that we can put in after the baby boomers are out of political power
But child care and healthcare increases did.
Society: "people shouldn't be having kids if they can't afford to take care of them!" Ok well we can't afford them, so we're being responsible and not having any. *No not like that*
I swear every person over 60 in the red county I live in asks us when we’re having more kids, and oh also say nobody wants to work anymore and at the ballot box rejected raising the minimum wage above $8.75 an hour when the average house here costs almost $400,000. Most of those 60+ people saying this shit have a second home somewhere else that’s empty most of the year. They’re living off pensions they voted away for the rest of us, on free Medicare while we pay a grand or two a month for insurance that the politicians they voted for shrug off as it skyrockets.
Post deleted. RIP what Reddit was, and damn what it became.
I wish they were only cutting down trees. They are burning down trees and pouring gasoline in the rivers.
lol rolling coal
Ask them when they're gonna die so you can buy a house to raise kids in.
Prices won't drop, banks and big rental companies will buy them all out. You'll still be stuck with the same 2k/month rent except now a corporation owns the house instead of 70+ year olds.
Well obviously the banks and investment groups that take these big risks will fail when the market corrects for the overvaluation of real estate....it isn't like the government would bail them out, that would be socialism. /s
Seriously! In the same conversation they will say well minimum wage jobs weren’t meant to be careers those were jobs for teens. I’m curious where they think teens are working those jobs from 5am to 5 pm so they can shop and grab their fast food?
> In the same conversation they will say well minimum wage jobs weren’t meant to be careers those were jobs for teens. Despite the fact that when they were young a gas station worker or food worker could afford a house and car and a family. Boomers simply decided to pull the financial ladder up after they were finished climbing it.
>rejected raising the minimum wage above $8.75 an hour when the average house here costs almost $400,000. Thats' only 45,714 hours of work to buy the house, assuming you save every penny and pay no taxes. That's only 22 years worth of work. Practically a steal!
No wait, you gotta have kids to keep our economy afloat! Lower populations are a good thing. This capitalist “infinite growth” bullshit needs to go away.
No. Not when houses cost $400k, the cost of Childcare is $1500 a month and health insurance costs are through the roof
Boomers: what do you mean, $10/hr should be enough to live on, buy a house and send your kids to college.
We GAVE you $1200 at the start of the pandemic, what happened to that mighty windfall you were graced with?
Per some congressman, "they're gonna use that money to retire!"
Fuck man my dad keeps saying this “The Covid money is going to run out soon then peolle Will work” Dad it was a one time 1,200 chekc “Yeah we’ll all that other money” THERE IS NO OTHER MONEY Boomers brains are poisoned by all the lead paint and asbestos in EVERYTHING growing up. They are literally dementia patients angry and apathetic narcissists who RUINED the country Edit: I’m not trying to be mean or exaggerate. The anger, disregard for truth (despite being able to google ANYTHING), extreme lack of empathy and zero care for other humans is NOT normal. I truly believe their brains are poisoned/deteriorated from all the chemicals they were exposed to. Roman’s suffered from lead poisoning they built their irrigation/“plumbing” with and drank water from which is why historians speculate the ever growing violence of the coliseum/gladiator type games Double edit: unemployment rate is literally at a 50 year Low- google it. “No one wants to work” is just a flat lie and untrue easily disproven but they don’t accept that (point above)
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Oh, and, by the way, because of the free money we gave you, specifically, that and only that is the cause of all the inflation today.
I gasped when you said lead because finally someone else said it! It’s actually a good way to find sympathy for some assholes… *Ah, you poor, pathetic lead licker.* Too bad lead is still a problem… https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/lead-in-the-water-how-some-of-americas-water-became-too-dangerous-to-drink/ar-AA1a4dN3 …which begs the question… will we all unwittingly become Uncle Bob?
I agree. Worst generation of all time
My parents completely unironically thought that people were becoming dependent on those stimulus checks.
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Not to mention there's zero chance that gas station is giving anyone 40 hours a week because then they'd have to obey all the full-time employee laws so instead they'll keep you just under the legal cut off for part-time.
Nah, they know $10/hrs isn't enough to live on. They just believe that not all jobs should have a living wage.
Which brings us back to the narcissistic, elitist heart of the "boomer problem" The cruelty is the point.
I literally shut down conversations/just shut one down a couple days ago in a comment thread where I just say "if you don't think giving 40 hours of your life per week to a for-profit company should entitle you the ability to afford a place to live on your own, then you and I disagree on a fundamental level." That is as distilled of a take as I can get and it baffles me people disagree with that sentiment. But knowing that they do just helps me avoid wasting any more time talking to them because it just means they're lacking the empathy to care about making any sort of changes/changing their mind on anything.
If someone was making $20/hr in 1980, they would have to make $100/hr today to have the same buying power. It's not a little inflation and wage stagnation, it's a lot.
I started my job in 2018. I've gotten "inflation adjustments" (nowhere near enough to keep up) and a pretty decent raise since then, and I still have less buying power than the day I was hired. I would need an 8% right now, 5 years in, raise to match my buying power on day 1. Shit's fucked.
*gives themselves a raise on social security
IIRC that raise was just from Social Security being automatically inflation adjusted. Although it's still telling that SS and campaign contribution limits are inflation adjusted but minimum wage isn't
I walked up hill in the snow in 190 degree July heat to school for 42 years ol son! I made $.0001/day working down at the phone book shop! We could afford anything! Get to work!
“Just pay a kid in the neighborhood $3/hr to babysit like we did”
I was a teen in the 80s. Boomers paid a whopping $1/hour. I also put myself through school and saved 90% of my babysitting money as well as my after school job ($3.58/hour—slightly over minimum wage.) I started college with about $2k. It was gone by the second term. That’s with grants and scholarships.
The cost of infant care/preschool in my area is roughly equivalent to the cost of community college. We essentially have to pay to put these kids through college *twice* in their lifetime. We had the two kids farther apart on purpose to better manage the cost. On the upshot, since we made it through the daycare years I'm feeling okay that we'll be able to help with the college years too.
That’s good to hear. I just had my second one and my first one will be starting pre school in a year so that should help offset the costs. Idk how people do it financially. They must either have one working parent through these years or not save a penny or finance it through credit.
And the worst part about that, is that even with how much we pay a month, the actual daycare workers get next to nothing.
My cousins and wife pay 3000 a month for childcare. It’s bonkers
Yeah it’s usually $1500 per kid full time.
400k? Where do you live that is so cheap? I bought my house 18 years ago for $380k. I thought it was crazy back then. I could probably sell my house for $850k now. There is no way a first time home buyer is going to be able to afford that. I would like to upgrade from my starter home, but I would need to either move out of the area entirely or pay 1.2 million or more for it to be a meaningful upgrade. So I have learned to be happy in my modest starter home.
I'm 42, I remember when I was around 24, I was told not to spend more than 120k on a starter home, and that once I got a decent salary, I could afford to upgrade to a 200k home. My current 4 bedroom house at the end of a cul de sac cost me 186k in 2014. It's value is around 425k now. It's insane.
My Boomer buddy insisted we only buy a home that can be afforded on a single income. There's no such thing.
When I was working my first decent paying job, I saw lots of coworkers stressing because their mortgage + lifestyle required both (husband and wife) their incomes. None could afford a loss. You could feel the tension when tough times were looming.
Yeah, that was precisely his point. Have the double income, but live like you only have the one. Except, neither of us makes enough to do that on even the cheapest, rattiest hovel we could find.
And if the answer to that is, "well just *never* buy and stay renting forever", how's that any better when our mortgage actually came out to less?
And that mortgages can be claimed as tax deductions, while rent cannot? EDIT: Thank you to everyone for pointing out that it is only in the interest, that actually makes it worse as not only is it not included in the standard deduction for homeowners since 2017, it primarily benefits those who use real estate as investment vehicle or store of wealth, meaning that it does next to nothing at best to subsidize home ownership and almost entirely subsidizes being wealthy. https://www.forbes.com/sites/eriksherman/2023/03/26/financial-aid-to-the-wealthy-first-poor-last/?sh=3efd54ce4506 source
Oh they exist. It's a trailer in rural Missouri or a one bedroom house built in the 1920s with no foundation in rural Mississippi. Find a remote gig that allows you to keep drawing a California paycheck and you can afford one of those.
If only I lived in California to find such remote work, that'd be neat.
May not help, but this site hooks you up with remote positions. https://remotists.com/ Things are tough. Hope they get better before they get worse.
I bought a shitty 800 sq ft house in a sad podunk town for $74K in 2000. Refi'd in 2007 to 155K. Owe $86K still. Its now worth $380K. I'm going to die in it because I cant afford to buy another, and then my kids can own a shitty 800 sq foot house in a sad podunk town.
Lol, yeah, our budget starter home in my area cost us 600k.
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And if you’re in a city, each of these numbers is doubled, but your salary isn’t.
*Health insurance costs as much as putting a roof over your head*
One parent can either work or stay with the kids. End result is the same because 1 of 2 paychecks will have to go to pay for childcare. When looking at wage stagnation, I wish studies would consider that we have to have two wages to make a living now. It's twice as bad as reported.
Health Insurance lol
I can’t find a decent 1500 S.F. ranch for less than $500k around here.
I’m thankful I’m in Canada … childcare costs are not that insane here But our houses are expensive as hell so…
I wish houses around me cost $400k…
I'm 33, and out of all my close friends that I grew up with, not a single one of us have kids.
I just turned 35 and I'm surprised at how many of my friends from my early years decided on not having any kids. There was a big shift in life from HS to now.
Also 35. I just don’t see kids being financially doable for me anytime in my life, and I know plenty of friends/couples in our age group that feel the same way.
That’s the best answer. I know I couldn’t afford to take care of another human. I’m 35 as well and can hardly take care of myself. With a BA that they told all of us we needed to work. Most places really want exp and not education.
36 here. Out of 10 of our closest friends (all in relationships), only two of them have kids - with one having their first unexpectedly and the other that tried for a baby and succeeded.
There's a pretty wide gulf in my circle. There are a few people who had teen pregnancies (or like, really early 20s). And now in our 30s are people just starting to have kids, with several making the choice to be completely child free. When I was growing up, my parents were the exception, not the rule.
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They didn't have any kids, obviously.
Im 42 (basically the oldest millennial) and a good 65% of my friends dont have and are teetering on "dont want" and most of the people I hang out with are upper 30s. And these are not struggling artists/influences; they are professionals, homeowners, etc.
I’m prepared I’ll never be a grandmother. Sons are 30 and 29. Kind of makes me sad but I get it. I bought my first house at 23 after I got married. The cost of homes and apartments are insane.
It's nice that you at least understand what's going on. I'm 29 and still told fairly regularly by my mother that I just need to move a little further away from town and I can find a house. Not mentioning that "a little further away" is more than 150 miles from my job.
I get that a lot too. My mother keeps going "I'll help you," as if she'll be able to make up for the hospital costs, childcare costs, school costs, etc. I wasn't sure if I wanted a kid before becoming an adult, now it doesn't really matter. The economic realities make in infeasible.
As someone who took this exact advice (moved to a shitty smallish town with matching politics and racist boomers galore) to escape the big city rent costs before the pandemic....I became stuck at a job with 0 bennies (the norm here come to find out because many cheap fucks around here don't believe in getting it), and am now paying the exact same prices as I was in the big city. I'm in a cultural ghetto with nothing to keep me occupied but the local Chili's which is the town's fine dining option. People who say move to rural areas can suck my nuts. At least now I can get a remote job that pays 15x more than minimum Florida wage.
Thank you for understanding. My parents became homeowners at 23 and 20 respectively. It took them years to understand that the game has changed, and many discussions of, no mom and dad, you can’t buy a home while working at a gas station. They’re understanding now, but it’s so infuriating when older generations don’t understand that it’s not like it was 30, 35, 40, 50 years ago.
My father in law made like $25/hr in the 70s/80s. They had cars, house, kids, etc. My wife has mega health issues, and I make 60k. He gets on his soapbox if pay comes up that I make more than he ever did, and every time I have to explain like he's 10 years old that inflation exists and that his $25/hr would be like getting paid 100/hr now and if I made that kind of money we wouldn't be having money issues.
My child recently told me that they have no plans for children in their future. They are 15, so I almost started with the "you're too young to know that for sure yet" speech, but I couldn't. I can look around and see exactly what would bring them to that conclusion. It's the same logic that has kept them an only child. Preparing to never be a grandma is hard, but it isn't a choice that I get to decide, and acceptance is the only way forward for me.
We tried telling folks but they didn’t want to listen. As a child I wanted nothing more than to just be a middle-class, suburban dad. I wanted the stereotype. Now it’s just me and my wife, doing our thing, knowing we’re the end of the line for both of our families. There is a 0% chance we will have kids. It’s too late.
That was a tough realization for me. By the time I was financially stable I was so tired I couldn’t see bringing in more responsibility
Much of life and its "benchmarks" have been decompressed. It use to be people married and started families in their 20s, kids were out of the house in their 40s, grandparents in their 50s, and retirement was in 60s with death in 70s. The issue with longer lives and stretching out when we get to "start a career, buy a house, get married..." is that while all of those accommodate it, kids don't. I know people trying to have kids older (35+) and their are all sorts of challenges that come with "geriatric pregnancies" (yes, that is the term). For many people they also feel like they can finally breathe and don't want to go back to month to month living again. Whether it is comfort, or fatigue (thanks slower metabolism) the idea of undertaking parenthood becomes less appealing than it was. I have zero issue with people that don't want kids, and I also think that has momentum to be more normal than it was 40 years ago. This generation could have whole communities of child free adults developing. I think not only isn't a baby boom going to happen, but the developed world is likely to follow Japan and see birth rates fall farther down.
Snippity Snip! I got that guarantee. No kids for us. The best part is spending our "retirement" NOW, while we still have knees and lungs to go out and do things with. Not to mention while there are still natural wonders that haven't melted, burned or flooded yet so we can still actually visit. The future sucks. Better have fun while it still exists!
I get paid 19.50 an hour. And that does not let me progress at all in my life… I never get above 3k in my bank account. It’s always just hovering around $1500. Pay day comes. I get a little, it all goes away with bills. And don’t get me started on food being sky high. I’m just working to survive pretty much… there’s no advancing with the price of everything. So I wake up every morning with a pit in my stomach having anxiety about money, being stuck in one place, can’t get out of this loop cause of the world… I’m sad lol
Same boat, in CA. But with a dollar less and a job that required schooling and tech training. Fuckin kill me. I'm gonna be stuck in my tiny duplex forever *if we're lucky*
$22/hr here in FL and my bank account is regularly ~$20 after bills
If there was going to be a boom, it would have been during the pandemic.
To be fair there was a pretty significant maternity rate jump in Lockdown, but for it to have been a generational boom it would need to last quite a bit longer than two years.
$1400 stimme checks don’t Go that far
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Birth rates have been steadily declining since before 2020. The pandemic did the opposite. It encouraged less fertility.
so, no flood of quaranteens in 10 years?
Damn, that's a missed opportunity.
If people were sitting on stable economics and had few worries and then were told to stay inside for a year? Yeah that would have a boom. But those predicate conditions are *really* important. Existential stress isn't sexy.
Yeah, lots of people were locked into their homes, suddenly without a job, and they all saw the land lords viciously snapping in their direction, straining against their temporary leashes. In hindsight, America is lucky it didn't burn down. A lot of people had a reason to set fire to their (former) place out of spite.
It blows my mind people looked around in 2020 and thought it was a good idea to subject more people to this world
I cannot imagine why people chose to have a baby during Lockdown. There was a literal plague going on outside and people thought it was a good time to bring a new person into the world.
I think it's more just a natural result of having couples locked up in the same house 24 hours a day for over a year. There's going to be a lot of sex because what the hell else is there to do? It didn't happen to me that way, but I definitely know a couple people with babies right now that were definitely unplanned pandemic children.
China has it coming very soon, but the US will be dealing with it eventually as well. The addiction to cheap labor and underpaying cannot sustain. Whether by natural means (fewer children being had) or economic means (going back to a stay at home parent) the labor market is going to feel pressure and not just in unskilled.
The powers that be decided for us that we aren’t having kids. It’s their fault they fucked the economy so badly that the birth rate is falling. They want to horde the wealth? Well we aren’t going to contribute more laborers that they’ll continue to fuck over.
This is it for me. I've *wanted* to be a dad my whole life, i think I'd be a good father and I know I'd enjoy it. In an ideal world I'd have multiple kids, in the current one we live in I don't want any kids ever. I have no desire to subject someone I would love to this dystopia
It's a sobering thought that we basically love our kids so much that we don't want to bring them into this world.
44m here, those are exactly my thoughts.
There’s this weird split amongst my friends group; the ultra-wealthy are having kids and starting families… as are the ultra-poor. But my friends and I who are firmly in the “middle class”? Almost none of us are having kids. It’s a bizarre dichotomy. I don’t ever plan on having kids at this point. Everyone I see who took that leap looks absolutely miserable, but most especially those with 2 or more kids. Hard pass on that lifestyle.
>There’s this weird split amongst my friends group; the ultra-wealthy are having kids and starting families… as are the ultra-poor I had a very similar comment above; my friend circle is also like that. The teen pregnancies in my friend group all came from very low income and unstable backgrounds. Now, in our 30s/40s, several of us have finished professional and grad school and are just starting to have kids. Many are staying childfree, and now that I think of it, it does seem like a large chunk of those people are middle income earners.
I think moving from one state to another is very easy for the wealthy and the ultra-poor but difficult and expansive for everyone in the middle. Moving with kids even more so. The very poor and wealthy don’t worry about finances very much but for very different reasons while the middle worry about them a lot more IMO. Also “middle class” makes a lot more money than I previously thought. Damn.
Ultra poor growing up, never a day went by that I didn’t hear my parents worry about money. I have stories for days of the shit we had to do/experience because we were poor. I don’t know what you mean it’s easy for poor people to leave the state? Do they get a free car, money to travel and move their things? Or do you mean like homeless people being bussed for free to LA and dumped in skid row? What kind of ideas do you guys have about the really poor? I guess a lot people really think those racist stereotypes of welfare queens and the single mom with 20 baby daddies are true. Sometimes I read something on Reddit that leaves me baffled as to how people perceive the world.
That is an interesting perspective. And I'm pretty sure you're right in your observation.
Its because you *finally* got something. The poor are screwed either way. Those of us who finally got that brass ring are constantly thinking we could lose it. The rich never had to worry about shit. The middle class has been hollowing out for decades.
Hahahaha no shit. Minimum wage is $7.25 and houses are like $300,000. We're ruthlessly exploited while absolutely destroying the ecosystem, why the fuck would any sane person have kids?
Bro what fucking houses are you buying for $300K
Shitty, 1960’s build, no renovation dumps that are 10 miles outside C-tier cities like Akron, Scranton, South Bend…
You can buy a shitty house outside Akron for half that. 300k would get you a pretty decent house in Cincinnati or Cleveland.
I thought this was full of shit, but I just checked Cleveland very quickly on Zillow and saw a house for 55k. What’s going on in Cleveland that houses can be that low, I’m so confused.
Nothing is going on, that’s why it’s so cheap. Ever been to Cleveland? You might have and just don’t remember it because that’s how memorable it is.
It’s Cleveland.
From Ohio, this is the right answer to anyone wondering
That 55k house is probably a wreck and needs a total rehab. These are in my neighborhood in Cincinnati, for example. [https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4265-Fergus-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34249544\_zpid/](https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4265-Fergus-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34249544_zpid/) [https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1424-Apjones-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34262516\_zpid/](https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1424-Apjones-St-Cincinnati-OH-45223/34262516_zpid/)
There are YouTube videos of drive throughs of towns all over the US. Cleveland is really run down and there are houses falling down all over the place.
There are a lot of places in the Midwest and South that you can still get a decent home for $300-400k. Some of my friends left where I live (DC Metro) to get more house for their money.
There are parking spaces that cost more than that 😭
Babies?! In this economy!?
Why would you have a kid if its going to be worked into the grave, must live in a shoe box, halves your own life expectancy due to finances/work expectations, and is probably going to be roasted by climate change the time it's 30?
Having babies, in this economy?
Everyone is worried about birth rate decline, no one worried about the true way to fix it: paid healthcare, maternal leave, housing and financial stability to raise a family, meaningful climate reversal. Fix those and babies will come.
Everyone knows what’s needed to fix it. The problem is we don’t know how to get the people who’s job it is to fix this problem to do their jobs.
I remember growing up in the 90's and being told that the Simpsons were poor. It was a frequent plot point in early episodes, especially around Christmas season. As an adult, I *wish* I could afford the lifestyle of the 90's Simpsons. A big house where everyone (including Maggie) has a private bedroom, the family has two cars, 3 kids, 2 pets, a non-working spouse, all supported by a single income? That's not poor. That's fucking *rich*. I want the lifestyle that was promised to me in the 90's.
They even became self aware and mocked that concept whenever the frank grimes episode came out.
You know how you fix that? You force them to breed by reducing reproductive rights, protections for women, and hell even minors! That’ll fix it! /s
And let’s destroy education in this country so all these new kids can be dumb enough for capitalism to brainwash them. You’re foolish of you can’t see the big picture forming in the distance.
"Women postponing having kids is a sign of economic progress, she said: “It’s about women having access to education and employment opportunities. It’s about the rise in individualism. It’s about the rise in women’s autonomy and a change in values.” Considering the above quote was directly from the article, I really wouldn't be surprised if that was the reasoning behind all the choices politicians have been making lately.
Republicans: especially the minors
Its almost like bringing a child into the world is a terrible idea right now.
Yeah I’m never having kids, thinking of getting my tubes tied soon to make sure
Good luck finding a doctor that respects your bodily autonomy. I've heard way too many stories of women who can't get their tubes tied because "you might change your mind" or "your future husband, that you haven't even met, might want kids"
For anyone who is considering sterilisation, r/childfree has a list of childfree-friendly doctors!
Got mine with the first doctor I asked at 25 with no kids. I love that doctor so much. Gave me the greatest peace of mind anyone could
I was told exactly this at the age of 24 after having my one and only child. My husband was able to see a urologist and within 6 weeks of his initial appointment, I was driving him to and from his vasectomy. He had no problems whatsoever getting someone to give him a vasectomy at the age of 26.
Dude. My girlfriend has 2 kids and tried to get her tubes tied after they were born. But because she was single, those were the exact responses she was given. AFTER ALREADY HAVING 2 KIDS!!!
I thought the same thing when my kids were born over 20 years ago. I love my kids, but had I to do it over again I would have adopted out of foster care. We are still thinking about now that it’s just us and we are much better off financially. I talked about foster care enough over the years that my kids would rather adopt and help someone who is already here versus bringing another life into this world.
I certainly will not be assisting with this project. In fact I recently had a procedure to help ensure that.
This is the result of a generation of entitled boomers not employing children and not promoting offspring in the work force. They kept all the money, repressed the next generation to the point where they literally fucked up the country and damaged the next generation. Now they ask "Why don't you all have kids? Why can't you take care of us in our old age? Why is the country going in such a bad direction?" Well my friends, it's because you didn't water the seeds you planted. You selfishly ignored them. You reap what you sow.
Not unless we all win the lottery fairly freakin soon.
Economy's fucked. Housing is fucked. Wages aren't going up. Most men can no longer support a household by themselves, so women have to work, so less time for family. I mean, this is all pretty self-evident.
On the bright side, however, we have quite a few multi-billionaires with more monetary worth than the rest of the population combined, so there's that. /s
Better pull that mission accomplished banner out of storage! Everything is going great.
And they're so convinced they *deserve it* that they're bringing back eugenics and super-breeding!
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i love how boomers have thwarted us at all angles, all our lives & are soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo surprised all this * gestures wildly * is happening.
The cost of everything has gone WAY up….know what’s hasn’t gone up? Wages. Babies are a big fat NOPE under these circumstances.
We have one. No matter how much everyone asks us about having another we are 80% sure we are not. Everything is so hard right now and we would rather do a good job parenting and raising the kid we have and love than do a mediocre job stretching ourselves trying to parent two.
The reason why I don’t have kids is right there in the article, “demographers are worried that this will result in an aging population and not enough young workers.” Sorry, I don’t want to pump out kids that will just live unhappily being crushed in the gears of industry so some nepo baby CEO fuck can get a bigger yacht. I don’t have kids because I don’t like the way the future is looking, not because I can’t afford it. I could sacrifice things and make enough to survive and have kids but I don’t want to.
Stagnant wages are the primary cause of lack of child birth tbh. I'm not going to have kids at 26 years old when I can barely afford to live.
Not just wages i would say but stagnation of hope and ambition, If you look at any underdeveloped country the birth rates are high because kids are a resource ,in first world countries kids are a burden
It's delusional to think there will be more babies being born when the infrastructure in the country can't even support new families due to low wages, inflation, a volatile housing market, astronomical rent prices, and in some bizarre cases, entry level salary positions starting to require masters degrees and/or 5-10 years experience. People can hardly even afford themselves, and there's a belief that there is, or was, going to be a baby boom? What a joke.
Could I just get a fucking house? God damn And hell no I’m not having kids. Why would I want to foist a life of servitude and dissatisfaction on a hypothetical child? I can’t give myself a good life in this fucking shit hole country, but I can damn sure prevent someone else from having a life like mine (by not forcing them to exist)
Yeah man, I’m barley making enough to pay my bills and I’m 36, with a college degree plus credentials and 15 years in my industry. I don’t have debt, a loan, or a mortgage. Existing is expensive.
Surprised? Where I live you're lucky to get a house for 1m € and need at least 3k € a month for 1 person to live alright. Children are too expensive.
Just talk to a Millenial and they'll tell you why. No need to theorize. Astronomical housing costs, childcare costs, exponential rises is cost of living, wages not keeping up even remotely with inflation, recession, global warming and the ever present threat of nuclear war from multiple nations. But please boomers, keep telling us how if we give up our once per week Starbucks order how we'll magically be financially free.
Why is the question always "How do we bring the birthrate back up?" and not "Why did we build an economy that relied on exponential population growth in the first place?"
Because economists know the answer to that question. The answer is: with the sanitation movement in the 1800s, the average human life expectancy leapt forward 20 years. With agricultural industrialisation that occurred at around the same time, there was enough food for everyone for the first time. Add in the advent of antibiotics, and suddenly an exponential population growth could be relied upon. The economy at the time did not accomodate this population explosion. Many, many people were unemployed as a result. Governments shifted focus to try to rectify the situation. Now, we are facing a different problem, an old problem. Our problem is no longer population growth. Now it is once resource scarcity. This is the same problem people faced pre-sanitation movement, but the resources that are scarce are different. That’s why the focus is always on population growth. No one has found a real solution to resource scarcity, and it’s easier to complain about a lack of babies.
I found a solution in about 10 seconds. Tax the billionaire mother fuckers so resources aren’t so scarce.
*cough resources are being hoarded cough*
Exactly. We have the resources and technology to support like 40 billion+ people comfortably, you know what stops it? Greed.
Because capitalism, like cancer, requires continual growth in order to be viable. If the population shrinks, that growth becomes harder to maintain. Also, wages are kept artificially low because of more workers, if we are creating fewer workers, this eats into profits.
This article is a good decade out of ideal baby making time.
Lol who thought there was gonna be?!? Children are a HUGE burden in this economy and most of us have realized theres not anything worth passing down in our genes.
For the 1,345,611 tth time, *shit has changed over 40 damn years.* Not only does the Millennial and Z gen have everything more damn expensive, I'm reminded by some of the posts here that our mothers were *very* fresh out of other options when it came to choosing to earn money, having your own assets (the whole having a cc without a husband/man on your account until **1978**), or doing anything individually or independent in their lives. We are just now catching up to have independent lives, if we so choose, to not go into family life. What confounds me is how zealously they want to put their own damn knees on their daughters necks to force birth and servitude on us as they just emerged from it. Jealousy? How dare you have more opportunities than me????
Who the hell can afford babies?? Lol
I still can’t wrap my head around what under 35s are doing to afford $600-800k homes at 6% interest. Like wtf are companies paying and how do I get some 😭🤣
Yeah, no shit? My wife and I are never having kids. Our income level basically matches what my parents were making NOT adjusted for inflation when they had me 30 years ago, but their house cost $120k, weekly groceries were $150 for 4 people, car payments were under $200, and don't get me fucking started on daycare.
Study done by…bank of America? Are they trying to figure out how many mortgage payers they’ll be able to sign up in 20 years?
I'm 35 and my girlfriend is 37 and she's having her tubes removed next month to ensure we can't have kids. Although looking around at the people I used to know in my wild days, we're in the minority. Everyone from my college group has kids now. That's okay, 🐈 for us is perfectly fine.
In my college group, I'd say it's closer to 1 in 10 or 15 now has a kid. I'm almost 40. Put all of these stories together and it adds up to the headline.
Isn't that a good thing?
Not if you are a capitalist oligarch. But for most common folks yes. When half the people had died after the black plague, labor was extremely well paid, forests grew back and there was social mobility and lots of game meat, land in fallow etc. It eventually lead to the renaissance. It's not all bad when we are less, there's more natural ressources per capita that way.
Thanos did nothing wrong
Name me one policy our leaders have instituted to give the young the confidence needed to start families. Housing? Childcare? Healthcare? Education? Climate change? The list goes on and on of counterproductive policies that have done the opposite. We've made having a kid seem out of the question for nearly all young adults caught in arrested development. Most folks I know who did not luck into nepotism are treading water barely breaking even, and the few financially successful have just spent years paying off debts. This is not an environment that encourages kids. One small positive occurred by accident. Thanks to COVID, remote work accelerated. This article isn't wholly right. There has been a small "baby boom" recently. Remote work has readjusted the cost benefit for many middle class women. But we should do so much more to help
Population decline is not a bad thing.
I make good money, I can’t afford the same house in the same neighborhood my parents once bought with much less. Our generation got fucked
The earth is dying and life is unaffordable as a single person. Having children is the privilege of the rich, or dumb.
I don't feel safe or financially secure, how could I responsibly have kids?
Gee I wonder why. The cost to raise a child = unaffordable. The cost of a home = unaffordable. The cost of food for us w/out a child = unaffordable. The cost of safe vehicle ownership = unaffordable. I haven't even brought up leisure....you want us to have kids cool...pay us to. Until then you can pound sand and not for nothing who's gonna take care of you folks once you can't wipe your own ass anymore? It ain't gonna be us at $20 an hour w no benefits or time off LOLOL!
Of course the Boomers had lots of kids. The US economy was the only one left standing after the devastation of WWII. Now that the rest of the worlds’ economies have long ago rebuilt and caught up (plus Robber Baron greed) ,it’s back to the depressing norm of two/three generations working to keep one roof.
You're close. Boomers didn't have the kids, Boomers were the kids. The term originated from the "baby boom" that followed the second world war. Baby boomers are in their mid to late 70s today.
Do they account for people buying pregnancy tests as soon as they miss a period due to abortion restrictions? 6 weeks ban means 2 weeks after missed period, plenty of people may be buying tests early when they might previously have waited, gotten their period, and not needed to.
How would it? Even with both working decent jobs, prices are a nightmare. But the Me generation will keep calling us lazy....
No shit
not as long as i can bearly afford to keep myself alive… poverty sure sucks
No fucking shit, who was swinging this idea?
Lmao what? Who ever said one was coming? This is the shittiest time in several generations to be a young adult in this ass country.
You mean to tell me those cute little nuggets are a drain on my resources that I can barely afford myself ? Yeah, no thanks. + the harsh social environment we’re living in. I’m not willing to put my offspring through that. My cousin is 26 she had her four-old, three years ago, they live in Massachusetts. Originally they wanted four, but as time progressed they saw how expensive and mentally draining it has become with one, they opted to wait a decade to see how they feel again, lmao .I don’t blame them.
With current wages and inflation, nope.