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No one wants to have kids anymore

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Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#341

Post by shapefrog »

ehutch79 wrote: post #67
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #43

A word of advice to anyone on the fence about having kids: There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to have kids, but do yourself and consult with actual parents for what it’s really like to have kids. Articles like this one, which are written by someone who apparently has chosen not to have children, are almost universally terrible at representing the true experience of being a parent. Yes, being a parent involves a…

Real parents consistently make it clear how terrible having kids is. The childless among us hear every complaint and lament about how terrible it is. Why would we do that to ourselves?

There are tons of "having a kid is great" in this thread. I have been present at many conversations in groups along these lines ... in multiple cases, the same people 1 on 1 tell me afterwards the exact opposite, what they have said in a group setting was an outright lie.

Nobody wants to be the one who speaks out, everyone is saying its amazing because the others say it is amazing.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#342

Post by stanski »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #91
ehutch79 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real parents consistently make it clear how terrible having kids is. The childless among us hear every complaint and lament about how terrible it is. Why would we do that to ourselves?

I have 2 kids, I don’t recommend it. Quality of life decline is steep unless you’re wealthy and can hire robust childcare support, and it causes a significant decline in relationship satisfaction with your partner. Maybe you end up happy in the end, maybe you don’t, it’s Russian Roulette in a different form. People who tell you to go for it aren’t going to make you whole if it doesn’t work out or be your village when…

I'm curious why you ended up having two?

My wife and I are done with the one. I think we got lucky - she is a sweet, fun and fairly easy (for now) two year old, but the decrease in life quality is significant. I didn't want to further extend the monotony of our current life by having a second.

Overall my advice to anyone would be if you are not missing anything in your life and are happy, you don't have to have children. Other people might tell you how great it is (after complaining a bunch, and then complaining some more later) but that's their life, not yours.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#343

Post by mcv »

nicodjimenez wrote: post #29

The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems. Btw this article neglects to mention a very important feedback loop: less babies equals less economic growth, which equals less babies because it’s too expensive, which in turn leads to less economic growth and so on. Collapsing birth rates are a serious problem! You won’t notice until the country becomes a depopulated wasteland and then it will be too…

> The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems.

Is that a serious comment, or sarcasm? Because banning condoms will not solve any problems, it will create more.

If you want people to have more kids, make sure they can afford more kids: pay young families more, give them the ability to buy a house big enough to raise children in, provide affordable childcare, and offer better healthcare to pregnant women, instead of worse.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#344

Post by fsflover »

frumper wrote: post #337
fsflover wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When there are too many people on Earth to support a sustainable live for humanity, not having kids is the paramount for survival. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33879397

It's my job to teach my kids well enough to get them into a position to survive. The Earth is huge.

I was talking about the survival of humanity.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#345

Post by mcv »

nicodjimenez wrote: post #90
inetknght wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems. It might solve the "problem" that the article discusses. But it will create many many more worse problems.

Worse problems than a dying population? I don’t think so. If the population keeps getting older and smaller by definition it is dying. And not dying is the first imperative of life.

The population is getting older partially because we've gotten a lot better at preventing people from dying. And the population is not getting smaller, but bigger. The population is growing and dying less.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#346

Post by toomanyrichies »

zpeti wrote: post #126
thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it’s your choice, but you’re definitely missing out on something special. I totally forgot to mention the patronizing attitude that so many people come to this conversation with. Thank for you for heads up.

Patronising is thinking you know what it’s like having children without having them. You don’t. You have no idea of the emotional and practical side of having children, and how hard and how amazing it is, and how it’s the best and hardest part of your life up until then. Patronising is thinking you know you don’t want kids without having them. You don’t. You have no idea what it’s like.

> Patronising is thinking you know you don’t want kids without having them. You don’t. You have no idea what it’s like.

In this example, who exactly am I being patronizing toward? Myself?

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#347

Post by Balgair »

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #36

> But deep down I get it. Babies are a huge opportunity cost. Financially speaking, they are like winning the lottery but backwards. You can't even think of having one without cancelling your subscription to a good night's sleep. And if you take into account inflation, economic recession, and the rest of the news cycle's highlight reel, even a one-child family can seem to have one too many mouths to fish Lego pieces…

Two nit-picks:

1 - It's likely going to cost more than 100k per year per kid to send them off to college in ~18 years, even to a very cheap state school. The financial picture gets really complex, so talk to an advisor and not some random internet commenter. That said, our own financial advisor has us planning for ~1M total per kid for college, but we're very much on the high end here.

2 - I've helped a lot of family members pass away in the last few years. It's been abnormally high, but the world has been abnormal too. I've helped somewhat poor family and very very wealthy family pass. The one thing I've learned is that the last few years/months are not something you can save for.

Not that you can't have so much cash as to not pass it along. But that the swanky retirement home is not very swanky at the end of the day. One family member was in a memory care place that was costing ~20k / mo. Yes, really. They had very good pensions. But the thing is that the retirement/hospice is still just a job to the people there.

They aren't getting out of bed at 3am to change you, to pick you up, to bathe you. They put you in an ambulance in lieu of putting you back in a chair, because of lawsuits. They are doing the bare minimum that they have to. Trying to plan for your retirement care via lawyer is just never going to cover all the bases and little things that come up.

The only people that are going to be taking care of you when the end is near (and that can be for years of time), are the people that love you. Sure, your kids may hate you, but that's mostly on you. But people that do not love you are not going to take very good care of you at all. That doesn't mean kids for sure, it can be other people. But you've got to have people that love you close by you near the end.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#348

Post by toomuchtodo »

stanski wrote: post #342
toomuchtodo wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have 2 kids, I don’t recommend it. Quality of life decline is steep unless you’re wealthy and can hire robust childcare support, and it causes a significant decline in relationship satisfaction with your partner. Maybe you end up happy in the end, maybe you don’t, it’s Russian Roulette in a different form. People who tell you to go for it aren’t going to make you whole if it doesn’t work out or be your village when…

I'm curious why you ended up having two? My wife and I are done with the one. I think we got lucky - she is a sweet, fun and fairly easy (for now) two year old, but the decrease in life quality is significant. I didn't want to further extend the monotony of our current life by having a second. Overall my advice to anyone would be if you are not missing anything in your life and are happy, you don't have to have child…

First one required several rounds of IVF and a switch to a remote job to have the flexibility needed for such an endeavor, second one was unexpected. Got a vasectomy after the second.

Experience is what we get what when we don’t get what we expected.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#349

Post by stanski »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #348
stanski wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious why you ended up having two? My wife and I are done with the one. I think we got lucky - she is a sweet, fun and fairly easy (for now) two year old, but the decrease in life quality is significant. I didn't want to further extend the monotony of our current life by having a second. Overall my advice to anyone would be if you are not missing anything in your life and are happy, you don't have to have child…

First one required several rounds of IVF and a switch to a remote job to have the flexibility needed for such an endeavor, second one was unexpected. Got a vasectomy after the second. Experience is what we get what when we don’t get what we expected.

Interesting. You sound like me from the future or something, except we only had to do IUIs instead. No vasectomy yet but maybe this is a good warning.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#350

Post by kylehotchkiss »

0xbadc0de5 wrote: post #116

My personal experience - and I've heard many others repeat the same sentiment: When you're single, your happiness levels typically range on a scale from 0 to 10. Once you get married, that range expands to run from -100 to +100. Then when you have kids, all the limits are removed.

Hah, agreed. Getting married has been a major highlight for me. Occasional -100 but many many +100s.
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