While that position is coherent, the urge to have a legacy and reproduce, can also be found in the form of wanting the environment — the world — to persist after us.
The environmental argument against kids insults me (not that you should care). As if it's a binary choice between preserving the environment and preserving our species. I like to think that humans of tomorrow will find ways to solve problems we don't yet know how, so that we can save the environment and our species :)
It's not as if less people having kids leads to humanity becoming extinct. We're still growing way too fast. Some people will just want them and that's fine.
It's just something that was previously seen as a virtue (or for example for Catholics almost a holy priority) is now becoming a hobby. And if not everyone takes up that hobby we can be sustainable for a lot longer. Even a population decline wouldn't be bad after we've been growing so hard as a species.
Of course we can't keep growing forever. And hoping the future comes up with a magical answer is exactly how we got into the climate mess we're in right now.
But that's good! Let it peak, drop a bit, and stabilise around 2 billion or so. That would be perfect for long-term sustainability.
We've seen the same here in Europe. My parents' generation usually had large families, my generation had mostly 1-2 kids, and these days many families have no kids.
Of course poorer countries and countries that are still very religious are a bit behind but they will catch up too. Humanity won't go extinct, there will always be people happy to have children.
Honest questions: Can we maintain our current tech level with 2 billion people?
And if we can't, is that fair to future generations? Aren't we condemning them to a more miserable life? (On the other hand, if 8 billion people leads to destroying the environment, that also leaves them more miserable...)
Of course we can. Even with a lot less. We can automate the hell out of everything :) In fact there's a big concern that there won't be enough work. Even hypercapitalist countries like the US are thinking about UBI now.
Food will be a bigger problem but less people also means less food needed.
That's what they told us in the 60s/70s/80s and we're still working as much while our standards are lowering but ok, we'll automagically fix things, we're just waiting for the right time
Standards are lowering precisely because there are too many people chasing the same ressources... You can't share everything beyond a certain point.
The boomerism view of infinite growth is incredibly stupid especially if you start evaluating material requirement for a standard rich boomer lifestyle.
The only reason we could have so many people on the planet at once is because almost half of them live in poverty, close to animal standard with some human technology sprinkled in some place...
It's just shortsighted to believe that having so many people was sustainable in the first place.
Remove your doomer glasses and be a bit more objective in assessing your countries achievements. Listening to your kind of folk you'd wonder why people risk their lives to migrate here if it was such a hellscape. Some countries are doing what yours did 3 generations ago right now and they don't have a tenth of your inherited guilt, nor a tenth of the media presence
> Eventually the wave of old people is gone and things are back to normal. It's not something we can't overcome.
What do you mean by back to normal ? The African demographic boom, even if we didn't have our own fertility problem, will ensure there will be no back to "normal". History is never about going back to normal
Right, I overstated the implication. More people deciding not to have children does not lead to extinction. It's just that when people say things like "not having kids is good for environment" it comes off as a moral prescription that ought to apply to everyone, and hence those who violate it are the bad guys (selfishly acting to harm the environment). And yet if sustainability -- rather than self-extinction -- is the goal, we need a mix of both types of people.
Am I wrong to interpret it like that?
The ones who insist on having children as an ultimate virtue, I find them to be just as wrong.
Either choice is fine, and the moral objections to either one are unreasonable.
People who don't care about the environment are breeding like rabbits. Their children, too, won't care about the environment.
The best thing you can do for the environment is to find someone as passionate as yourself and create a large family of conscientious, thoughtful, active environmentalists.
The absence of people with bad ideas won't help as much as a surplus of people with good ideas. Since even if we had half the people they could still pollute like crazy.
Very few people in first world countries though, will be able to balance or surpass negative environmental effects of all the usual things included in raising a child, even with activist lives. Neither will their children.
If there were no humans, the environment would be destroyed when the sun expands.
Humans are the only hope for other species including animals and plants, since we can bring them into outer space and use energy storage or from other parts of the solar system / galaxy to preserve life further.
I have two kids. It's tough. But this kind of "opinion" column on a large network is just despicable.
Kids is the hardest thing to come to life, I call it "life on hard mode". And I've moved across the world. But the gains are immense.
You can bend yourself backward your entire career trying to achieve something that is taken away in a whiff. Your children is a richer investment. When you leave this earth, you're leaving something tangible.
Living a full life is about experiencing life fully. Raising children is a huge part of this. Going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
People on HN are typically pretty well off. Low social economic couples tend to have 3, 4, 5+ kids. Certain countries with extremely low standards of living have many kids as well.
Look at yourself and be clear about this: we're thinning.
Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
If being "smart" is not having kids, we've failed at the game of life!
> we're decreasing, the typical white middle-class couple is facing extinction. [...] I don't mean this with a grain of racism
Please don't do this. "We" on HN and in the west and in world in general is incredibly diverse. Your comment disrespects this human diversity. Please take some time to think about that.
This isn't how discourse works and you know it. It is eminently acceptable to censure people who put forward racist and eugenicist views even if done so politely.
They can look like Carlos Slim Helu (#8 on the Forbes list of billionaires), Mukesh Ambani (#9), Zhong Shanshan (#15), Gautam Adani (#24), etc. There is no reason why a wealth-controlling multi-billionaire can not look like a native Bolivian.
> Look at yourself and be clear about this: we're thinning, the typical white middle-class couple is facing extinction.
> Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
Society needs fixing to preserve the place of the white middle class?
I am, to be clear, a well-educated white single man over 40 (who has enough to do without this restaurant-based existence you think is the apotheosis of childlessness). But I think society needs fixing so that I am not in a class protected by privilege. So far I think the threat of extinction is having no meaningful impact either way.
> going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
As opposed to sitting at home with your partner when you're 40+ because your kids are out being teenagers and you need to be available in case they need you? Life at either extreme looks boring.
> Living a full life is about experiencing life fully. Raising children is a huge part of this. Going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
Then don't do that. I go clubbing a lot and I'm almost 50 and I really enjoy it. My partner is pretty polyamorous like me so we're not really monogamous either, making it even more interesting.
Maybe this doesn't work for you but I don't like the idea of society saying what I should want to do with my life. I'm very happy as it is.
Yes, having kids is incredibly taxing on ones time and nerves and all that. And yes, most parents probably love their children and have warm pleasant feelings when they see their children grow up. And also at least some percentage of people need to have kids, so that we can continue to exist as a species and all that jazz. All not questioned.
What I do question are the following things, and disclaimer, it is going to be a bit philosophical. I also don't tell you this to tell you, that you are doing something wrong. I am telling you this to give another point of view:
> You can bend yourself backward your entire career trying to achieve something that is taken away in a whiff. Your children is a richer investment. When you leave this earth, you're leaving something tangible.
As a determinist I can understand, that to most people children are a very tangible result of their lives. That's fine. But there are so many other things in life that one could do or achieve, that have nothing to do with children. Your children are not solely your own work's result either. Think of all the people involved in raising them. Think of the rest of society contributing to your kids being able to be raised the way they are. Daycare people, kindergarten, primary school, secondary school, the friendly neighbor, relatives, friends helping with school homework or additional teaching if necessary, ... probably I am forgetting many.
And so many people in various professionsa and jobs can claim just as well, that they leave behind something very tangible, even though they might never have kids themselves.
Many actions of many people all day long all contribute just as much, only that their influence on the children's lives are less direct. Butterfly effect and all that.
Ultimately I even find that focus on ones own children a bit selfish. It is probably a very natural tendency and ones own children are ones dearest usually, so I can understant why it exists. However, there is nothing that says society must be this way. Nothing that mandates, that we look after our own child before others.
> Living a full life is about experiencing life fully. Raising children is a huge part of this. Going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
There are many other huge parts of life. Unfortunately we have to choose in our lives which huge parts we pursue. Why don't you do other good things for society with your partner? You could offer tutoring for pupils in need or for talented ones. You could work for charity saving children around the world. You could do many great things. Those are not lesser things compared to having kids yourself.
> People on HN are typically pretty well off. Low social economic couples tend to have 3, 4, 5+ kids. Certain countries with extremely low standards of living have many kids as well.
> Look at yourself and be clear about this: we're thinning.
I see no problem. The only problem I see there is that of broken education systems in my country. I don't care where a child or adult comes from. I care about their education and skills. I care about how they can contribute to our society. I don't have the fear of being replaced by people from other countries. If they are friendly and willing to contribute well to our society, I welcome them.
> Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
> If being "smart" is not having kids, we've failed at the game of life!
I partially agree, that society needs fixing. I don't agree on a theoretical basis, that smart people having kids is necessary. I think it is necessary for smart people to pass on their skills and knowledge. Which should be how we fix society. We make the smart people pass on their stuff, through a good education system. Yes, it will be a lot of fixing needed.
Lastly, I do understand, that there are many reaso...
I have 4 kids. Running my own business helps because of the flexibility. But the costs of living is something i did not expected to be so high. 3k per month for daycare/afterschool. Memberships, food, clothing, electronics etc. expensive housing, insurances. We easily spend 8,10k per month without saving anything. Nevertheless I love to have kids. Best investment ever.
They said they spend 10k a month for their kids. I lived in the bay area before.
My rent was like 2.5k. 10k outflow a month is fucking insane. Its absolutely indefensibly out of touch spoiled beyond imagination.
You could hire a chef and a maid to cook your kids organic bullshit every day, fly around the entire world once a month and still come under 10k. Whatever they are doing to spend that much needs to be reconsidered. Insurance, tennis practice, private school, whatever it is. 80% of it needs to be cut, and put into savings or invested at regular intervals. Its just plain irresponsible, and to complain about the cost of kids while waving numbers like that around would piss off 90% of families in the US living well under that outflow.
Nanny here in NY is $30/h. If you work full time (and commute) you'll need about 10 hours a day. 30x10x5x4 is 6000, then add food (formula is insanely expensive), diapers, clothes, basic medical and you're easily up to 7k/m before they've taken their first steps.
Which is to say, if you make less than 67 you get sizeable benefit, but if you earn more you are likely net negative (but child positive) until you pass about 100k. That's a scary gap.
> Regular daycare costs multiples less than an at-home nanny
Unless, as I said, you have a multiples pregnancy.
I don't know where you're getting your figures but two infants is going to be $3k at least, and that's assuming you can transport them to the daycare facility and assuming that the hours line up with your work. 2x that for the city.
I really hope I'm wrong but two adults with full time in-office jobs don't have much choice here.
Daycare isn't much cheaper either, take Seattle as example it is about 4200 per month, for multiples the 2nd child get a 10-15% off. A nanny will be cheaper once you have more than 1 child.
Also, there is a long waitlist, so it needs really good luck to get an "offer" from the day care when you need it.
I am sure it's quite a high figure (I don't know how high; I suspect not as outrageously high as it might seem).
But your reply was not any more of a practical solution. I was trying to centre it on a more realistic observation that money outgoings are connected to much less easily fixable lifestyle circumstances.
its absolutely fixable. the issue is ideology and habit, expectation. rigid. difficult to change.
look how much disagreement im getting for even suggesting someone should be spending less than 10k a month on 4 kids. These are resistant responses from people who dont even exhibit the behaviour.
I assume you don't live in one of the tech/finance hubs anywhere in the world. Because really, 10k a month is nothing really special. no fancy car, no fancy house. Just a lot of fixed costs. And for your information. Our daycare is only 2.5 days a week. I take care of my kids 1.5 weekdays and my wife 1 day. Can you imagine daycare a full 5 days a week? that's 2 times more expensive.
I did live in the bay area for a few years. It is expensive but 10k is too much. The generous explanation is you got rich and just gradually went out of touch.
Now I grew up not that long ago. I am still in my twenties and I did grow up in a major city.
But I might be able to provide some perspective.
I grew up without a computer except for old donated beaters. Free. For fun we ran around outside, and hit ant piles with sticks. We ate beans and hotdogs, and old clothes from yard sales. There were injuries. Scrapes and bruises.
There was not a single moment me or my siblings were concerned about wealth or costs or feeling poor. We just had an amazing time playing. Balls, sticks, junk, broken bikes, old hammers, string, nails, grocery bags, old books, half used art supplies. Children do not care about quality. They dont care about nice clothes. They dont care about formal education. They just crave stimulation.
Quality stimulation does not come from money. I dont even know that it can be bought.
When I look back and think about what I would change, I wouldnt add daycare. I wouldnt add nice food or clothes or technology, or tennis teams or memberships. I wish I could have seen my dad everyday. I wish my step dad became better friends with me and showed me coding years before he got cancer and died.
Honestly, 10k/mo for four kids is on the cheaper side for the Bay.
Just in daycare alone, they should be at ~8k/mo for four (~$500/wk/kid, daycares can't do bulk discounts). I have friends in TN that are at ~1k/wk. per kid with a ~2.5 year waiting lists. Daycare isn't well tied local cost of living in the US.
Also, rent for one person isn't rent for a family of six, it should be a bit higher for the extra space. And $2.5k per month is, nationally speaking, really high for one person! Wow. I had no idea it was that bad in the Bay these days.
How would you go about raising four kids in the Bay?
Not super detailed, but you know, just a sketch. Daycare? Food costs? Housing? Health Insurance? Those kinds of big ticket items. I'd love to know how to get my costs down more.
From his previous post, this guy is clearly a young know-it-all that comes from either a poor or stingy family.
The reality is that he truly has no clue, he just thinks he knows better and he clearly has pretty low standards.
I would say he is the kind that shouldn't have kids because they would probably suffer but he will have them nonetheless and he will rationalise all the corner cutting as something normal even though there is a price paid, he just doesn't know it yet or prefer to deny it.
We traded one parent working and multi generational housing for this (which had other issues of course). Instead of having someone staying at home and raising their kid(s) now you have to work to pay someone else to raise your kid(s), and very often that entire new pay check gets siphoned. If your couple is composed of two min wage worker you can't eve match the previous system in any way (quality of life, education, stimulation, &c.).
Couple that with the fact that most people leave their hometown to work in big cities and you got the perfect mix of time/money and social network issues
That's my mom's job, she takes care of kids, parents drop them as 6am and picks them up at 7pm+. I've talked to these kids, they're miserable, they spend twice as much time with my parents than with theirs, and theirs are so exhausted after work they don't even take care of them once they pick them up (micro waved food and netflix on the daily)
(I'm not saying that applies to you, your comment just made me think about that)
Yep, that's pretty much it. This new system pushed by bourgeois feminist for their own benefit is strictly worse than what we had before for 90% of the population.
Funniest thing is that if you give them enough time most women would tell you that they would rather just had kids if they could have found the husband with the means for it.
But the current propaganda is very strong and you cannot say anything at the risk of passing for the biggest asshole. Yet I'm pretty sure that if you offered the previous women deal to men, many would take it in a heartbeat.
Instead, we have to listen to insufferable people lecture us on the "meaning" of work, wich hilariously for many women, literally translate into taking care of other people's kids, just for much longer (for example in France they represent up to 80% of the teachers).
This double working parent nonsense is really big bullshit, there is very little benefit for anyone but very few ultra privileged...
I've three kids. It's wonderful, it's exhausting, and it's often terrifying. Being a parent is a painful experience, but so is living life. Would my life be easier and less painful without them? Yes. Would my life be better without them? No, just different.
I respect antinatalists, but I chose differently. I chose to bring laughter and joy to this absurd, meaningless Universe we habit, even if for a brief lapse. Is it the right choice? Perhaps not. Is it a selfish choice? Yes. Why did I do it then? For the same reason I keep breathing. I don't know much more than that.
Life is what any of us make it. The antinatalist position is fundamentally fatalistic. It’s a total negation of the one redeeming feature of the universe: anything could happen.
I respect not having kids. The idea that you’re inherently better off not having kids is nonsense.
To maximise quality of life, maximise duration of life, or maximise the numer of humans?
At the moment, we seem to be aiming for 'maximum number of humans'. But in a world of climate crisis and depleted resources, that means ever-fewer freedoms, rapidly declining quality of life, and increasing levels of war/conflict.
Not having kids is selfish. Most of the worlds social systems depend on new generations of workers. I'm not only talking about paying taxes and contributions etc.
But if not enough people have kids, there won't be enough doctors, engineers or cleaners when the same people get older.
This is a remarkable inversion. The primary reason people forego children in the west is because it throws a wrench in their comfortable lifestyle. They prefer to live unto themselves, instead of unto children, i.e. selfishly.
I believe the environmental/climactic concerns raised by antinatalists are just a feeble deflection. They are primarily interested in personal comfort.
That's an unusual definition of "playing god", since it includes something that pretty much every life form back to the earliest single-cellular bacteria does.
This may be true in many cases, but I know quite a few people that chose not to have kids for other reasons.
For some, these are possible medical complications, e.g. history of heart defects, high risk of childbirth fatality.
For others, its that they had abusive or traumatic childhoods, and either don't feel they'd be up to the task of parenthood, or associate childhood with something so unpleasant that they wouldn't want to inflict it on others.
I think I never wanted children because I realized quite young that there’s no god and when I died I would be done and gone and nothing I had done would ever have mattered. It did not make for a happy childhood and is not something I’d wish upon a child. And I don’t even have any happy stories about religion to pass onto a child like my parents tried to impart on me.
If I were to create people in order to try and find some meaning but leaving them as adrift in this meaninglessness as I, would that really be a selfless act? It seems quite the opposite to me.
Perhaps this is indeed “cope” in one way or another, but it’s what I’ve felt from a very young age, though I think it took me a lot of reflection to realize it and be able to put it into words.
It's weird how a whole bunch of parents jump into threads like these to tell us all about how totally awesome having kids is.
I love my son, but it's also easily one of the hardest things I've ever done and will continue to be so for the next 18+ years. I wouldn't recommend having children to anyone: it's a singularity, and there's also no undoing it. You need to be very sure it's what you want. It will be expensive, it will limit what you can do in all sorts of ways, because it is relentless in a way which exposure to it as an aunt or uncle or friend simply won't communicate adequately (heck: even parents with older children seem to rapidly forget what having younger children is actually like, as I've experienced).
It's a different experience for different people. Why wouldn't parent's comment if they enjoy having kids? It's no different than the people who jumped in to state the reasons why they wouldn't have kids, why do they do it? Why did you feel the need to put your comment in, maybe answer that too? I think it's weird how someone always jumps in to comment on how weird it is that some people jump in to comment.
I've got 3 kids. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Or not recommend it. How the fuck should I know what you want to do or how it'll turn out? I'm glad I had mine and I'm glad we started at 25 instead of 35. Regrets? Some, but if you've none I may not believe you. You can regret things even if you also wouldn't want them to turn out differently.
Having kids is the hardest thing anyone can ever do — I am thinking of counterpoints while writing, but none comes to mind. However, I recommend having children.
It is, contrary to some commenters, not a selfish thing to do, but a completely selfless act. You can see it for yourself when you watch the children around you: The pure joy of being alive! The full range of emotions! The good, the bad and the ugly…
You could argue that the children are thrown into the world and are now stuck with it, and you rather would prefer nonexistence to existence. If you can answer the question, is life worth living, positively, then you can argue, that existence is better than nonexistence and consequently being thrown into this world is better than to pass on the experience. It would, however, be selfish to keep this experience all to yourself and not allow potential offsprings to take part in this experience.
> You need to be very sure it's what you want. It will be expensive, it will limit what you can do in all sorts of ways, because it is relentless in a way which exposure to it as an aunt or uncle or friend simply won't communicate adequately
This is right! Having kids is total; It will dominate your life. Every second of your day for at least 4 to 5 years. If you are not willing or able to endure, then you should not have kids. And again: You cannot fathom what it means to have someone who is so dependent on you and the life and future depends on you. No, not even the clingy partner you had.
The hardship is soon forgotten — this is why the uncles and aunts and friends — don't communicate it adequately. These corny moments are real: Memories that will stick with you forever, even the bad parts, that somehow and with time get twisted into fond memories. (My son was crying every night for 8 months when he was falling asleep. I carried him on my arm until he was so exhausted that he slept. I sang songs for him for hours. Then he would sleep from 11 pm to 4 am. So at 4 I went to the living room with him, and we tried to catch some sleep on the couch. It got better after thees 8 months, but what a ride — now I like to think back and miss these nights when he slept in my arm).
You might be in these first years, or I am having a short respite, but it gets easier after the first years. But you don't have kids for yourself, but for your kids.
> Having kids is the hardest thing anyone can ever do
Ok I'll bite. It's not anywhere near the hardest thing anyone can ever do. It's very easy to get started, most people just do it day by day, it's integrated with life, and throwing in the towel is kinda frowned upon. I'm sorry your kid had colic, my first had the same although not for as long and my second would just scream in bed when she was a little older so I'd stay and read and doze while holding her hand. But it wasn't hard like if I decided to write a book or climb a mountain or something.
You are foolish, it is very much an option, one that many choose to exerce.
Having kids is not strictly synonymous with raising kids well and while you may not just kill the kid you can also do the strict minimum and let it be as much as possible (or transfer the responsibility to someone else).
It is extremely current and something many parents do, just as much as soft quitting any of the other activities you mentioned...
The bar is rather low, it needs to have foods to not starve, clothing to not be naked and a place to sleep; if you do those things for yourself, you are more than a third of the way done; all the rest is completely optional and many parents definitely chose to leave the option on the table.
> it will limit what you can do in all sorts of ways
You are literally adding N + 1 complexity to the universe. There is a whole world of possibility opened through having children.
What you see as reduced options is actually a series of choices you decided you’d want to have to make. And good parents choose the options that payoff in the long term.
Since you have children, I think you'd agree with me that it's changed you in a way that you can't explain to someone who doesn't have any? Wouldn't you rather everyone underwent that change?
I could just as easily say that choosing not to have children has changed me in a way that I can't explain to people who never experienced that.
The broadest group of my cohort decided to have children. It was the easiest path to begin - most folks are straight and have sex drives and that will often result in babies. Those few of us seniors who decided not to have had a weird expectations foisted on us from some and strange condemnation from others - social pressures I could claim parents will never understand.
So please stop this one-side-or-the-other nonsense. And the "mystical experience of being 'me'." We all make choices. We're all similar. We are each unique.
It’s totally awesome and/or I am the gatekeeper for what’s actually hard enough to warrant not having children. Meanwhile ignoring the article and the numbers showing a different reality than their own. This is what every one of these topics end up being on this site.
> The idea that you’re inherently better off not having kids is nonsense.
We're in a world where we constantly told that we have to give up meat/dairy, powered transport, heating/cooling, and a whole lot more to avert climate catastrophe.
I'm surprised there's so few mentions of the incredible destructiveness of having kids (e.g. vs. owning an ICE car or taking a few flights per year)
Climate change won't cause human extinction. It will cause destruction of the environment, leading to it being able to support even less people than it does now. Because nature can't keep up with the speed we're changing it.
But human extinction, no. Some areas will even become more habitable.
And humans will only become extinct if everyone stops having kids which won't happen because some people like having them.
The bottom-end of "human's as a species still exist" is not an existence you are familiar with or want, and is worse then what our hunter-gatherer forebears had to deal with.
> Some areas will even become more habitable.
Rather makes a lot of assumptions that the "no longer supportable" population will simply gracefully starve to death and leave the lucky ones be in the interim.
> The bottom-end of "human's as a species still exist" is not an existence you are familiar with or want, and is worse then what our hunter-gatherer forebears had to deal with.
No, but that's the case even now. The bottom end of humanity is having a horrible time. I'm sure people in North Korea or the war-torn countries in Africa won't be that much worse off than they are now.
> Rather makes a lot of assumptions that the "no longer supportable" population will simply gracefully starve to death and leave the lucky ones be in the interim.
I agree think it will lead to conflict over land, for sure. Siberia might even become a hospitable place :) Mass migrations will cause huge problems for sure and probably even some wars. But again, those things are something we have now too.
But it's not an extinction event, especially not for us here in the west. We'll have to deal with a lot of inconveniences but we have the resources to mitigate them.
It's not fair but really nothing in the world is fair now (and it seems to be getting even worse with pretty much all the world leaders being hardliners now)
So to summarize: you have completely undue confidence that this "won't be that bad" for you, despite billion+ death levels.
Buddy: you're posting on a forum for tech workers. Not owners. Not billionaires. Not only are we not on anyone's radar as "essential", no one needs that many of us. Might want to rethink your place in the decaying world order if you think an ecosystem collapse needs a lot of programmers.
I was just saying this would not be an extinction event. Which it won't be.
The world order is decaying anyway due to all the hardliner world leaders I mentioned, all intent on conflict. But I don't think this has an awful lot to do with the climate issue. More with overpopulation and countries like China getting richer and wanting to play the geopower game.
And yeah it may well be very bad for me but there really isn't anything I can do about it. I stand by my original point that it's not a human extinction-level event though.
Not in all cases - I know people that don't hold any special place in their hearts for humanity as a whole.
They see human extinction as a possibility to accept, rather than as something to necessarily avoid.
I know a few people like this, and their reasons vary. These range from "if humanity goes extinct, it's god's will" to "dinosaurs went extinct and the earth survived, something else will evolve if we're not here" to "we've shown we can't be trusted to care for the planet, let nature take its course".
In most cases they'd rather avert climate catasrophe, but for the continued habitability of the planet (for many species), rather than for the continuation of humanity.
I think you get it backward, lot of people would like to have kids, the problem isn't life with kids, it's life with modern jobs and everything that come with them
Less so when you could afford a house, a car, 2 kids and a stay at home wife on a single salary. It was also much easier when people didn't move to foreign countries and/or far away cities for their jobs, losing their family network &c.
I'm in my mid 20s, in tech and couldn't afford that at all, I could barely afford my gf being unemployed. I don't have a car and live in a small flat. If I can barely afford a comfortable but frugal lifestyle while being paid more than 60% of my peers I'm not too surprised most people literally can't afford kids
The irony is that when you can afford kids in your mid to late 30s, it becomes much harder medically to have them (assuming your partner is similar in age). Lots of people just wait until they are ready, and then find out the window has passed, it’s really frightening.
Yeah, I don't get how they don't see that but to be honest boomer culture is insanely omnipresent and they had it so good they must be thinking that it cannot be that bad.
The reality is that if you are a couple both working an average job you won't have a whole lot of extra time depending on living situation (commute and access to transport) but on top of that you have very little extra cash that could be helpful to solve logistical pains kids make.
All the people of my age that had kids now have unenviable lifestyles, it feels like they can have what the poor boomers had and not much more and nowadays the expectation is that it will last up to a quarter century because of how much we came to overvalue diplomas (even though they do not sort the good from the bad, at all...).
Because of the insanely collectivist system around the world, it makes no difference to have kids or not for the end of your life, so it becomes more of a decision of accepting to be poorer for the privilège of reproduction.
This pretty stupid all things considered, it seems like a feature to have parents dependent on their kids for the end of their life, this way they would have a lot more motivation to do the job right and those who would do a bad job would have it coming...
In the end, collectivism has a way to always destroy the foundation it relies on, which is hilarious. We just are in the destructive phase, what will come out after is bound to be better I think (hard to do worse).
Life with kids has always been problematic, but it has got much harder in the last few decades as social attitudes have changed. Levels of parental involvement and attention that were perfectly normal in the 1970s would now generally be considered criminally negligent. Across most western countries, the amount of time that parents spend with their children has dramatically increased; that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it does greatly increase the opportunity cost of having children.
Cultural anthropology might have an answer there. I guess that some cultures and traditions view not having kids as selfish because there's a cultural push for preserving society (kids will become workers, help parents, pay taxes, fight in the army, and so on). I consider myself selfish because I've done it to fill my life with something I felt was lacking. I've no rational excuse.
I agree with what you're saying, but it doesn't seem to have much to do with the article.
It doesn't suggest that people are having fewer children because they are "antinatalists" or consider having children a "selfish choice". It's right there in the title: they think they just don't have time due to their work/life balance. As I said in another comment, that's more likely to be an economic problem (specifically, housing) rather than a philosophical change as you seem to be saying.
It really isn’t that different. You have to make different work life balance choices when you have kids, increasingly very hard decisions given rising costs (housing, childcare, food, activities, etc…). You also can’t really relax on long weekends anymore unless you are content with large amounts of screen time, it’s not like yesterday when my boomer parents just threw me out of the house and told me to come back around lunch/dinner.
The article is locked down, so I have no idea what it says after the second paragraph. I can imagine though.
The comment I was replying to said that people aren't having kids because they are morally against the concept of (anyone) having kids. The article is about people who perhaps want to have kids but their job pays too little and takes up too much time. Those are about as different as reasons can be.
Another top-level comment included a link that lets you read the whole article (though there's not much substance to it, and the distinction was already clear about by the end of the first paragraph). There isn't much discussion about it because that's discouraged on Hacker News. From the FAQ, under "Are paywalls ok?":
> In comments, it's ok to ask how to read an article and to help other users do so. But please don't post complaints about paywalls. Those are off topic.
> I respect antinatalists, but I chose differently. I chose to bring laughter and joy to this absurd, meaningless Universe we habit, even if for a brief lapse.
That's a false dichotomy, people without kids can bring joy and laughter to "this absurd, meaningless Universe we habit". You don't have to justify yourself for what you have chosen.
I agree with you, but, to be honest, I'm not too worried about logical phallacies in my post because I'm not trying to convince anyone, nor trying to justify myself. Mine was but a metonymy: by having kids, I'm bringing new smiles to the universe. Existing smiles are totally fine, too!
Looks like the last time there was a big change was 1960, I assume that was the development of good birth control techniques. I'd theorise that families never really wanted children, and once given the means to make effective choices we discover that humans don't think it is that rational to have kids.
It is a weirdly philosophical problem - similar to what we will soon face with artificial intelligence - of what exactly are we trying to do as living entities. It is hard to find a path that isn't either nihilism or, from a factual and materialistic perspective, insanity.
I personally think this is probably a good thing. Evolutionary forces will push society above replacement rates sooner or later by whatever means it takes, but we should enjoy the window where we don't need to fight about resources for as long as is possible. If only the African nations would get their birth rates under control, anyway.
There's nothing rational in having kids, as in many other things we do as human beings. I've no arguments to refuse books like David Benatar's Better Never to Have Been. Actually, I agree with most of his theses. The only rational actors that want us to have kids are governments, because citizens pay taxes and provide soldiers.
Still, I embrace my lack of rationality. It's what makes me human.
The downward trend is generally attributed in a large part due to children changing from being an economic boon - free labor on farms - to an economic burder like they are today with childcare etc.
For those of you who decided not to have kids in your 20s-30s, and are now in your 40s+, when changing that decision now becomes increasingly more difficult: did you regret it? Did your position of “I want to live my life, I don’t want the hassle or the cost, or there are too many humans already, or something else”, did that position change or weaken?
I had my first child in my mid 30's, and one of my friends started when both him and his partner were in their 40's. No regrets, but the biological challenges can be very real -- my friends had to use IVF for both their pregnancies.
I don't know anyone who had kids a bit later in life who regretted it purely due to their age. Though being now in my mid 40's I think I would struggle with the sleep deprivation and noise of a new baby....
I've just turned 40, and I'm currently childless, but not because that was my goal. Twice wanted to settle down with a woman, but I wasn't her Mr Right. I'm still friends with the second, but she's (metaphorically) married to her activism; she and I split just as I moved to Germany which was itself just before the pandemic.
Then I ended up with a boyfriend, but medical tech isn't quite there yet for Mpreg :P
No regrets — there's also at least four[0] ways around that off the top of my head, but I think explaining them and how they relate to my life right now would derail the rest of the conversation.
[1] Would be five, but I'm too old for sperm donation.
Personally I find a deep satisfaction that my marriage produced a child so far. It gives it a lot of meaning. If I was in a relationship that wasn't headed anywhere except our demise it would eventually feel pointless to me, like a lot of effort for nothing. I'm sure this is a minority opinion though so take it with a grain of salt.
It's funny because I am trending in the same direction.
You can't say it because of political correctness but I believe many of our fertility problem lies in the behavior of today's women.
But women can't do no wrong so...
If you can't/won't have kids, men make better partners anyway. Everything else can be solved one way or another...
No, but there is a very brief, almost imperceptible flicker of envy when you realize most of your friends have children.
Our decision was really my wife’s decision, I was always indifferent, which may explain the feelings described above. Wife remains staunchly committed to a child free lifestyle and couldn’t be happier.
No I'm nearly 50 and I don't regret it at all, never have in the slightest.
I see all the strings my friends have, having to book meetings months in advance. Where I can go out dancing till 6am whenever I feel like it (which I do a lot) or wake up at 3pm on a Saturday. I don't think my life would have been so full if I'd been so tied down with a family.
As I travel more, my opinion that there are enough humans already has only strengthened.
If I feel the need to scoop up the purported "joy of children", I can visit my sister and wind up my nephew for a few hours, then leave the sugar crash and ensuing tantrums to be her problem as I whizz off back to reality.
I'm so very grateful that my home doesn't have some little narcissist in it running around wearing my face and destroying my property, sanity, and finances. Or at least, not another one. :)
In my 40s, never wanted kids, and my position hasn't changed at all.
I've never really had the urge, and it's only ever been friends/relatives pushing the "you should have kids, they're amazing!" narrative.
I'm sure they are, but I equate it with e.g. painting. I'm sure painting is very enjoyable, frustrating at times, and can bring a ton of joy and wonder to the world. But I just don't enjoy painting, or have any desire to learn, and don't feel the world is so desperately short of artists that I have a duty to do it.
Seeing many friends of mine seriously struggle with money and time also convinces me I made the right choice. I also don't envy a lot of issues they have to go through, e.g. bullying, teen pregancy, phone addiction, tuition fees, serious/lifelong medical issues, etc.
You could also just work less, or let yourself spend less time and energy on your kids.
I get that most people recoil in horror at the latter one. I think they're silly. The fact of the matter is the world is a safer and more prosperous place than ever before. You should be able to invest less into your children than your parents did before you and still have them lead happy lives.
If you have a child, and your own life isn't a pile of misery, you can be reasonably confident your kid's life won't be either. After all, you grew up in a poorer world than they did. But if you hold back on having children because you fear you can't afford to send them to Yale, or buy them all the Steam games they ever wanted, you're probably not saving them from a life of pain, you're just depriving the world of another soul which could've had a beautiful experience here.
I wonder if the key issue here is lack of housing in developed countries. Here in the UK, owning a nice house (not just a flat/apartment) in a decent suburb is out of reach for most people who are at the traditional age to have children. That is a problem of lack of land rather than some inherent material cost. With such a vicious fight over the few properties that exist, almost all income is squeezed on that goal, with very little left for other costs of raising children. It also encourages everyone to have a worse work/life balance in a desperate attempt to get more income for housing (but of course it's a zero sum game because that just pushes the prices up for everyone).
I'm not sure about plenty. There's a common structural issue where properties and what you can do with them is controlled by local authorities elected by the locals while locals are also protected from the housing market using rent control.
Since the locals already got theirs and experience a lot less of the market pressure non-locals experience, restrictive housing policy follows fairly naturally. This is true for both renting and renter locals.
The Netherlands has the 17th highest population density in the world, and most of our land is still dotted with water here and there (all very cleverly, but it's still there). There are vast areas of nature reserves, with no building allowed.
Most people can afford a house, even in the Randstad. So it's not a lack of land, and it's not development blocking. I'm not suggesting anything else, but though I'd take those two out behind the shed.
>let yourself spend less time and energy on your kids
>The fact of the matter is the world is a safer
>and more prosperous place than ever before.
Sadly, it's often not even a matter of safety from "danger", but safety from the law. Getting CPS called on you[1][2], or getting arrested[3][4] as a parent is not good, even if you are fortunate enough to win.
Then there's the whole angle of disappearing third places, lack of places that can be reasonably visited without driving privileges, nobody's outside because of all of the above so there's nobody to "hang out" or "play" with, desire to funnel kids/teens into more "productive" activities like academics and sports (depending on affluence and interest, this isn't AS bad as the above points), places outright banning[5] young people, etc etc.
> You could also just work less, or let yourself spend less time and energy on your kids.
When nearing end of life, many people, especially fathers, say they wish they'd dedicated more time to their children rather than work. While meaningful work can provide purpose, it doesn't compare to the happiness derived from building meaningful relationships with loved ones. Children offer a rare opportunity to enjoy one of the deepest forms of human connection available, and I think it's shortsighted to put career advancement over building a family. Balancing work and family life is challenging, but the payoff is well worth it.
There are actually people who think to themselves, "Oh, no. Distant future me might feel bad, because future me brought beings into existence that were so delightful, that DFM felt spending those extra hours chasing dollars instead of spending those extra hours playing with them was a bad move in retrospect. Maybe I should rethink my plans to have them in the first place." As stupid at it sounds when you put it into those terms, stripped of the fancy talk about "human connection" and whatever. As if no connection at all is preferable to a slightly dissatisfactory one.
I don't give a shit what some old man version of me might end up regretting on this front. My kids deserve to be born because life for them is probably going to be great and filled with joy and adventure, with or without me.
Perhaps more people are living in piles of misery - it seems that anxiety and depression levels only increase. I see many people try to write this off as some artifact of data/survey or other, and yet, fertility also seems to trend inexorably down. Maybe your beautiful experience of life is more the exception than the rule; certainly that is not how I would describe my life experience.
I don't have nor want/have any desire for kids, yet all the people with kids keep telling me I should, and not having them is selfish (...how? Isn't it the other way around?), and multitude of other reasons why I should definitely have them and that if I don't then I'm somehow a horrible person.
What I don't get is why people keep forcing their lifestyle onto those with a different lifestyle? Do they see me having all this free time and get jealous and want me to spend the best years of my life also stressing out and raising kids or why is that?
Funny how the OP just complained about the social pressure and then people like you can't refrain from adding on top of it.
I have kids, I love them, I love parts of what having kids is about, and I hate other parts. If for some reason I had to hit rewind, I would probably choose it without having kids with the information I gained over the years.
My "lifestyle" is just having more time for my hobbies and entertainment with a lot less stress, so I figure for you kids are more rewarding than those things, but to me (and a lot of other people like me) they are not.
No, it is not the other way around, how could it? Had your parents not had you you would not have been able to voice your opinion on this subject. Were your parents selfish when they did so?
If is not a 'lifestyle' thing to have children, rather the opposite: not having children is a 'lack of life' style. If enough people take up this 'lack of life' style your culture will die out and be replaced with one where having children is the norm. This is not a value proposition but simple math - every couple needs to have ~2.1 children to keep the population at a steady level [1].
Also, 'they' do not see you having all this free time and get jealous, they notice that you're spending time on hedonistic pursuits while time is running out - there is a set time frame within which having children is a viable proposition. They are not jealous of your free time at all because from their perspective it is wasted time - time which could be spent with your family instead of just by yourself or with your partner.
Does this mean you are a horrible person for not wanting to have children? No, of course it does not. Not everybody is brought into this world to raise children. It does mean you are missing out on one of the most formational experiences life has to offer, all that free time you gain does come at a certain cost. The choice is yours to make due to the advent of birth control - choose wisely.
> Also, 'they' do not see you having all this free time and get jealous, they notice that you're spending time on hedonistic pursuits while time is running out - there is a set time frame within which having children is a viable proposition. They are not jealous of your free time at all because from their perspective it is wasted time - time which could be spent with your family instead of just by yourself or with your partner.
Yes some are.
This is incredibly inpopular to articulate it out loud but there is a large enough proportion of parents who regret having kids.
There seems to be a colossal misunderstanding in the first line.
> successful, meaningful careers, and they just didn't see how they
could juggle those jobs and the demands of parenthood.
That's a false dilemma. Meaning does not come from a bare "career". It
comes from how that "career" relates to others. Not everyone can have
kids, and many of us find ourselves alone. "Kids" could equally be
replaced by charity work, intimate relationships, sports or whatever.
But rising up the ranks and accumulating a big pile of money brings
neither success nor meaning.
I think the observed change in attitudes has less to do with parenting
(or not) than that the present generation have bought into the
corporate lie much more than earlier ones.
It’s also not meaningful if that career coerces you to give up your outside family life (by imposing a huge penalty for having kids) so you can keep working your desk job, report to a boss, and have your 3 weeks of vacation a year.
It shocked me to find quite how devious and aggressive workplaces can
be towards women that get pregnant (or who they simply suspect of
being in a potentially "fertile" relationship).
Shouldn't it be illegal for employers to monitor communications that
might indicate impending motherhood? What about measuring their body
temperature covertly? Spying on eating habits. Or making comments
about weight and shape?
So you don't have to deal with searching for "Pregnant and screwed" :)
here's a link I dug up for people [0] and some real accounts from
women in IT who get the sharp end of this [1].
One woman I know went through a wrenching and drawn out court case and
won a small fortune against a big British company. She was not able to
come on the show because that settlement for constructive dismissal
came with a serious NDA/gagging order.
It can only be shocking if you see things in you own selfish point of view.
You define business as souless corporation but most of them are actually small organization that have real people depending on them and that just get by. Hiring someone who can be unreliable and just leave its position is really a bad deal for the business (and indirectly all the coworker if the postion was actually useful).
The problem is mostly women who wants to have it all either you want to suffer through the sacrifice that are asked to a man for work or you want kids, you choose; but complaining about this just show the unreal level of entitlement the women of todays have imposed on society.
Its particularly insane to have peoples complaining about this in the current society, when women have received an insane level of positive discrimination and the major problem is actually how bad most of the men have it.
View from a US-expat in the Netherlands: It doesn't have to be as bad as it is.
Subsidize daycare, fund schools (from pre-school to university) and focus on learning at-school and not at-home, and pass laws forcing employers to allow parents to reduce their working hours, should they wish to. You can rebuild your cities to be bike able, change gender norms, or change work culture, but honestly the most change will come from the first list.
My situation as a parent here:
On the cost side, recurring costs for after-school daycare (2x week), school 'contributions' (field trips), violin lessons and rental, gymnastics classes, and normal clothing purchases are €200/month. Daycare is subsidized and we are lucky that we only need two days, but bumping that up to 3 or 4 would not be insane on the cost side. Baby day care was also subsidized, but can get expensive if you are sending them 5x week... it depends on the parent's income. For us subsidies covered about a third of the costs, but we earned well.
The school here takes care of education, with very little homework. It's well-funded, and does not require much extra effort or money from our side. We can be as involved as we want to be.
We are able to use only 2x of day care per week because a) most employers understand the needs of parents but mostly b) by law employers are required to let you reduce your hours to, for example, take care of your kids. We both work a half-day once a week, with another family member helping on the remaining day.
While the Dutch will complain about higher education costs, the costs are reasonable. A 4 year study will cost you around €10k in tuition, total. That 4 year study results in a masters if the student is able / wants to follow a university track.
> While the Dutch will complain about higher education costs
Being a Dutchman myself I'll just put this down to the following piece of Dutch wisdom: Ik klaag, dus ik besta [1], a derivation of Descartes' first principle.
[1] ...which translates to I complain, therefore I am
It's not a co-incidence that so many people come here to raise their children, but close-by countries like France, Germany, and Spain aren't much different.
And yeah, complaining is the national pass-time, until you visit certain other countries ;)
Universal health care, daycare and public college, along with jettisoning all this RTO bullshit into the sun would do a lot to increase incentives for people to have families in this country (US). Given our start-your-worklife-massively-in-debt, 80-hour-workweek, slave-at-the-office-till-you-die mentality, don't be surprised if more and more people don't have kids.
Yeah, expect the Dutch do not make any more children than other countries, now you have a give a lot bigger part of your income to the government whether you want kids or not and this money is going to be use for increasingly inefficient and uncompetitive institution that somehow always needs more money for inexistant results.
Oh, and suddenly your whole population tends to think and act alike for many important subjects because of the built-in propaganda at school. The effects of this can clearly be seen in the current active generation.
As a French that until recently had better fertility than most European countries because of heavy subsidy for having kids I find it funny that you think it even works long-term because it clearly doesn't, even France has dropped fertility and not only you get all the help in the world to have kids, mother are actually paid to have them, yet it doesn't work...
The reality is that it's all about division of labor/responsibility between the sexes but because of previously mentioned "universal education" this is something that cannot be said, because not politically correct (in pretty much any political side which is hilarious in itself).
It's very easy to idealize this coercive system when you were able to choose it but realistically if you would ask many past a certain age, they would definitely choose some other arrangements than to rely on the government for their kids, considering the ongoing cost via taxation (you get to pay forever, how cool) and low quality results...
If everyone was anti-natalist, civilization would collapse, and there would be no work or no life. Surely some logical people can see it's the wrong approach, unless you despise humans in general and want them gone? We're the only species that can create computing or venture into outer space.
Anyways, I have one child and hoping for a second. He has been a total joy for me and my wife since he was born.
Reading the rest of this thread, it seems that the anti-anti-natalists (to which I gravitate more closely) are misrepresenting the anti-natalists' view and that they don't actually expect everyone to be anti-natalist?
“Deeply invested in having successful careers”, yes of course, because rent is too expensive for people in their prime birthing years, and it’s not getting cheaper.
So what else are we supposed to do but grind it out and hope things get better
“We choose to [have kids] and [have a career] not because they are easy, but because they are hard. Because that goal will serve to organise and measure the best of our energies and skills,”
On the one hand, I'm happy to see people being responsible. So many people who shouldn't have had children don't change, and think they can "have it all". You can not. Your life as you know it is over, and if that only dawned on you after you already had a kid, then join the club, but don't delude yourself, and don't make your kid suffer the consequences of your delusion.
On the other hand; stop being a little wuss. The reasons I see being given by those fretting the responsibilities seem to be born from general anxiety and over-thinking. Nobody is ever ready to have a child, but we do it any learn along the way because we're arrogant enough in the beginning, and humble enough afterward the beginning.
What I see with this generation however, is never trying because on paper it's impossible. Yes, it's impossible, but that shouldn't stop you if it's what you really want.
It's an interesting demographic problem: how do you encourage people to have enough children that the working-age population doesn't decline so quickly that we can't support our retired people and also have a wider effect on the economy? In the long run it's something that we'll have to deal with. China is starting to experience it.
I think that the populations of developed countries will start to decline, and a gradual decline is acceptable. We can't rely on immigration forever, presumably less rich countries will start to have less children too as they modernize.
The article emphasizes socioeconomic conditions as a root cause for the declining birth rate. Whilst those factors do not help, it's not why the birth rate is declining.
It's a universal trend. The exact same issue is happening in countries that are far more family-friendly.
The world used to REQUIRE you to have children. As your personal pension plan. By cultural or religious force. Or because of the lack of education or contraceptives.
Now in most parts of the world, you're not required. It becomes a question of WANT instead of MUST. And when you ask people how many children they want, the answer is typically 0, 1 or 2. Most people still want children, and quite a few prefer 2. But that averages out to 1.5-1.8 in the aggregate. Which is far below replacement level.
People still want children, just not many per household. Why the cut-off at 2? Because 3, 4, 5 does not fundamentally improve upon the joy of having children whilst it adds a lot of challenges. Bigger home, bigger car, many more trips to take them everywhere, cooking is more complex, it's a mess.
Anyway, the point being is that the article is largely wrong. People that do not want any children because of their focus on career will still not want children when policies are more family-friendly. There's plenty of evidence of this not working. It doesn't move the needle.
You should still go for better policies, just don't expect it to fix this problem.
200 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 265 ms ] threadBut it's good for environmental reasons to not have kids anyway.
But I'm glad we don't have this kind of social pressure to have kids anymore. Like there was in the 50s and some countries still do.
Nevertheless, I'm sure if I had PG's wealth, I could have kids and have a lot better work life balance with them. But I do not.
If humanity has to go extinct in 40 years might as well tear up all current climate agreements.
In contrast, kids are necessary to stop overaging and the collapse of our society.
But anyway, if you need active workforce, the solutions is simple: immigration.
That said, here's a fine poem in support of your angle: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48419/this-be-the-ver...
It's just something that was previously seen as a virtue (or for example for Catholics almost a holy priority) is now becoming a hobby. And if not everyone takes up that hobby we can be sustainable for a lot longer. Even a population decline wouldn't be bad after we've been growing so hard as a species.
Of course we can't keep growing forever. And hoping the future comes up with a magical answer is exactly how we got into the climate mess we're in right now.
We've seen the same here in Europe. My parents' generation usually had large families, my generation had mostly 1-2 kids, and these days many families have no kids.
Of course poorer countries and countries that are still very religious are a bit behind but they will catch up too. Humanity won't go extinct, there will always be people happy to have children.
And if we can't, is that fair to future generations? Aren't we condemning them to a more miserable life? (On the other hand, if 8 billion people leads to destroying the environment, that also leaves them more miserable...)
Food will be a bigger problem but less people also means less food needed.
That's what they told us in the 60s/70s/80s and we're still working as much while our standards are lowering but ok, we'll automagically fix things, we're just waiting for the right time
The only reason we could have so many people on the planet at once is because almost half of them live in poverty, close to animal standard with some human technology sprinkled in some place...
It's just shortsighted to believe that having so many people was sustainable in the first place.
I guess if you don't care about your country or continent legacy that could work yes
And that position can still be reassessed in the next 30 years.
I am still not convinced that a globally aging population is a big issue in the long term.
Such a phase sucks but it's temporary. Eventually the wave of old people is gone and things are back to normal. It's not something we can't overcome.
What do you mean by back to normal ? The African demographic boom, even if we didn't have our own fertility problem, will ensure there will be no back to "normal". History is never about going back to normal
If you care about quality of life, employment, pensions, shortages, smooth transitions, immigration, it's a whole other story
Am I wrong to interpret it like that?
The ones who insist on having children as an ultimate virtue, I find them to be just as wrong.
Either choice is fine, and the moral objections to either one are unreasonable.
Edit: edited to expand the last sentence.
In fact I really hate moral judgments of people's personal lives, like is being done to the LGBT community in the US at the moment.
The best thing you can do for the environment is to find someone as passionate as yourself and create a large family of conscientious, thoughtful, active environmentalists.
The absence of people with bad ideas won't help as much as a surplus of people with good ideas. Since even if we had half the people they could still pollute like crazy.
Humans are the only hope for other species including animals and plants, since we can bring them into outer space and use energy storage or from other parts of the solar system / galaxy to preserve life further.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sP2tUW0HDHA [IDIOCRACY Opening Scene (2006) Mike Judge]
Kids is the hardest thing to come to life, I call it "life on hard mode". And I've moved across the world. But the gains are immense.
You can bend yourself backward your entire career trying to achieve something that is taken away in a whiff. Your children is a richer investment. When you leave this earth, you're leaving something tangible.
Living a full life is about experiencing life fully. Raising children is a huge part of this. Going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
People on HN are typically pretty well off. Low social economic couples tend to have 3, 4, 5+ kids. Certain countries with extremely low standards of living have many kids as well.
Look at yourself and be clear about this: we're thinning.
Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
If being "smart" is not having kids, we've failed at the game of life!
> we're decreasing, the typical white middle-class couple is facing extinction. [...] I don't mean this with a grain of racism
Please don't do this. "We" on HN and in the west and in world in general is incredibly diverse. Your comment disrespects this human diversity. Please take some time to think about that.
That is a very strange perspective.
> Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
Society needs fixing to preserve the place of the white middle class?
I am, to be clear, a well-educated white single man over 40 (who has enough to do without this restaurant-based existence you think is the apotheosis of childlessness). But I think society needs fixing so that I am not in a class protected by privilege. So far I think the threat of extinction is having no meaningful impact either way.
As opposed to sitting at home with your partner when you're 40+ because your kids are out being teenagers and you need to be available in case they need you? Life at either extreme looks boring.
And there’s always delivery.
Then don't do that. I go clubbing a lot and I'm almost 50 and I really enjoy it. My partner is pretty polyamorous like me so we're not really monogamous either, making it even more interesting.
Maybe this doesn't work for you but I don't like the idea of society saying what I should want to do with my life. I'm very happy as it is.
I don't think that should be a life goal. It is just a basic reaction to the fear of death.
Yes, having kids is incredibly taxing on ones time and nerves and all that. And yes, most parents probably love their children and have warm pleasant feelings when they see their children grow up. And also at least some percentage of people need to have kids, so that we can continue to exist as a species and all that jazz. All not questioned.
What I do question are the following things, and disclaimer, it is going to be a bit philosophical. I also don't tell you this to tell you, that you are doing something wrong. I am telling you this to give another point of view:
> You can bend yourself backward your entire career trying to achieve something that is taken away in a whiff. Your children is a richer investment. When you leave this earth, you're leaving something tangible.
As a determinist I can understand, that to most people children are a very tangible result of their lives. That's fine. But there are so many other things in life that one could do or achieve, that have nothing to do with children. Your children are not solely your own work's result either. Think of all the people involved in raising them. Think of the rest of society contributing to your kids being able to be raised the way they are. Daycare people, kindergarten, primary school, secondary school, the friendly neighbor, relatives, friends helping with school homework or additional teaching if necessary, ... probably I am forgetting many. And so many people in various professionsa and jobs can claim just as well, that they leave behind something very tangible, even though they might never have kids themselves.
Many actions of many people all day long all contribute just as much, only that their influence on the children's lives are less direct. Butterfly effect and all that.
Ultimately I even find that focus on ones own children a bit selfish. It is probably a very natural tendency and ones own children are ones dearest usually, so I can understant why it exists. However, there is nothing that says society must be this way. Nothing that mandates, that we look after our own child before others.
> Living a full life is about experiencing life fully. Raising children is a huge part of this. Going to a restaurant twice a week with your partner, when you're 40+ and no kids, will get very repetitive and boring.
There are many other huge parts of life. Unfortunately we have to choose in our lives which huge parts we pursue. Why don't you do other good things for society with your partner? You could offer tutoring for pupils in need or for talented ones. You could work for charity saving children around the world. You could do many great things. Those are not lesser things compared to having kids yourself.
> People on HN are typically pretty well off. Low social economic couples tend to have 3, 4, 5+ kids. Certain countries with extremely low standards of living have many kids as well. > Look at yourself and be clear about this: we're thinning.
I see no problem. The only problem I see there is that of broken education systems in my country. I don't care where a child or adult comes from. I care about their education and skills. I care about how they can contribute to our society. I don't have the fear of being replaced by people from other countries. If they are friendly and willing to contribute well to our society, I welcome them.
> Society needs fixing, not having less kids. Smart people need to have kids too.
> If being "smart" is not having kids, we've failed at the game of life!
I partially agree, that society needs fixing. I don't agree on a theoretical basis, that smart people having kids is necessary. I think it is necessary for smart people to pass on their skills and knowledge. Which should be how we fix society. We make the smart people pass on their stuff, through a good education system. Yes, it will be a lot of fixing needed.
Lastly, I do understand, that there are many reaso...
Famously easy to switch to this when you live in an HMO in Statesville, State USA or a housing development in Suburbiton, Townshire UK.
You could hire a chef and a maid to cook your kids organic bullshit every day, fly around the entire world once a month and still come under 10k. Whatever they are doing to spend that much needs to be reconsidered. Insurance, tennis practice, private school, whatever it is. 80% of it needs to be cut, and put into savings or invested at regular intervals. Its just plain irresponsible, and to complain about the cost of kids while waving numbers like that around would piss off 90% of families in the US living well under that outflow.
There are many families in the US, in NY, that make less than 10k/year.
There is some state coverage but the income limits are low (50-70 for 1-2 kids)
https://ocfs.ny.gov/programs/childcare/ccap/help.php#CCAP-in...
Daycare outside of that is incredibly pricey, and if you're as 'blessed' as we were with a multiples pregnancy then the nanny quickly becomes cheaper.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/11/nyregion/child-care-nyc.h...
Which is to say, if you make less than 67 you get sizeable benefit, but if you earn more you are likely net negative (but child positive) until you pass about 100k. That's a scary gap.
You are in a ridiculously privileged state to be able to simply afford that and you act as though it's impossible to get by without it.
Regular daycare costs multiples less than an at-home nanny, just as public school is far cheaper than private+tutors.
So again my point is that these are not necessary expenses but chosen.
And that I know right now people doing skilled and licensed labor-intensive jobs for less than 30/hr.
Unless, as I said, you have a multiples pregnancy.
I don't know where you're getting your figures but two infants is going to be $3k at least, and that's assuming you can transport them to the daycare facility and assuming that the hours line up with your work. 2x that for the city.
I really hope I'm wrong but two adults with full time in-office jobs don't have much choice here.
https://winnie.com/resources/guide-to-child-care-costs-in-ne...
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskNYC/comments/dbki6j/childcare_co... [note several years old]
Also, there is a long waitlist, so it needs really good luck to get an "offer" from the day care when you need it.
But your reply was not any more of a practical solution. I was trying to centre it on a more realistic observation that money outgoings are connected to much less easily fixable lifestyle circumstances.
look how much disagreement im getting for even suggesting someone should be spending less than 10k a month on 4 kids. These are resistant responses from people who dont even exhibit the behaviour.
Now I grew up not that long ago. I am still in my twenties and I did grow up in a major city. But I might be able to provide some perspective.
I grew up without a computer except for old donated beaters. Free. For fun we ran around outside, and hit ant piles with sticks. We ate beans and hotdogs, and old clothes from yard sales. There were injuries. Scrapes and bruises.
There was not a single moment me or my siblings were concerned about wealth or costs or feeling poor. We just had an amazing time playing. Balls, sticks, junk, broken bikes, old hammers, string, nails, grocery bags, old books, half used art supplies. Children do not care about quality. They dont care about nice clothes. They dont care about formal education. They just crave stimulation.
Quality stimulation does not come from money. I dont even know that it can be bought.
When I look back and think about what I would change, I wouldnt add daycare. I wouldnt add nice food or clothes or technology, or tennis teams or memberships. I wish I could have seen my dad everyday. I wish my step dad became better friends with me and showed me coding years before he got cancer and died.
Money is just not what kids need.
Just in daycare alone, they should be at ~8k/mo for four (~$500/wk/kid, daycares can't do bulk discounts). I have friends in TN that are at ~1k/wk. per kid with a ~2.5 year waiting lists. Daycare isn't well tied local cost of living in the US.
Also, rent for one person isn't rent for a family of six, it should be a bit higher for the extra space. And $2.5k per month is, nationally speaking, really high for one person! Wow. I had no idea it was that bad in the Bay these days.
lentils and potatos, my friend. lentils and potatos.
How would you go about raising four kids in the Bay?
Not super detailed, but you know, just a sketch. Daycare? Food costs? Housing? Health Insurance? Those kinds of big ticket items. I'd love to know how to get my costs down more.
The reality is that he truly has no clue, he just thinks he knows better and he clearly has pretty low standards. I would say he is the kind that shouldn't have kids because they would probably suffer but he will have them nonetheless and he will rationalise all the corner cutting as something normal even though there is a price paid, he just doesn't know it yet or prefer to deny it.
Couple that with the fact that most people leave their hometown to work in big cities and you got the perfect mix of time/money and social network issues
That's my mom's job, she takes care of kids, parents drop them as 6am and picks them up at 7pm+. I've talked to these kids, they're miserable, they spend twice as much time with my parents than with theirs, and theirs are so exhausted after work they don't even take care of them once they pick them up (micro waved food and netflix on the daily)
(I'm not saying that applies to you, your comment just made me think about that)
But the current propaganda is very strong and you cannot say anything at the risk of passing for the biggest asshole. Yet I'm pretty sure that if you offered the previous women deal to men, many would take it in a heartbeat.
Instead, we have to listen to insufferable people lecture us on the "meaning" of work, wich hilariously for many women, literally translate into taking care of other people's kids, just for much longer (for example in France they represent up to 80% of the teachers).
This double working parent nonsense is really big bullshit, there is very little benefit for anyone but very few ultra privileged...
I respect antinatalists, but I chose differently. I chose to bring laughter and joy to this absurd, meaningless Universe we habit, even if for a brief lapse. Is it the right choice? Perhaps not. Is it a selfish choice? Yes. Why did I do it then? For the same reason I keep breathing. I don't know much more than that.
I respect not having kids. The idea that you’re inherently better off not having kids is nonsense.
Nonetheless nothing I condemn.
At the end of the day it's harder not to have kids and stop this cycle than not, thanks to evolution.
To maximise quality of life, maximise duration of life, or maximise the numer of humans?
At the moment, we seem to be aiming for 'maximum number of humans'. But in a world of climate crisis and depleted resources, that means ever-fewer freedoms, rapidly declining quality of life, and increasing levels of war/conflict.
But we know in which world we bring humans in.
Climate change, rassism, bulling etc.
To create their future workers/slaves.
I believe the environmental/climactic concerns raised by antinatalists are just a feeble deflection. They are primarily interested in personal comfort.
I am not an "antinatalist" because of this.
It has nothing whatsoever to do with comfort (or the environment or climate).
I note that the "unto" here is a very interesting word choice that hints at an underlying belief structure that drives your opinion.
I believe creating new life is playing 'god'.
It's easier to never exist than life life.
This has nothing to do what you thought
That's an unusual definition of "playing god", since it includes something that pretty much every life form back to the earliest single-cellular bacteria does.
I'm not sure I do this most of the time.
> can't think about the implications
I definitely don't do this bit.
For some, these are possible medical complications, e.g. history of heart defects, high risk of childbirth fatality.
For others, its that they had abusive or traumatic childhoods, and either don't feel they'd be up to the task of parenthood, or associate childhood with something so unpleasant that they wouldn't want to inflict it on others.
If I were to create people in order to try and find some meaning but leaving them as adrift in this meaninglessness as I, would that really be a selfless act? It seems quite the opposite to me.
Perhaps this is indeed “cope” in one way or another, but it’s what I’ve felt from a very young age, though I think it took me a lot of reflection to realize it and be able to put it into words.
Although I've not fully understood what makes that decision "selfish" in the sense that I'm not acting in a way that is a detriment to others.
I love my son, but it's also easily one of the hardest things I've ever done and will continue to be so for the next 18+ years. I wouldn't recommend having children to anyone: it's a singularity, and there's also no undoing it. You need to be very sure it's what you want. It will be expensive, it will limit what you can do in all sorts of ways, because it is relentless in a way which exposure to it as an aunt or uncle or friend simply won't communicate adequately (heck: even parents with older children seem to rapidly forget what having younger children is actually like, as I've experienced).
I've got 3 kids. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Or not recommend it. How the fuck should I know what you want to do or how it'll turn out? I'm glad I had mine and I'm glad we started at 25 instead of 35. Regrets? Some, but if you've none I may not believe you. You can regret things even if you also wouldn't want them to turn out differently.
That's the point: these aren't equal opposites.
The answer to "should I have children?" is "you have to decide that for yourself but be aware of what it is you're deciding".
It is, contrary to some commenters, not a selfish thing to do, but a completely selfless act. You can see it for yourself when you watch the children around you: The pure joy of being alive! The full range of emotions! The good, the bad and the ugly…
You could argue that the children are thrown into the world and are now stuck with it, and you rather would prefer nonexistence to existence. If you can answer the question, is life worth living, positively, then you can argue, that existence is better than nonexistence and consequently being thrown into this world is better than to pass on the experience. It would, however, be selfish to keep this experience all to yourself and not allow potential offsprings to take part in this experience.
> You need to be very sure it's what you want. It will be expensive, it will limit what you can do in all sorts of ways, because it is relentless in a way which exposure to it as an aunt or uncle or friend simply won't communicate adequately
This is right! Having kids is total; It will dominate your life. Every second of your day for at least 4 to 5 years. If you are not willing or able to endure, then you should not have kids. And again: You cannot fathom what it means to have someone who is so dependent on you and the life and future depends on you. No, not even the clingy partner you had.
The hardship is soon forgotten — this is why the uncles and aunts and friends — don't communicate it adequately. These corny moments are real: Memories that will stick with you forever, even the bad parts, that somehow and with time get twisted into fond memories. (My son was crying every night for 8 months when he was falling asleep. I carried him on my arm until he was so exhausted that he slept. I sang songs for him for hours. Then he would sleep from 11 pm to 4 am. So at 4 I went to the living room with him, and we tried to catch some sleep on the couch. It got better after thees 8 months, but what a ride — now I like to think back and miss these nights when he slept in my arm).
You might be in these first years, or I am having a short respite, but it gets easier after the first years. But you don't have kids for yourself, but for your kids.
Ok I'll bite. It's not anywhere near the hardest thing anyone can ever do. It's very easy to get started, most people just do it day by day, it's integrated with life, and throwing in the towel is kinda frowned upon. I'm sorry your kid had colic, my first had the same although not for as long and my second would just scream in bed when she was a little older so I'd stay and read and doze while holding her hand. But it wasn't hard like if I decided to write a book or climb a mountain or something.
For me this was the hardest part. You don't get to get out. Maybe it's a mindset thing.
Starting a book, an app, a diet. You all can just throw the towel and be done. Kids, not an option.
Having kids is not strictly synonymous with raising kids well and while you may not just kill the kid you can also do the strict minimum and let it be as much as possible (or transfer the responsibility to someone else). It is extremely current and something many parents do, just as much as soft quitting any of the other activities you mentioned... The bar is rather low, it needs to have foods to not starve, clothing to not be naked and a place to sleep; if you do those things for yourself, you are more than a third of the way done; all the rest is completely optional and many parents definitely chose to leave the option on the table.
You are literally adding N + 1 complexity to the universe. There is a whole world of possibility opened through having children.
What you see as reduced options is actually a series of choices you decided you’d want to have to make. And good parents choose the options that payoff in the long term.
That doesn't mean it's bad. But it's also not going to end (it will however, get different - but not easier).
Since you have children, I think you'd agree with me that it's changed you in a way that you can't explain to someone who doesn't have any? Wouldn't you rather everyone underwent that change?
The broadest group of my cohort decided to have children. It was the easiest path to begin - most folks are straight and have sex drives and that will often result in babies. Those few of us seniors who decided not to have had a weird expectations foisted on us from some and strange condemnation from others - social pressures I could claim parents will never understand.
So please stop this one-side-or-the-other nonsense. And the "mystical experience of being 'me'." We all make choices. We're all similar. We are each unique.
We're in a world where we constantly told that we have to give up meat/dairy, powered transport, heating/cooling, and a whole lot more to avert climate catastrophe.
I'm surprised there's so few mentions of the incredible destructiveness of having kids (e.g. vs. owning an ICE car or taking a few flights per year)
Having kids and no cars helps ensure the continuation of humanity.
Turns out there's only one sure way to ensure human extinction, and it's for humans to stop reproducing.
But human extinction, no. Some areas will even become more habitable.
And humans will only become extinct if everyone stops having kids which won't happen because some people like having them.
> Some areas will even become more habitable.
Rather makes a lot of assumptions that the "no longer supportable" population will simply gracefully starve to death and leave the lucky ones be in the interim.
No, but that's the case even now. The bottom end of humanity is having a horrible time. I'm sure people in North Korea or the war-torn countries in Africa won't be that much worse off than they are now.
> Rather makes a lot of assumptions that the "no longer supportable" population will simply gracefully starve to death and leave the lucky ones be in the interim.
I agree think it will lead to conflict over land, for sure. Siberia might even become a hospitable place :) Mass migrations will cause huge problems for sure and probably even some wars. But again, those things are something we have now too.
But it's not an extinction event, especially not for us here in the west. We'll have to deal with a lot of inconveniences but we have the resources to mitigate them.
It's not fair but really nothing in the world is fair now (and it seems to be getting even worse with pretty much all the world leaders being hardliners now)
Buddy: you're posting on a forum for tech workers. Not owners. Not billionaires. Not only are we not on anyone's radar as "essential", no one needs that many of us. Might want to rethink your place in the decaying world order if you think an ecosystem collapse needs a lot of programmers.
The world order is decaying anyway due to all the hardliner world leaders I mentioned, all intent on conflict. But I don't think this has an awful lot to do with the climate issue. More with overpopulation and countries like China getting richer and wanting to play the geopower game.
And yeah it may well be very bad for me but there really isn't anything I can do about it. I stand by my original point that it's not a human extinction-level event though.
We're stuck on a finite planet with diminishing natural resources. Endless growth isn't possible.
Maybe we should just accept that some things auto regulate. It's the way of nature.
They see human extinction as a possibility to accept, rather than as something to necessarily avoid.
I know a few people like this, and their reasons vary. These range from "if humanity goes extinct, it's god's will" to "dinosaurs went extinct and the earth survived, something else will evolve if we're not here" to "we've shown we can't be trusted to care for the planet, let nature take its course".
In most cases they'd rather avert climate catasrophe, but for the continued habitability of the planet (for many species), rather than for the continuation of humanity.
If it did, then I personally have no environmental impact; it's already all on my parents ;)
The idea that you’re inherently better off having kids is nonsense as well.
I'm in my mid 20s, in tech and couldn't afford that at all, I could barely afford my gf being unemployed. I don't have a car and live in a small flat. If I can barely afford a comfortable but frugal lifestyle while being paid more than 60% of my peers I'm not too surprised most people literally can't afford kids
The reality is that if you are a couple both working an average job you won't have a whole lot of extra time depending on living situation (commute and access to transport) but on top of that you have very little extra cash that could be helpful to solve logistical pains kids make.
All the people of my age that had kids now have unenviable lifestyles, it feels like they can have what the poor boomers had and not much more and nowadays the expectation is that it will last up to a quarter century because of how much we came to overvalue diplomas (even though they do not sort the good from the bad, at all...).
Because of the insanely collectivist system around the world, it makes no difference to have kids or not for the end of your life, so it becomes more of a decision of accepting to be poorer for the privilège of reproduction.
This pretty stupid all things considered, it seems like a feature to have parents dependent on their kids for the end of their life, this way they would have a lot more motivation to do the job right and those who would do a bad job would have it coming...
In the end, collectivism has a way to always destroy the foundation it relies on, which is hilarious. We just are in the destructive phase, what will come out after is bound to be better I think (hard to do worse).
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/01/parents-children-pare...
You don't do it or not do it for humanity, society or whatever random shit you make up.
It doesn't suggest that people are having fewer children because they are "antinatalists" or consider having children a "selfish choice". It's right there in the title: they think they just don't have time due to their work/life balance. As I said in another comment, that's more likely to be an economic problem (specifically, housing) rather than a philosophical change as you seem to be saying.
I guess most commenters jumped to their own reasons. In that sense, I think it's a natural reaction to the topic.
The article is locked down, so I have no idea what it says after the second paragraph. I can imagine though.
The comment I was replying to said that people aren't having kids because they are morally against the concept of (anyone) having kids. The article is about people who perhaps want to have kids but their job pays too little and takes up too much time. Those are about as different as reasons can be.
Another top-level comment included a link that lets you read the whole article (though there's not much substance to it, and the distinction was already clear about by the end of the first paragraph). There isn't much discussion about it because that's discouraged on Hacker News. From the FAQ, under "Are paywalls ok?":
> In comments, it's ok to ask how to read an article and to help other users do so. But please don't post complaints about paywalls. Those are off topic.
That's a false dichotomy, people without kids can bring joy and laughter to "this absurd, meaningless Universe we habit". You don't have to justify yourself for what you have chosen.
Looks like the last time there was a big change was 1960, I assume that was the development of good birth control techniques. I'd theorise that families never really wanted children, and once given the means to make effective choices we discover that humans don't think it is that rational to have kids.
It is a weirdly philosophical problem - similar to what we will soon face with artificial intelligence - of what exactly are we trying to do as living entities. It is hard to find a path that isn't either nihilism or, from a factual and materialistic perspective, insanity.
I personally think this is probably a good thing. Evolutionary forces will push society above replacement rates sooner or later by whatever means it takes, but we should enjoy the window where we don't need to fight about resources for as long as is possible. If only the African nations would get their birth rates under control, anyway.
Still, I embrace my lack of rationality. It's what makes me human.
Asking for a friend :)
I don't know anyone who had kids a bit later in life who regretted it purely due to their age. Though being now in my mid 40's I think I would struggle with the sleep deprivation and noise of a new baby....
Then I ended up with a boyfriend, but medical tech isn't quite there yet for Mpreg :P
[1] Would be five, but I'm too old for sperm donation.
If you can't/won't have kids, men make better partners anyway. Everything else can be solved one way or another...
Our decision was really my wife’s decision, I was always indifferent, which may explain the feelings described above. Wife remains staunchly committed to a child free lifestyle and couldn’t be happier.
I see all the strings my friends have, having to book meetings months in advance. Where I can go out dancing till 6am whenever I feel like it (which I do a lot) or wake up at 3pm on a Saturday. I don't think my life would have been so full if I'd been so tied down with a family.
As I travel more, my opinion that there are enough humans already has only strengthened.
If I feel the need to scoop up the purported "joy of children", I can visit my sister and wind up my nephew for a few hours, then leave the sugar crash and ensuing tantrums to be her problem as I whizz off back to reality.
I'm so very grateful that my home doesn't have some little narcissist in it running around wearing my face and destroying my property, sanity, and finances. Or at least, not another one. :)
I've never really had the urge, and it's only ever been friends/relatives pushing the "you should have kids, they're amazing!" narrative.
I'm sure they are, but I equate it with e.g. painting. I'm sure painting is very enjoyable, frustrating at times, and can bring a ton of joy and wonder to the world. But I just don't enjoy painting, or have any desire to learn, and don't feel the world is so desperately short of artists that I have a duty to do it.
Seeing many friends of mine seriously struggle with money and time also convinces me I made the right choice. I also don't envy a lot of issues they have to go through, e.g. bullying, teen pregancy, phone addiction, tuition fees, serious/lifelong medical issues, etc.
I get that most people recoil in horror at the latter one. I think they're silly. The fact of the matter is the world is a safer and more prosperous place than ever before. You should be able to invest less into your children than your parents did before you and still have them lead happy lives.
If you have a child, and your own life isn't a pile of misery, you can be reasonably confident your kid's life won't be either. After all, you grew up in a poorer world than they did. But if you hold back on having children because you fear you can't afford to send them to Yale, or buy them all the Steam games they ever wanted, you're probably not saving them from a life of pain, you're just depriving the world of another soul which could've had a beautiful experience here.
No, this is a problem of poor planning and preventing building up (dense).
Plenty of “developed” countries outside of the Anglo world have solved this issue.
Since the locals already got theirs and experience a lot less of the market pressure non-locals experience, restrictive housing policy follows fairly naturally. This is true for both renting and renter locals.
Most people can afford a house, even in the Randstad. So it's not a lack of land, and it's not development blocking. I'm not suggesting anything else, but though I'd take those two out behind the shed.
>The fact of the matter is the world is a safer
>and more prosperous place than ever before.
Sadly, it's often not even a matter of safety from "danger", but safety from the law. Getting CPS called on you[1][2], or getting arrested[3][4] as a parent is not good, even if you are fortunate enough to win.
Then there's the whole angle of disappearing third places, lack of places that can be reasonably visited without driving privileges, nobody's outside because of all of the above so there's nobody to "hang out" or "play" with, desire to funnel kids/teens into more "productive" activities like academics and sports (depending on affluence and interest, this isn't AS bad as the above points), places outright banning[5] young people, etc etc.
[1]https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2018/09/05/mom...
[2]https://www.cnn.com/2015/04/13/living/feat-maryland-free-ran...
[3]https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/07/arreste...
[4]https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-mom-accused-of-leaving-ki...
[5]https://www.businessinsider.com/teen-bans-curfews-malls-them...
When nearing end of life, many people, especially fathers, say they wish they'd dedicated more time to their children rather than work. While meaningful work can provide purpose, it doesn't compare to the happiness derived from building meaningful relationships with loved ones. Children offer a rare opportunity to enjoy one of the deepest forms of human connection available, and I think it's shortsighted to put career advancement over building a family. Balancing work and family life is challenging, but the payoff is well worth it.
I don't give a shit what some old man version of me might end up regretting on this front. My kids deserve to be born because life for them is probably going to be great and filled with joy and adventure, with or without me.
What I don't get is why people keep forcing their lifestyle onto those with a different lifestyle? Do they see me having all this free time and get jealous and want me to spend the best years of my life also stressing out and raising kids or why is that?
I have kids, I love them, I love parts of what having kids is about, and I hate other parts. If for some reason I had to hit rewind, I would probably choose it without having kids with the information I gained over the years.
And I totally understand people not wanting kids.
If is not a 'lifestyle' thing to have children, rather the opposite: not having children is a 'lack of life' style. If enough people take up this 'lack of life' style your culture will die out and be replaced with one where having children is the norm. This is not a value proposition but simple math - every couple needs to have ~2.1 children to keep the population at a steady level [1].
Also, 'they' do not see you having all this free time and get jealous, they notice that you're spending time on hedonistic pursuits while time is running out - there is a set time frame within which having children is a viable proposition. They are not jealous of your free time at all because from their perspective it is wasted time - time which could be spent with your family instead of just by yourself or with your partner.
Does this mean you are a horrible person for not wanting to have children? No, of course it does not. Not everybody is brought into this world to raise children. It does mean you are missing out on one of the most formational experiences life has to offer, all that free time you gain does come at a certain cost. The choice is yours to make due to the advent of birth control - choose wisely.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fer...
Yes some are.
This is incredibly inpopular to articulate it out loud but there is a large enough proportion of parents who regret having kids.
And that doesn't mean they don't love their kids.
> successful, meaningful careers, and they just didn't see how they could juggle those jobs and the demands of parenthood.
That's a false dilemma. Meaning does not come from a bare "career". It comes from how that "career" relates to others. Not everyone can have kids, and many of us find ourselves alone. "Kids" could equally be replaced by charity work, intimate relationships, sports or whatever. But rising up the ranks and accumulating a big pile of money brings neither success nor meaning.
I think the observed change in attitudes has less to do with parenting (or not) than that the present generation have bought into the corporate lie much more than earlier ones.
It shocked me to find quite how devious and aggressive workplaces can be towards women that get pregnant (or who they simply suspect of being in a potentially "fertile" relationship).
Shouldn't it be illegal for employers to monitor communications that might indicate impending motherhood? What about measuring their body temperature covertly? Spying on eating habits. Or making comments about weight and shape?
So you don't have to deal with searching for "Pregnant and screwed" :) here's a link I dug up for people [0] and some real accounts from women in IT who get the sharp end of this [1].
One woman I know went through a wrenching and drawn out court case and won a small fortune against a big British company. She was not able to come on the show because that settlement for constructive dismissal came with a serious NDA/gagging order.
[0] https://pregnantthenscrewed.com/
[1] https://cybershow.uk/episodes.php?id=22
The problem is mostly women who wants to have it all either you want to suffer through the sacrifice that are asked to a man for work or you want kids, you choose; but complaining about this just show the unreal level of entitlement the women of todays have imposed on society.
Its particularly insane to have peoples complaining about this in the current society, when women have received an insane level of positive discrimination and the major problem is actually how bad most of the men have it.
Subsidize daycare, fund schools (from pre-school to university) and focus on learning at-school and not at-home, and pass laws forcing employers to allow parents to reduce their working hours, should they wish to. You can rebuild your cities to be bike able, change gender norms, or change work culture, but honestly the most change will come from the first list.
My situation as a parent here:
On the cost side, recurring costs for after-school daycare (2x week), school 'contributions' (field trips), violin lessons and rental, gymnastics classes, and normal clothing purchases are €200/month. Daycare is subsidized and we are lucky that we only need two days, but bumping that up to 3 or 4 would not be insane on the cost side. Baby day care was also subsidized, but can get expensive if you are sending them 5x week... it depends on the parent's income. For us subsidies covered about a third of the costs, but we earned well.
The school here takes care of education, with very little homework. It's well-funded, and does not require much extra effort or money from our side. We can be as involved as we want to be.
We are able to use only 2x of day care per week because a) most employers understand the needs of parents but mostly b) by law employers are required to let you reduce your hours to, for example, take care of your kids. We both work a half-day once a week, with another family member helping on the remaining day.
While the Dutch will complain about higher education costs, the costs are reasonable. A 4 year study will cost you around €10k in tuition, total. That 4 year study results in a masters if the student is able / wants to follow a university track.
Being a Dutchman myself I'll just put this down to the following piece of Dutch wisdom: Ik klaag, dus ik besta [1], a derivation of Descartes' first principle.
[1] ...which translates to I complain, therefore I am
And yeah, complaining is the national pass-time, until you visit certain other countries ;)
fwiw 4 year study ends with a bachelors degree
Oh, and suddenly your whole population tends to think and act alike for many important subjects because of the built-in propaganda at school. The effects of this can clearly be seen in the current active generation.
As a French that until recently had better fertility than most European countries because of heavy subsidy for having kids I find it funny that you think it even works long-term because it clearly doesn't, even France has dropped fertility and not only you get all the help in the world to have kids, mother are actually paid to have them, yet it doesn't work...
The reality is that it's all about division of labor/responsibility between the sexes but because of previously mentioned "universal education" this is something that cannot be said, because not politically correct (in pretty much any political side which is hilarious in itself).
It's very easy to idealize this coercive system when you were able to choose it but realistically if you would ask many past a certain age, they would definitely choose some other arrangements than to rely on the government for their kids, considering the ongoing cost via taxation (you get to pay forever, how cool) and low quality results...
Anyways, I have one child and hoping for a second. He has been a total joy for me and my wife since he was born.
It just means you don't want to have kids. It doesn't imply any kind of belief structure.
Who knew HN had such a trad subculture.
Does not wanting children rule you out from being a role model for them (or anyone else) or being "exemplary"?
So what else are we supposed to do but grind it out and hope things get better
On the other hand; stop being a little wuss. The reasons I see being given by those fretting the responsibilities seem to be born from general anxiety and over-thinking. Nobody is ever ready to have a child, but we do it any learn along the way because we're arrogant enough in the beginning, and humble enough afterward the beginning.
What I see with this generation however, is never trying because on paper it's impossible. Yes, it's impossible, but that shouldn't stop you if it's what you really want.
I think that the populations of developed countries will start to decline, and a gradual decline is acceptable. We can't rely on immigration forever, presumably less rich countries will start to have less children too as they modernize.
It's a universal trend. The exact same issue is happening in countries that are far more family-friendly.
The world used to REQUIRE you to have children. As your personal pension plan. By cultural or religious force. Or because of the lack of education or contraceptives.
Now in most parts of the world, you're not required. It becomes a question of WANT instead of MUST. And when you ask people how many children they want, the answer is typically 0, 1 or 2. Most people still want children, and quite a few prefer 2. But that averages out to 1.5-1.8 in the aggregate. Which is far below replacement level.
People still want children, just not many per household. Why the cut-off at 2? Because 3, 4, 5 does not fundamentally improve upon the joy of having children whilst it adds a lot of challenges. Bigger home, bigger car, many more trips to take them everywhere, cooking is more complex, it's a mess.
Anyway, the point being is that the article is largely wrong. People that do not want any children because of their focus on career will still not want children when policies are more family-friendly. There's plenty of evidence of this not working. It doesn't move the needle.
You should still go for better policies, just don't expect it to fix this problem.