this post was submitted on 26 Jul 2024

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268

Kids? A Growing Number of Americans Say, ‘No, Thanks.’ (www.nytimes.com)

submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

61 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Paywall removed: https://archive.is/anyBg

Like Ms. McKay, a growing number of U.S. adults say they are unlikely to raise children, according to a study released on Thursday by the Pew Research Center. When the survey was conducted in 2023, 47 percent of those younger than 50 without children said they were unlikely ever to have children, an increase of 10 percentage points since 2018.

When asked why kids were not in their future, 57 percent said they simply didn’t want to have them. Women were more likely to respond this way than men (64 percent vs. 50 percent). Further reasons included the desire to focus on other things, like their career or interests; concerns about the state of the world; worries about the costs involved in raising a child; concerns about the environment, including climate change; and not having found the right partner.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

It's not only about "not being able to afford them". Plenty of people in the world "cannot afford" kids and have 7 of them.

It's the mix of being educated and understanding that it's not a great idea to have kids, plus the means of being able to prevent or stop pregnancy. Also a cultural shift that allowed us to think by ourself and not feeling forced to have kids.

But the machine need human lubricant to keep working for its owners so they are going to take that from us to ensure we keep making them workers to exploit.

We are already seeing how anti-pregnancy methods are being attacked. And soon they will take away this new culture to bring back the old hivemind culture. And of course the education. There is already a trend on how bad it is for everyone to have a college degree.

[–] [email protected] 55 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Is this a surprise? People can barely afford to take care of themselves these days, why would they want to further burden themselves with a child?

Stop stealing everything from the lower and middle classes and giving it all to the rich, and this trend will magically reverse itself.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

There was a podcast I listened to a while back that indicated the opposite, the idea was that the better off people are, the less likely they are to have kids. One of the explanations I remember was that the better off people are, kids are just another competing thing that they can do. For example, if you are well off and can go travel for a long period of time, you might be more inclined to do that vs deciding to have kids. Another stat was that birthrates were higher for lower income people.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Nah this is bullshit. Most people want to raise a family in a home they own. Take away that possibility of certainty of having a roof over your head and then planning for a kid sounds scary. If you don't want to accept that, you could also blame the micro plastics floating around in everyone's balls now because plastic was considered such a useful byproduct to the petroleum industry.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (2 children)

How do you explain the inverse correlation between income and the total fertility rate within and between nations?

To me it seems counterintuitive that having more money, or like you said about ability to secure a roof over ones head, would mean less chance of having kids but that seems to be a clear trend. Have you actually looked into it or you just making up bullshit?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

It is hypothesized that the observed trend in many countries of having fewer children has come about as a response to increased life expectancy, reduced child mortality, improved female literacy and independence, and urbanization that all result from increased GDP per capita,consistent with the demographic transition model. The increase in GDP in Eastern Europe after 1990 has been correlated with childbearing postponement and a sharp decline in fertility. In developed countries where birth control is the norm, increased income is likewise associated with decreased fertility. Theories behind this include: People earning more have a higher opportunity cost if they focus on childbirth and parenting rather than their continued career. Women who can economically sustain themselves have less incentive to become married. Higher-income parents value quality over quantity and so spend their resources on fewer children.

From the link you used, it seems to suggest it is less about where they have time to spend and more towards other reasons. The only one that would be affected by choosing between one and the other is between children and continued career but that could be fixed with better access to child care services (day care, etc...)

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

My experience has been that my coworkers across several jobs that have kids tend to be both less educated and more religious. Regardless of income, my less ignorant coworkers tend not to have kids.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Unbounded growth isn't progress, it's a disease.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

Literally Cancer's modus operandi

[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 month ago

Nobody can afford kids with all of the corporate price gouging and wage theft. no shit we're not having more kids.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

If I could buy a house where I live I could consider one. But that won’t be for a long time or I move and start over

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (4 children)

I think previous generations felt they had no choice. And even ITT those who chose to have kids are still smitten with this idea that life has no meaning without kids. Which was historically a coping mechanism for those previous generations who needed a way to deal with not having a choice.

Having kids seems awful 99.999% of the time. Life has a lot to offer without giving your entire existence over to children, despite the popular belief otherwise

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Societal pressure to have children is a huge factor for sure. I've heard from previous generations in my family that during the baby boom era, rumors would circulate in their community if you didn't have enough children, like "something must be wrong with the Johnsons down the street because they only ever had two kids" (and this was in upper-middle class WASP America).

Obviously this attitude continues today in certain communities (Mormons, small rural towns, etc), but it's no longer as prevalent.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

And someone with your mindset should not have kids. So, good on you for making that choice. Previous generations knew they had a choice, but they were pressured because having a family was part of “the American Dream”.

I am an older millennial and have a child. Sure, it’s hard work and I sacrifice to give them things they need or want but I wouldn’t change it. His outlook on life, focus on being a good person, and how he views the world at 10 is all amazing. It’s these kids that see through the BS and try and be better that are our future and hope for changing things.

Plus, like it or not, they are the ones that will take care of you when you’re old and suffering and they’re the ones that kind of keep the world running when we’re too old. I guess you can always purchase a gun and off yourself though but to me, that seems horrible rather than saying goodbye and going a lot more peacefully.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think previous generations felt they had no choice.

Previous Generation here, you're wrong.

Life has a lot to offer without giving your entire existence over to children

I'm also a parent and if you are giving your entire existence over to your children then you're doing it wrong. Yes being a parent means making time and energy for your children but that demand fades the older they get and even while they are young you should still be making time for yourself and your partner.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

How old are you? You're saying you had kids before birth control existed? That's obviously what I meant

Also I would consider giving hours every day mandatorily giving my life up to someone/something. Just like I feel like my job consumes my life. It does.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (1 children)

well that and having to watch the kids have a lower quality of life than you had and that includes the part you provide as well as their long term prospects.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Right! There's no shortage of reasons not to have kids. If I felt they were easy to afford and I knew they'd turn out well, I might just be interested. But no such guarantees exist so yeah I'm not risking being stressed an insane amount for 25%+ of my life.

The behavior I see in kids alone is probably enough though. My kids would have to go to school with that? All the trauma I experienced in school as a kid? Yeah I'm not choosing that for someone else. And I'm absolutely not home schooling either. I know someone whose life was destroyed by that and other choices his parents made.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 1 month ago

And if you weren't clearly in highschool....

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Well its never been and never will be a guarantee but its almost a guarantee for not those things this millenium so far and what it would take for it to have good prospects is sci fi level technology.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Guarantee was too strong a word. Replace it with "reason to think that" and my point remains the same

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

yeah that makes much more sense.

[–] [email protected] 77 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I really can't comprehend how someone can look at the state of things and think it is appropriate to subject another person to the rat-ass future that's coming. That's before you even consider the expense of raising children, which is also prohibitive.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

They don't "look"... Those are the ones that want kids. Those who weight the pros and cons, most likely reach the conclusion that having kids is not feasible.

[–] [email protected] 47 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Some of us even say, "fuck no."

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And for a non-zero number of those, it's because no fuck.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Speak for yourself

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

*fuck for yourself

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

*fuck yourself

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

*Fuck

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