Is our society heading towards the point where having children is an unaffordable luxury for the average couple?

[MamaLlama123]

Is our society heading to the point where having/ raising children is becoming a luxury?

Thinking about my family as an example - My grandmother had 5 children - she was working class and a SAHM. Despite not having much, my grandparents were able to house, feed and raise their children well. They were not in poverty. They had small treats like fish & chips every Friday and a few days at the seaside every year etc. I don't think family size for this generation was any kind of luxury but children was just an inevitable outcome of life

Comparing this with today, I read so many threads on mumsnet about women who are in a much stronger position than my Grandma. They are not SAHM but actually have extensive qualifications/ careers and resulting in 2 incomes within the household. Despite being so much better off, women seem unable to confidently go forward in planning even a small family 1-2 children (comments from a recent thread about delaying 2nd child due to nursery fees comes to mind)

Are children becoming disproportionately more expensive compared to previous generations? and do you think that having children will be an unaffordable luxury/ unrealistic goal for todays children?

Anecdotally, historically the women in my family have worked going back to my great grandmothers. The only SAHMs have been in my generation, my SIL and one of my cousins. The 2 childless relatives in my family have wanted kids but haven't for reasons that aren't financial, they are actually the wealthier ones. One has been TTC for years with no luck and the other hadn't found Mr Right but froze her eggs in case she wanted to in future.

So in my family we've always had 1-3 kids going back to great grandmothers. My Grandparents were always frugal, made their own clothes and curtains, didn't spend what I do on tech/ home renovation etc. and often did without to afford budget holidays.

However, I do completely understand your sentiment that raising kids are expensive and will be considered a choice in future. It's a tough financial future for most of us / our kids.

I wouldn't let that put me off. Most 18 yr olds I know have jobs so buy these things themselves. Or at least contribute towards it.

I know loads of people with over 4 children and most are low income. They make huge sacrifices and have a lower standard of living than most people want.

Working class women always worked. Being a SAHM was an aspirational middle class luxury.

The accomodarion thing is interesting. Housing is insane now and definitely an ssue in terms of starting and growing families.

However mutli generational living was very common and even expected. Young couples would often live with their parents for a good amount of time before they could afford to buy or rent their ow place.

I was born in the very late 70s and we all lived with my paternal grandparents until my parents could afford their own rental.

To be honest, some of that is optional. I don't own a car myself so I won't be funding one for DS.

What are you talking about? Every 18 year old I know is in full time education and will br until at least 21/22 years of age. Some have part time jobs but at best we are talking about a small tiny income. We have to supplement student loans, and everything else. Our expenditure has gone through the roof.

A lot depends where you live to be honest. You can still buy a 3 bed house for around £150k where I am.

I won't be supplementing DS's student loan. I can't afford to in my situation. He'll be entitled to the full loan though so he'll have to manage on that.

I had one quite late (40) so would have needed to have a second straight away. There was absolutely no way I could afford this so he's an only. He would have loved a little brother or sister so it makes me sad. It also makes me confused that certain families I work with just seem to keep announcing another pregnancy but with no obvious way of supporting them so obviously everybody doesn't find it unaffordable.

I agree with this.

I didn’t learn to drive until I graduated, started work and could fund my own insurance. The only people who learnt to drive at 17 tended to be the wealthy people with 2 car households, who would get added to the insurance of the “run-around”

It’s not optional if you live rurally, there is no public transport whatsoever. We can’t work without a car.

Yes. I don't know anyone who goes to uni with a car to be honest. He will have to wait until he's graduated and working, he is always welcome to live at home so he can afford to learn but I don't have the spare cash to buy him a car or insurance myself.

But presumably you knew that when you chose to live there?

Well yes but that's a choice you made. I'm just saying it's not essential for everyone.

What? It’s not a choice at all. Especially not for the people in council housing with no prospects to easily relocate.

SAHP weren’t the nor back then - both my Grandmas worked bring up their families, and my Great Grandmas!

None of them lived a life of luxury and holidays rare! But all of them had a lot of children Grandparents had 6 and G-Granny one side had 8! SAHM only the rich who also had Nanny’s! SAHM seems to be a more recent thing - when I was at school most Mums worked sadly in a low paying job. I also grew up though in a poor area.

My Mum as one of six living in poverty in central London didn’t want the same for her children. I’m one of 3, she also worked. But again for me I saw the struggle, we didn’t really have holidays . Food was monitored and clothes handed down. I didn’t want that for my children - so have had 2 - drive the importance of education. For me education is the key.

Contraception till the pill was introduced in the later sixties was very unreliable so those 5 children may have not been a choice. But you didn’t write what the timeline was for those births.

Women rarely complained back then as they just had to get on with it. They were very voiceless especially the working class.

It is a myth that women didn’t work, many did. my Grandmother was a bus driver and then in the Women’s Auxiliary air force as an ambulance driver. This was in the 1920 onwards.

After WWI due to the huge loss of men of marrying age many women never married so had to work.

People had much lower expectations, even when I was growing up in the 1970’s there just was nowhere near as much stuff to buy.

I live in council housing, do you?

The bottom line is the average cost of a child ( just to 18 years, most of us continue for a while after that) is

£233,256

A quarter of a million pounds.

We are offered barely any support from society, maternity care is woeful, childcare costs are astronomical. SAHP is not valued at all.

We have to make drastic changes if we want a future generation and work force. My dd18 said there is no way she intends to put herself through it… and her friends all say the same.

Uneducated women that were voiceless is not where we are today thankfully, and many now understand the reality of marriage and motherhood, and quite frankly have other options.

While it might not be essential everywhere, driving is a really important life skill and opens up opportunities for people (employment opportunities for example). And, as with everything, poorer children suffer and struggle to afford it. I think there's a very strong argument for teaching children to drive as part of education to try to equal the playing field a bit.

I felt like the first 3 years were affordable mostly because we didn't use/need childcare.

Yes but they can still do it after graduation when they can afford it themselves. I don't know anyone who learned to drive the minute they turned 17.

You surely realise your town/city perspective is not everyone’s reality.

Rural life is not a choice for everyone, and some kind of idyllic utopia - it is in some areas the most poverty stricken in the whole country. Unless you want to remain unable to work and cut off driving is not an optional extra to be done leisurely when it suits. It’s a life line.

My parents married in 1952 (had me in 1954) and they couldn't afford to buy a house. They didn't have a car and we had 4 UK holidays over the course of 18 years and they were very cheap holidays.

We didn't have any heating indoors apart from a coal fire in the living room. No tv, no washing machine. Money was very tight.

Our friends and neighbours all seemed to be in roughly the same position or even worse off

Both my parents worked. Once they had children mum worked evenings so she could be home during the day.

So the situation of your grandparents certainly was not the norm at the time.