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?

I agree that the concentration of decent jobs in the SE really doesn’t help

Agree with @Kendodd , depending on where you live driving can be a necessity. All of my friends started driving lessons soon after their 17th birthday.

In fact the only person I know who didn't learn to drive until their 30s is my DP and that's because he lived in London with good transport links.

Equally if people lived where they could afford it would help. Disproportionate aspiration is another cause of low birth rates.

This makes logical sense but in reality it's a huge wrench for people to have to consider moving away from their friends and families in order to have children. I would have really struggled on maternity leave had it not been for a local support network.

I'm older but all my colleagues and my own DC bought houses recently in their late 20s, first baby arrived age 30.
All did extra work,frugal food, packed lunches, no holiday or coffee's out.

Not London but SE

I want a third but we can’t afford one. Before tax income of 90k for the two of us. Nursery is a killer . Can not afford another house with an other bedroom! So we have two children who I adore and accept it’s just not fair to have a third as we would be totally stretched and have zero disposable income.

Support with Driving and University and trying to save a tiny bit to give each child towards wedding ! Would be impossible too.

All of that is a choice. You don't need a bedroom for each child. Your kids can pay for their own driving lessons and weddings. They can get a job through university.

Nursery is a killer but the rest isn't needed. If you really wanted a 3rd you'd make it work.

Sometimes, yes. But many times, no. Look at the amount of migrant workers who come over to this country and uproot everything to work here, are they making excuses or are they just going ahead and making it work for them?

I agree - I have 2 DDs in early teens and both of them recently have been questioning me about my choice to have them, did I think I’d have to work this hard, don’t I get frustrated not having any chill time, why does everything cost so much, etc.

My response is that I wanted children and I wanted a career and with only 24 hours in the day, if you want a good relationship with your children and a career you have to sacrifice some things, and that for me has been a social life and hobbies for a long time (much better now they can be left for a couple of hours alone) and we had a really good chat about pros and cons of having children.

I never say to them ‘when you have children’ as frankly, I think they’d do well to think twice about doing it as it’s not respected, supported or valued and I think more and more young women are thinking carefully about what it means for them, their careers, their aspirations and good for them!

Expectations are higher but also, people have to accept some responsibility for their spending choices too.

I have friends where both parents work FT and earn double what we do and they have no better standard of living than us. They don't have a better house etc but they took out 100% mortgages which (given their circumstances) was an error.

I was a SAHM for years and now PT. We saved hard and put down a huge deposit. We also don't spend big money on clothes or change our cars every 4 years. Some of it does come down to unwise choices in your 20s IMO.

It does not cost a quarter of a million pounds. I have seen those costings. They are way over inflated. It is £12,900 a year. We have two children and this is how much I earn. I wonder what I am living on then? Fresh air?

When I was a young adult people used to say do not way until you can afford children, or you will never have them. People just had children and made it work somehow.

It can’t cost quarter of a million to raise a child. I’ve had 4.

I do not work part-time.
It includes so called loss of earnings and is based on a middle class lifestyle.

The difference is that our lifestyle expectations are very different. A few days is a run down caravan was literally all we got as kids, we had fish and chips perhaps once a month and I can probably count on my fingers how many restaurant meals I had in my first 10 years of life, literally once a year treat.

People had one old car if they were lucky, some of my friends didn't have one, one phone (landline obviously) per household, just standard tv, no memberships to gyms, they hadn't invented soft play and kids didn't do clubs except scouting/guiding or equivalents. Kids shared bedrooms, even beds. Prams were handed down as were clothes ... can go on but you get my drift

Now we have very different expectations of what is a minimum standard of living basically and a normal wage won't stretch that far. I still stayed home with mine until junior school age but that meant sacrifices like one old car, payg mobile etc. I've got a tots group at work today and nearly every adult came in with a shop bought drink despite the fact we give out free drinks here, several are going for lunch after tots in town ... they don't live cheaply, us running it are always a bit aghast

Childcare is the big issue, especially since it is almost always women who are the lower earners so end up being forced out of work if they don't want to be a SAHM.

Our nursery fees for one child are currently £2k+ per month, I'm expecting twins and when they are at nursery too it will be £6k+ per month which is just insane. We're incredibly privileged to be able to take the hit knowing that it's an investment in our careers as well as excellent childcare for our children but twins can happen to anyone and they can easily price a mother (usually) out of work.

Probs crossed loads of posts, but fwiw I agree with those saying we've been that way for at least a decade or so already.

Really hoping a Universal Income that supports a small family to survive on a single minimum wage job is the answer - there will always be those who cannot achieve more than that, for whatever reason. Makes sense to me to make that the bottom bench mark. Everyone on a level peg, access to health and social care, and anything earnt on top provides higher standards and luxuries.

We also seem to have a financial model that depends on business and services hooking people in for a lifetime of spending, rather than solving actual issues. Nothing is made to last more than a year or so and "membership" models rather than one off purchases are becoming way too common for my liking. Sustainability needs to include social and environmental factors, not just £££, but it seems there's no real will as quick bucks always seem to win out.

If I were to remove things from my daily life that I didn't have growing up, our household would easily save £1300 a month. That's before things like holidays, trips out, toys and clothes. The trouble is, I don't want to give up things like central heating, a lovely car and expensive coffees.

We actually pay less tax here than we did in the UK.

My tax rate is 38.7%. In the UK I had my tax free allowance, my 20% rate and my 40% rate, I then had my 11% national insurance. Overall I will actually pay less tax on my income here, so that alongside lower childcare costs has made a huge difference to our finances.

I don't know about in the U.K. but I have a friend in the US who this has happened to. Spent so long saving up to be able to afford more than 6 weeks maternity until it got to the point she became peri menopausal and was unable to conceive. Obviously I've distilled a very long and sad story into a couple of sentences but essentially yes she was unable to afford a child despite living in a not too expensive area and both she and her husband working full time in skilled jobs.