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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

If you can't afford children you shouldn't have them.

960 replies

MrsArchieTheInventor · 05/04/2012 12:28

"If you can't afford children you shouldn't have them" [and] "child benefit and tax credits should be abolished" with the mantra that if she choses to be childless she should not be forced to pay for the 'breeding' choices of others.

A Facebook friend of mine. I didn't retaliate.

Hmm
OP posts:
usualsuspect · 06/04/2012 10:38

But I'm not a squeezed middle , and I funded many of them though free university places and now my own can't afford to go.

Do you think thats fair?

GnomeDePlume · 06/04/2012 10:41

Bonsoir - it wasnt my contraceptive failure - contraception fails sometimes - in my case it was the coil didnt do its job!

Do I sue the doctor for not having fitted it properly? Of course not.

I think that there was a covenant between society and children. As a society we need children who are going to be active contributers to the society. Of course ideally you would interview prospective parents and demand that they do their best for their children. That isnt possible so we as a society have to do our best.

This means providing the very best in early years support, education and health and welfare support.

In return we hope that these children will be economic contributers in the future to pay for our own old age.

Whatmeworry · 06/04/2012 10:47

Or do you mean 'encourage people with higher IQs and no disabilities to have more children and discourage those with lower IQs and disabilities from having more'

Read what I wrote slowly.

"The reason I think this will hit the fan is now that the middle classes are seeing real incomes fall, they wil be increasingly reluctant to fund other people's children while being unable to afford their own."

The middle classes want the same shot at having kids as the people they are funding. I think they were happy to subsidise others while their own incomes were also rising, now they are falling I think they are less so. That is all.

Yummymummyyobe1 · 06/04/2012 10:48

I think this in awful thing to say what else should we ban/restrict based on income Health Care, education etc. On the other hand I do disagree with those people in society who have child after child as thought it is a though it was a career.

Everybody has the right to a family which should never be based on income baby's don't need much materially all they really need is a place to live, food and lots of love. Ev

HappyMummyOfOne · 06/04/2012 11:04

Bonsoir is right, we encourage people to "get" more money by having children whilst those who do the right things and actually only have children they can afford pay for the choices of others. That cannot be and shouldnt be right.

Nobody has the right to a child. If you cant afford to support children as you are already on benefits (even WTC) or plan to claim once the child arrives then people should be forced to take responsibility. Thats not what the welfare state is there for but whilst we continue to allow it people will believe its their "entitlement" and more and more children will be born into the benefit cycle.

We need children who grow up in working households so that they see it as the norm to provide for your own family. Stats show a high percentage that grow up on benefits go on to claim themselves so the argument that children will be looking after people in old age doesnt work as many wont be contributors.

From a quick google, after hearing that most claimants want to work, is shows that children in households JSA are no where near as high as those in households claiming income support. Theres a huge difference between the two so it wouldnt appear that most claimants with children want to work.

Whatmeworry · 06/04/2012 11:07

Everybody has the right to a family which should never be based on income

No, but equally no one has a right to expect others to fund that family.

bejeezus · 06/04/2012 11:08

The attitudes here stink. I pay tax, I'm working class. Maybe I don't want my taxes to pay for NHS treatment for the obese members of the 'squeezed middle' after they've gorged on too much French cheese and red wine huh? Or their high flying husbands with stress related illness who couldn't find the time to excercise and smoked cigars

OhDoAdmitMrsDeVere · 06/04/2012 11:10

Try and keep up yourself dear.

The whole argument is based on the flawed premise that the country is going to hell in a handcart because of millions of over breeding plebs sticking their hands out for your cash.

This is not the case.

Its a fevered fantasy, encouraged by the government and seized upon by those who prefer this version of reality.

bejeezus · 06/04/2012 11:10

Where does it end? Who decides?

bejeezus · 06/04/2012 11:23

A lot of people that go on to do really great things are born into poverty

Rich kids? Not so much...

usualsuspect · 06/04/2012 11:23

Anyone who wants a child to go without whatever the circumstances of that childs birth is sick.

I'm hiding this thread now.

Whatmeworry · 06/04/2012 11:24

Its a fevered fantasy, encouraged by the government and seized upon by those who prefer this version of reality.

I see. And the reality is?

OhDoAdmitMrsDeVere · 06/04/2012 11:24

Who decided it was poor people sponging of the state that was the real problem?

Why do people chose to believe it?

Could be if we blame the 'others' no-one has to take a look at their own habits?

It couldnt possibly be that the goverement has a vested interested in turning us against the poor, disabled, disadvantaged and vulnerable?

We are being led by a group of people who have no need for the welfare state, NHS or state schooling. Not only do they not need it now they are rich, they have never needed it. They have no experience, no grounding, they no nothing.

How then are they qualified to make the decisions they are now making? How are they able to gauge the effects of their new policies?

Why would they care?

Pity the fools who follow them like well fed sheep because your turn will come.

OhDoAdmitMrsDeVere · 06/04/2012 11:26

The reality is that the rich have always and will always screw us for all we have and then blame those with nothing.

How do those with so little power manage to bring the country to its knees? How does that work exactly?

Kelly-Anne and her 4 kids in Bradford has wielded her mighty sword of fecklessness and plunged us into a pit of despair Hmm

Think not.

bejeezus · 06/04/2012 11:51

Yy mrsdv

Maybe if you have aspirations in that direction, you lie your allegiences carefully

Bring back Harold Wilson

Codandchops · 06/04/2012 12:06

This thread is so sad, any one of us could find ourselves in the position of needing benefits at any time. I didn't plan that my child would be autistic, I did not plan to be a lone parent. Sometimes life is shit but I am so grateful for the benefits system that is allowing me to take a year out of work to support my son and is giving me benefits to do so.

Sadly people like the OP's facebook friend will often qualify their statements with "but I don't mean people like you". Sadly when it comes down to it the benefit claimants are often "people like" me. When I was working (as a HV) I saw loads of families who needed the benefits system but I can genuinely say that the majority had either worked or were working with benefits such as HB topping up a minimal income.

OutragedAtThePriceOfFreddos · 06/04/2012 12:14

Any one of us could need benefits, I think that's why the majority of us support their existence. But I also think the majority of us would not have children, especially more than two, when we had been on full out of work benefits long term.

I think people struggle to see the difference between people like me who think that benefits are a wonderful thing but there has to be a limit, and the minority of people who think all benefit claimants are scummy scroungers like those mentioned in the OP.

bejeezus · 06/04/2012 12:16

Hmmm....where do we stand on NHS funded IVF treatment for middle class people? And for those that might claim tax credits?

What about working class surrogate mothers that carry babies for middle class couples? I assume they are allowed to give birth?

GnomeDePlume · 06/04/2012 13:07

The children we have now pay for our pensions, they will pay for our health care. They will wipe our dribble in our care homes. They will write books for us to have read to us, they will read to us. They will carry out operations on our varicose veins, they will work to find new treatments for arthritis. They will make television programmes for us to watch and make us laugh. They will clean the streets when we are too old to manage this ourselves. They will be our nurses and care home workers, doctors and dentists. The people who serve us in shops, the people who build things and make things and earn money to pay for us.

They will listen to us drone on about how much harder things were in our day.

And some of you want fewer of these people? You are quite mad!

Whatmeworry · 06/04/2012 13:09

The children we have now pay for our pensions, they will pay for our health care. They will wipe our dribble in our care homes.

The ones brought up in 3 generations of welfare won't.

Codandchops · 06/04/2012 13:15

How do you know that worry? I know youngsters in jobs who have come from families like that. Youngsters who want something better for themselves.

I agree though that in a chaotic family their chances of escaping it are less.

GnomeDePlume · 06/04/2012 13:26

And that is why there should be a covenant between society and child to ensure that the child gets the best start possible. You try to break the cycle. Not by denying financial support to the child but by providing the child with support.

A sensible far thinking society will provide the child from an impoverished background with more not fewer opportunities. With the best of education not the worst, with the best of healthcare and welfare not the worst.

It's enlightened self interest really.

Whatmeworry · 06/04/2012 13:30

It's enlightened self interest really.

But it breaks down when the cost of supporting other people's kids (without any guarantee of where it ends) impacts your ability to support your own.

Which is where we are. Which is why this is becoming an issue.

I think there has been a lot of wilful misrepresentation of theh original premise we were discussing, which is that there has to be a LIMIT to what the state spends on the kids of people who can't afford to have them. Not zero, but not an open chequebook either.

woollyideas · 06/04/2012 13:35

WhatMeWorry

The ones brought up in 3 generations of welfare won't.

What a prejudiced view of the world you have.

HappyMummyOfOne · 06/04/2012 13:41

I agree that the vast majority of people support the existance of benefits. What many dont support is people choosing to live on benefits rather than work or people that have children knowing that the state will be the one providing for them. Its the "i can do what i like and its my entitlement" attitude that lots seems to have.

GnomeDePlume, whilst some may pay into the put how many wont. How many will repeat the benefit cycle their parents had and go on to claim themselves. Whilst we need children, we need those that will support themselves and pay taxes.