Is it a right to have Kids you can’t afford!?!

[KN2212]

I am totally fed up of listening to people complain about how broke they are after having kids. Babies and childcare are cripplingly expensive but that’s pretty much common knowledge, right?

I fell out with a long term friend of mine about a year ago. Since the birth of her DD all she did was complain about the situation she’d orchestrated.
Her and her (now ex) partner had no home of their own, low income, high debt and no savings when they decided to go ahead and have a child (though granted had been together for 7 years). The poor boyfriend busted his butt working 13 hour shifts 6 days a week in a call centre whilst they all lived in one cramped room at her parents and she complained he wasn’t doing enough. Due to her crippling shopping debts and inability to hold a job they were never going to make enough to live and knew that pre getting pregnant.

(Other friends are in similar situations, complaining about how they ‘can’t afford to go back to work’ because of childcare costs but equally can’t afford to live if they don’t go back to work!!! Come on and take some responsibility you knew this was going to be your situation.)

Whilst she was complaining over coffee one day about how the benefit system wasn’t giving her enough free money I called her out on her obvious poor planning and asked why she didn’t wait and save pre child. She got very defensive and said that they were never going to be able to afford a child due to their financial situation so why bother waiting?

It just got me thinking really hard, since when did having children become a right? It seemed so clear to her that she deserved to have a child despite not being able to afford one and that the government should now support her because she deserved to have her daughter.
Am I wrong in thinking that having children you can’t support is completely irresponsible and shitty and entitled?

I know a lot of women who want kids but are having to wait and plan and save and do it ‘the right way’ it seems unfair to them. When women like my ex friend do exactly what they want without planning and then hold the government over a barrel saying that their kids don’t have food and clothes. It just sucks like the children shouldn’t have to suffer but the tax payer shouldn’t have to pay for your unfair choices.

To clarify I have empathy for unplanned pregnancy’s no contraception is 100% but that’s not the kind of situation I’m talking about here. I’m talking about planned pregnancies.

Roadtorivendel I don't think success has any impact on whether someone views abortion as something that is an option for them or not.
Labelling it as 'being sentimental about embryos' hugely minimises the decision lots of women have to face and the emotions some women who do have an abortion face.

In parts of the UK women can't access free legal abortion, so wouldn't even have that as a choice.

I've seen people who seem to think you are responsible for your kids only for as long as the government gives help for them

Is it because of government payments though or because of not adapting to a changing world. When I was young, kids started work at 15 and were often married by 18.

All my family left home at 18 to go to university, nobody moved home afterwards. So we honestly assumed, when we became parents, that our responsabilities would end at 18.

This jumped out at me.

It just got me thinking really hard, since when did having children become a right?

Since when should it not be a right? It's this sort of thinking that leads you to forced abortion and sterilisation of poor women.

OKMaybeNot Have as many kids as you want, just don't expect other people to pay for them.

Roadtorivendel I don't think success has any impact on whether someone views abortion as something that is an option for them or not.

Did you mean to so wildly misinterpret my post? I said they're either scrupulous about BC or open to an abortion? Also, I suggest it's correlated rather than causal.

Labelling it as 'being sentimental about embryos' hugely minimises the decision lots of women have to face and the emotions some women who do have an abortion face.

I cannot get my head around the idea of raising a child in poverty being the better, less stressful alternative to an abortion, but I'm not sentimental about embryos so no surprise there.

You do know that in Northern Ireland it is illegal not to report a crime you have knowledge of? Therefore, if you are raped and choose not to report but then become pregnant and want to claim a rape exemption in this type of proposed situation, by claiming the exemption you are admitting you have committed an offence as you have not reported the rape.

Catch 22 there.

RoadtoRivendell in Northern Ireland (which is a part of the UK) there is no access to free and legal abortion. What would you suggest those women there do?

There you go again with the 'sentimental about embryos' comment. That is your opinion therefore irrelevant to anyone else's lives.
Either you have an inability to understand that others morals and views differ to yours or you're just being a GF. 🙄

RoadtoRivendell in Northern Ireland (which is a part of the UK) there is no access to free and legal abortion. What would you suggest those women there do?

It's a travesty and the state needs to deal with the fallout of their barbaric policies i.e. provide for unplanned children. I would think it's pretty obvious that I'm a strong supporter of abortion rights.

Either you have an inability to understand that others morals and views differ to yours or you're just being a GF

Of course other people have different morals. I suggest they be scrupulous about their birth control if they want to avoid an unplanned pregnancy.

So, if I live in Antrim I would get support, but if I live in Anwick I don't?

Sounds like an excellent idea to me. I have no idea why these fascists who deny women bodily autonomy shouldn't pay for it.

It would become a welfare magnet and they'd eventually be forced to reconsider their position.

Do you actually live in NI, or is this an academic exercise?

My gran always said:
take what you want and pay for it.

Meaning NOBODY is expected to pay for your choices. All the consequences are yours and only yours to take.

Rich or poor - whatever. Your life, your choice, your consequences. Do not expect anybody else to pay for them.

As to "I didn't know" in the age of internet - do you even.

I have four kids, I had my first at 16, I know I know, teenage parents are useless and soooo class less, however, I can't afford to go back to work, I would love to, and Just to clarify, I don't NEED to, but I would love to, the childcare bill for three kids, school drop offs and pick ups and and three hours a day childcare would cost us £1300 a month, I can't afford that!! And why should I pay someone more than two thirds my standard wage, for my job, when I can do it myself and me and husband are a little better off? He gets marriage tax allowance, which he wouldn't, and I get the child tax credit, kids pre 2017, which although not loads, is enough for me to take them out and treat them a few times a month, £1300 in childcare is ridiculous, especially when all these family's you are posting about get it for free, well between 15 and 30 hours of it. If we got that, paid to a qualified childminder I could go back to work, pay my tax and our childcare would be free, but it never works that way for the people who want to work.

I have no issue with the fact that you had your first child at 16.

But unless your other three children are triplets, having a large family is a choice you made.

I was watching a programme on TV a while back where this mum on benefits was saying she'd like to go to work but then she'd have to put her five children into childcare and she didn't think it was right that her kids should be looked after by someone else when they could be looked after by their mum.

Now it's quite likely that she wouldn't be able to get a job which would pay enough to cover the cost of childcare anyway. But that's not the argument she made. The argument she made was that she didn't want her children to be cared for by someone else.

I'm afraid that really made me see red.

If you choose to have five children and expect the state to pay for them so that you don't have to go to work and leave them in a nursery or with a childminder, that is a choice you have made, expecting people like me to pick up the bill. People like me who know that we will not be able to afford to have more than two children, and who will have to put their two children into nursery or childcare and go back to work so that we can continue to pay for our own children and all of yours as well.

Maybe your husband earns enough to support your family and you don't rely on benefits in which case, fine by me.

But I think that morally, if you have a choice between relying on benefits and going back to work but spending most of your money on childcare, and you choose to stay at home and rely on benefits so you can be with your kids, you're just forcing other people to pay for your choices.

It's not free money. It's taxpayers' money that could be spent on schools or the NHS.

@scrumplepaper

I don't think most people would begrudge you having children and receiving some benefits to help pay for them (I wouldn't anyway ). You'd be making a contribution - it's when people deliberately choose not to work and claim benefits instead, or have large families that they can't possibly support that's so frustrating.

I originally wanted 4 kids, but stopped at 2 - we'd be so broke otherwise!

I was born in 1980, I'm an only child. My mum is one of nine. Her reasons for only having me was because she wanted to give me a nice life...we were northern working class, my parents worked full time, owned their own home, cars and we had foreign holidays. Never a benefit in sight. I think times have changed, the sense of responsibility has eroded.

I have three, my household income is six figures I also have never received a benefit in my life.....but I would never suggest that someone shouldn't have children, people need to be responsible of course but there seems to be so many factors working against the working classes nowadays that we really would have a nation of Tarquins if we only let net contributors breed.

It's a very complex problem.

I made the decision to work nights when my husband worked days to provide for our kids, it’s just an excuse when people say, I can’t find a job, sometimes you have to make sacrifices( like lack of sleep in my case) to give to your kids more then you had. To be honest it’s doesn’t last long, I found a day job after both of them were in secondary school.

Yes its irresponsible.

Article in metro recently. Family with 9 children complaining that the council, I think it's Birmingham, can't give them a 6 bedroom council house. They were evicted, perhaps illegally, from a private let, currently in 3 flats, previously b&b. I feel for anyone struggling to house their family, but 9 kids. Most low and middle earning couples know they can't afford more than two or three at a push.

Lets put it this way having a family is expensive and especially when children come into the picture, you just want to ensure that they never go without.

I am a firm believer that if you can not afford children and it would put you in an unnecessary financial hardship whereby the whole family suffers you need to rethink.

And in today's modern age contraception is a good way to ensure that you are financially stable or semi stable and have everything in place to ensure that you do not have to live off welfare or struggle unnecessarily.

I feel for anyone struggling to house their family, but 9 kids. Most low and middle earning couples know they can't afford more than two or three at a push.

This is exactly it.

Very few people would actually say "the poor shouldn't breed", or have a problem with a low income family with two kids relying on state benefits. But STOP CHOOSING TO HAVE LARGE FAMILIES AND RELYING ON THE TAXPAYER TO PAY FOR THEM!

If I (as a higher rate taxpayer) have decided that I can't afford two kids, I damn well don't want to work my arse off paying for you to have four or seven or nine. Take some responsibility. Contraceptives are free on the NHS. USE THEM!

@Gran22 that's an extreme example though. Very few people have 9 children!

The same principle applies to any more than two, IMO.

Unless the second birth is a multiple birth, choosing to have more than two children is a luxury and a lifestyle choice. You should only be doing it if you can afford to support them. Not the taxpayer. You.

Should disabled people who can't do paid employment due to their limitations be allowed to have children then? They're relying on the state aren't they? Should their circumstances prevent two people in love from starting a family? Is that fair?

Was that directed at me? If so, I fail to see what it has got to do with the point I was making, which is that people who are reliant on state benefits should not take the piss by having a large family. I'm not saying they shouldn't have kids at all. I'm saying it fucking pisses me off when they choose to have three or more knowing that people like me will pay their bills, when people like me are stopping at two because we don't think it's right to have more children than we can afford.