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.

I find this thread really difficult.

Firstly, and most important- who are you to judge what decisions other people make? You may not like them, fine, but to fall out with friends seems very high and mighty, no one is perfect. It’s very possible you make decisions your friends don’t like...

Secondly, every parent will agree, no matter how much planning for a child you do, financial and otherwise, children are always a shock to the system. Even with people with huge incomes can struggle, when we had our dd we hadn’t saved anywhere near enough and needed to borrow more. It happens.

Maybe just don’t let these things worry you. I think it’s very strange you have fallen out with friends. What a shame.

I do think it's a right to have a child if you're doing everything you can to make your life better but nothing you do means you'll have a job that pays well (ie if you and your partner are teachers / nurses etc). However, I don't think you shouldn't be allowed to have a thousand children the benefits system pays for.
What about people who aren't 'clever' and admin etc is the best job they can hope for? They're still working hard 9-5. The government should be doing more to make childcare affordable or help parents with childcare costs, waiting until the child is 3 isn't particularly helpful because by then you've been out of work way too long.

I completely see your point op but sadly this won’t end well.

Something somewhere is very badly wrong and has been for years.
I genuinely don’t know the answer to it.

With regards to benefits, sadly many abuse it- using it as a lifestyle choice as opposed to what it should be, a safety net.

My sil for example. Seven children and has never worked. Has no desire too. The state pays for it all.

We both work our arses off yet can’t afford half of what she does.

How’s that right?

I'm very interested that you should choose to join Mumsnet to make this oh-so-goady first post.

Babies and children are expensive whether you can afford it or not. but yes most people will wait until they are somewhat financially secure or mature enough to have a child/dren.

As for your friend she is just a ....... her partner for allowing it and going along with it is a spineless wimp.

Personally I would not be friends with people like that i just prefer to surround myself with like-minded individuals who prefer to be stable financially and mentally before embarking on parenthood.

The rights of the fertile to procreate whatever their fitness or circumstances are protected while the rights of the infertile to access medical treatment to enable them to procreate are heavily circumscribed.

If you fell in love with a man and subsequently found out he had a low sperm count

Or have been unlucky enough to have blocked fallopian tubes

Or you have PCOS and don't ovulate naturally and didn't respond to clomid

Or it took 10 years for you to be finally diagnosed with endometriosis and by that point it had not only caused you years of pain, but had severely impacted your fertility

Unless you have a spare £7k to drop in one go, and you live in an area with no NHS IVF funding, then sorry, no child for you

I think what op is saying is that people should take financial responsibility for themselves and their families. I entirely agree. Of course we should have a safety net And circumstances can change but deliberately having children you can’t afford is hugely irresponsible.

Of course people should plan their children until they can afford them, and not have more than they can afford - that’s what’s called family planning.

In the near future there will be fewer jobs due to increases in technology - many many jobs have been lost already due to call centres, internet shopping - if there was a need for more humans why are wages so low?

What we need is better childcare funding and to encourage employers to facilitate more flexible working to fit around children - for mums and dads. Also more value placed on staying home to raise children. Like in other Northern European countries. Mothers are a great pool of employees. I manage my time so much better now I'm a mum.
I have 2 under 2 so going back to work is going to be hideously expensive- plus my commute costs me over £500 pm on top of childcare.
I agree with PPs that children can't be only for the well off - that's a disgusting notion. And I do personally think having children is a right.
But at the same time I do find it frustrating that a lot on my school friends have quite a few kids and have never ever had a job. Yet I see them on Facebook doing things like getting their nails done / posting about their sky TV. Me and my DH work hard have have good jobs, but are thinking incredibly hard about if we can afford a 3rd child.
Neither of my first 2 children were financially "planned for" (although we owned our home and had a years salary in the bank) so I certainly can't get on any sort of high horse about not saving up and financially planning for DC. DC are wonderful little surprises sometimes, and if we all waited till we could afford babies and the life we want we will have a rapidly declining population and a lot of sad people around.
I wouldn't want to stop low income families from receiving any of the help that they do - in fact i think they should probably get a lot more. It's just a bit disappointing to see the way some people spend the money they receive from the public purse. I know some people try to make their life look "luxurious" on SM so all is probably not what it seems - but still. Once you have children how you spend your money is incredibly important- regardless of where the money comes from. This also seems to be the issue with the family OP is talking about.
Also - on the topic of financial readiness for children- I think it helps to think about the position parents with grownup children were in when they had their babies - they weren't always financially comfortable. My mum was a skint student when she got pregnant with her first. Living in "student digs", no financial plan. Dropped out of uni (back in the 70s). She's a fantastic mum, and we lived a very comfortable and happy life. My friends dad was taking stuff out of skips to sell at markets when my friend was young and now her dad has a yacht and a 5 mil house. He also has a "new" family with young kids and she thinks she had a much happier life than the new kids do.

I don't know anybody in my social circle who either had to claim tax credits to help with childcare costs or one parent had to stay home because they couldn't afford to work and pay childcare.

I'm from a very working class background and somebody needs to do these low paid jobs. Not everybody is able to go into a high paid profession, some people simply don't have the intellectual intelligence. That's just a fact.

And for the millionth time, people cannot use the benefit system as a "lifestyle choice" to have loads of kids as it's been capped at 2 children for a couple of years now.

I'm a single parent, I get working tax credits. I couldn't have predicted becoming a single parent.

That first paragraph didn't make sense, I meant everyone I know had to claim tax credits.

Poor people are allowed to have children. That's the reason I hate the government's 'end child poverty' campaigns. Because poverty is measured as a relative thing, there will always be some people defined as living in poverty. Those people are entitled to have children. And while I think it is the state's responsibility to make sure those children are adequately fed, clothed and housed, they will probably not have the same holidays, toys, computers, experiences, whatever as children from better off homes.

THAT IS OKAY.

It really is. It is okay to wear hand-me-downs and things from charity shops and only ever eat supermarket value brands and not have a TV in your room and not go on holidays and never have your own bedroom and have to get a job as soon as you can to help out. Children can still be loved and looked after and thrive when there's not much money in the house.

While I'm at it, it is also okay to have a third (or fourth or fifth or whatever) child, EVEN IF THAT MEANS your older children won't have as much money lavished on them or will have to share a bedroom or won't get to do after-school activities.

What you describe isn't someone who can't afford children, this is someone who lacks basic financial knowledge and budgetting skills having a kid that she was unprepared for. There is a big difference in my book.

We have 2 kids, unlikely to ever be able to afford a home of our own as we can't save for the deposit whilst working jobs that pay a few £'s over the living wage so pay all our own costs BUT we know how to budget and live within our means. The only finance we have and ever have had is a 4k car because we felt it was the safer option. My kids may not have everything they want in life and yes we miss out as a family sometimes but everyone is cared for and we make do with what we have.

I did empathise with you until the old "doing it the right way" line was trotted out, who are you or anyone else to tell people what is the right/wrong way is?!

The difference is that a family that is depending on benefits will often just be scraping by and they won't have the best of everything and live comfortably like the media portrays!
I would rather work my arse off so my children can have nice things, savings and expensive holidays etc but if someone makes the choice to sacrifice these things and rely on benefits then I really can't pretend to be jealous or angry about it.

Channel 4s poverty porn refer to it as breeding and feeding

I love these threads. The rich get tax breaks, and companies don't pay taxes. However let's blame the poor people because they make a nice easy target.

Childcare is crippling. When I was pregnant with my first it would have cost me 950 a month in childcare for my full time job. My take home after that would have been 27.00, tell me how I could have worked that?

Maybe if we had living wage. Affordable childcare it wouldn't be so hard for many families.

I didn’t wait until I could afford a baby. He wasn’t planned and I thought long and hard about what to do and all my family were on board to help. I had him and I’d never change it. Family stuck to their word and my mum looks after him whilst I work, she still has young kids and so does my partners mum so we all help one another out. If I’d waited until I was financially able I wouldn’t have him. We actually do really well financially and otherwise.

Situations change, what if someone can afford a child and then suddenly life happens and they lose their job through illness/mental health another scenario?

It’s all a cycle. We as a society may need to help financially support some children as they grow up but most of them will then work and do their share towards supporting the elderly of this society when they stop working, along with the generation coming along below.

I think we need to see the bigger picture and not see it as individual families but everyone as part of a whole.

I have help from tax credits for my children but I also work full time. Society is set up in a way that a lot of people could never afford children without a bit of support at least at some point in the child rearing days.

Nobody should be denied a fundamental biological need simply because of how our current society works.

I think more needs to be done to make childcare affordable and to facilitate childcare via school to enable people to work. I can afford nursery and am just managing to keep my career going but I earn a lot. I can see why it just isn’t worth working for lots of women (I would say people but let’s be honest it’s mainly women that give up work). Nursery seems manageable but the logistics of our primary school less so. There seem to be 6 weeks of 1/2 days for transition, no after school club, a long waiting list for breakfast club, patchy holiday childcare that ends at 4 etc. There are currently no childminders that cover our school area. We might end up having the choice of getting a nanny to cover primary years (just as we were assuming our childcare costs would go right down) or quit my job which seems utterly ridiculous. School hours jobs are like hen’s teeth. Lots of employers still seem to be suspicious of part-timers.

When there are so many structural barriers to working, there are lots of incentives to stop with young children. If I was on a low income, the numbers just wouldn’t really work. It is very easy to say ‘save’ from a comfortable financial position but lots of people haven’t got any choice and I’d hate to be in a world where only they rich could have kids. I’d also hazard a bet that there will be lots of kids from poorer families who are happier than those from richer families with both parents working full time with high powered jobs and long commutes. Money doesn’t buy everything.

I agree with the OP. Being able to afford to have a child doesn’t mean you have to be affluent in any sense of the word. It just means that you have a handle on your finances and aren’t living in crippling debt month to month. A lot of people I know have had to wait until they are in their mid 30s to have their first baby as they needed to pay off debt first and sort out living situations etc

I think society is structured badly for young families in this country.- Childcare isn't set up properly and housing is in crisis. i cant agee with a world where only wealthy people have children.

I asked if it was a right for someone who had no home, a low income and circa £35,000 in credit card debt to choose to have a child she very openly could not afford?

Having a family is a human right.

How can someone with no income be able to run up £35k in debts? While we're on the subject of personal responsibility, perhaps we should talk about the responsibility of the people who make the decision to lend large sums of money to financially naive people.

It is funny how responsibility only ever works one way.

Lots of scenarios. When we had our second dc, dh had just lost the job we'd moved away from home for. We struggled in poor rented housing, on benefits for the first and only time as a family. He took any work he could, the benefits system back then paid nothing unless one was fully unemployed and then it was minimal. DH worked away, worked weekends until we got on our feet. I got agency work to fit round him as we had no family to help, and once both DCs were in school, i got permanent work.

We had both left school with few qualifications and never earned massive salaries, but we kept our expectations reasonable. Holidays were visiting family or the odd week in a caravan. Our car was often on its last legs, but DH needed one for work. Our children grew up understanding they would need to get some qualifications if they wanted to have decent careers and a better lifestyle. We are grandparents now, our DGC are growing up enjoying more financial security, great holidays, lovely homes, and they too are encouraged to be aspirational.

The biggest difference, IMO, is between those that try to show their children a good example and encourage them to try, regardless of their financial situation, and others for whom work isn't something on their radar. If we'd been well off, would i have been a SAHP? Perhaps. But having children with no intention of ever trying to support them by working, even on a low income, is wrong. Having multiple children in that situation is also wrong. And creating children, then becoming an absent parent who doesn't provide, is doubly wrong. The only SAHPs I know round here are single, young mums, who have always been on benefits. Most working couples with children need two incomes.

Obviously situations change, people become ill, jobs are lost, relationships break down. One size doesnt fit all, but for a while there was a culture of entitlement, and many, like the OPs friend, have been sucked into believing they can have what they want with no personal effort. Austerity has hit the genuinely struggling, who are trying to get by, but its hit people like her too, most of the debt was probably far from necessary, but she felt entitled.

It's not about just the rich should have kids.
People with no job and never had a job should never have kids
But then those are the ones who don't care, have no self respect, or any respect for the rest of society who pay for their lifestyle.
Lazy British people are the biggest drain on this country... why the hell should I pay for them to live and then support their child

I don’t see the op saying it’s only for the wealthy.
She says can you afford them it’s a very big difference.
Children don’t have to have everything shiny and new to be able to afford them, a good loving caring home and all the basics like food and housing are essential of course but they don’t need the latest iPad or latest comp game etc so affording is not something only for richer it’s common sense.
I realise childcare is extortion often and often for lots makes a standard minimum wage job unviable. And this is where the government need to look at financing properly.
The lady from France had a good point that they have government run child care for free. If we had similar it would solve a huge amount of problems for many.
Although we do know people that don’t want to work in general most do want to. And if the system was working better the ones that didn’t want to work would stand out much more and could be far easier dealt with then.
Lots of issues seem to come from one government implementing one way then as fast as it gets going the next government move in and recind it all and change it yet again to huge national cost. And common sense states the billions in all these changes mean billions lost just in implementing new systems and practices.
Just look at the job centre as one example,or jobcentre plus or whatever balmy name it is today.
Just the cost alone of name changing runs into millions for absolutely no gain at all and a monsterous waste of money. Every benefit change cost millions and millions and then a new government comes along and begins the process again.
If that money went to funding free child care every one is a winner.