Don’t have more kids if you can’t afford them!

[SportMum1982]

I’m not a raving Tory! But honestly I would have loved more children!!! I would have loved 4 kids but I know we cannot afford 4 kids.

Why do people expect the state to pay for their children? Bar education though! If I’m being really cruel tell me, but I feel I did want more kids but stopped.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-67999028

When have we ever given people 'unlimited benefits'?

And has introducing punitive changes to the benefits system over the past few years made any difference, other than increasing social stress and health & education inequalities?

I realise you weren't talking to me, but I have an answer I can't imagine will go down very well.

It probably doesn't help when there's a strong narrative being pushed anywhere and everywhere that white males are privileged or problematic simply for being white and male, and so those from working class backgrounds aren't getting the support and encouragement they need and are being left to the wayside.

I anticipate being called an MRA for merely suggesting that that might be having an impact, but that's just how pointing these things out seems to go here on MN.

Oh sorry it's just the way you're typing it's hard to decipher. I also read it wrong too 😅 sorry my mistake.

So, if someone has more children than they can afford, what should they do? Starve them, dump them or offload them to someone else ? If the state shouldn't step in, what do you suggest?
It would be beneficial to society financially if no one smoked, no one was over weight, nobody drank, gambled, took drugs, commited crimes or was generally feckless. It would be cheaper for society if nobody was ill, disabled or idle. However, we are humans not machines and life embraces every variant possible. Simple solutions to complex problems don't work but they suit the indignant & self righteous.

"It probably doesn't help when there's a strong narrative being pushed anywhere and everywhere that white males are privileged or problematic simply for being white and male, and so those from working class backgrounds aren't getting the support and encouragement they need and are being left to the wayside."

You think this narrative is being promoted consistently throughout primary and secondary education in state schools by both male and female teachers, but not in private schools to middle and upper class men, who continue to achieve highly in education and professionally?

Because as an ex-teacher I'm just thinking about how this 'strong narrative' would actually manifest itself in terms of teaching and classroom interaction. I mean I know lots of teachers who believe that white privilege exists and that we don't yet have sex equality - not sure I know anyone who would believe that 'just being white and male is a problem' and hold that belief in such a way that it would impact profoundly on how they behave towards their pupils. However - I'm not a Daily Mail/Telegraph reader who's signed up to all the media culture war BS, so what do I know...

Yup. This.

Yes, it’s good to be financially independent, but from the child’s perspective, both parents are responsible for their upbringing so the father shouldn’t be able to wriggle out of his financial responsibilities.

Ive lived in the US for over a decade and while the country has huge problems, they’ve got a far better enforcement system for child support. Fathers really do have to pay-if they don’t, their driving licenses and passports can be seized. Their employers will be informed and their wages garnished. Self-employed people will be investigated.

A friend’s horrible ex, who tried everything to avoid paying, suddenly coughed up when he realized that his employer was about to be informed as he didn’t want people knowing that he was a deadbeat Dad.

Re. The two-child cap. People's circumstances can definitely change, but I think that for most of us, having more than three children is unaffordable, even in the best case scenario. Only the truly wealthy can afford large families nowadays so I do have limited sympathy with the Mum of five in the article-surely she realized that she’d be financially stretched? I liked the idea of four children but realized after one that it was unrealistic so I stopped at two. We’re v. lucky to have easy access to contraception nowadays so we can make these decisions. 🤷

"I think that for most of us, having more than three children is unaffordable, even in the best case scenario."

It's not unaffordable in some other countries. It's unaffordable in the UK because we have a punitive welfare system, we don't believe in heavily subsidised, high quality childcare, and we have successive governments who have totally neglected housing policy and made it impossible for ordinary people to access affordable housing in large swathes of the country.

All these things are political choices, not an inevitability.

As for the two child cap - all the evidence shows it has no significant impact on decision making when it comes to family size.

In which case - what's the point of it, given that figures from both sides of the political spectrum have criticised it for pushing larger families into deep poverty, with all the damage to children that arises from living in destitution?

@izimbra Yes, I meant that large families are unaffordable in the UK and certainly here in the US. and in many other countries. But at least people in the UK have easy access to contraception so if you know that five children are unaffordable, you can choose not to have a large family. Whereas it’s getting harder to make that choice here in the US in some states.

BTW - the evidence on class and family size suggests that as a group professional and middle class women don't choose to have smaller families on average because they're just morally superior to working class and uneducated women, but because they start their families on average a whole decade later and therefore have significantly less opportunity for further pregnancies - accidental and otherwise. There are also huge financial incentives for women on professional incomes to return to work. Women in unskilled jobs are poor if they have kids, and poor if they don't.

This is one of the worst comments I have read on the thread!

"I meant that large families are unaffordable in the UK"

What's a 'large family'? 3 kids? 4 kids?

"but don't have one if you personally can't afford the payments."

These people shouldn't have any children. At all :

care assistants
supermarket workers
teaching assistants
most receptionists
most people working in social care
cleaners
hospitality workers
most agricultural workers
most junior admin staff
most transport workers
childminders
shelf packers
etc

@izimbra I personally think once you get to 4 kids it's definitely a large family.

I have a family member who's had 4. Has had to rely on benefits at times as her husband has severe mental illness and she doesn't earn a fortune. She raised her kids under New Labour - when we had a less punitive benefits system. At times she lived on the edge - juggling credit cards etc to pay day to day expenses, but she got through. All 4 kids are successful - one's a doctor, one's an accountant, two are teachers. All she ever wanted was a big family, and she needed support from the state at times to raise her kids. Do you feel someone like this is immoral? These days she'd be tarred and feathered on mumsnet, called 'inadequate' and her family life would have been much more difficult. She's one of the best mums I know.

@izimbra well that's a bit of a leap isn't it? You asked what's a large family now you are asking if your friend is immoral... what do you feel as you know her? I added to the thread already about what I think of been 1 of 4 myself.

I personally view more than three children as a large family from a financial perspective. Most people I know with three children are financially stretched and couldn’t afford another child.

Part of this is the cost of modern standards of living-we all need phones, internet, etc., whereas our grandparents didn’t even have central heating and probably bathed once a week. Older children were expected to help bring up the younger ones and this often affected their own prospects. Our expectations are higher and rightly so.

People don’t realise when they say “don’t have kids if you can’t afford them”, this is what it means.

People working full time.

“I don’t think that people who work in supermarkets should have children” sounds ridiculous, because it is.

"You think this narrative is being promoted consistently throughout primary and secondary education in state schools by both male and female teachers, but not in private schools to middle and upper class men, who continue to achieve highly in education and professionally?

Because as an ex-teacher I'm just thinking about how this 'strong narrative' would actually manifest itself in terms of teaching and classroom interaction. I mean I know lots of teachers who believe that white privilege exists and that we don't yet have sex equality - not sure I know anyone who would believe that 'just being white and male is a problem' and hold that belief in such a way that it would impact profoundly on how they behave towards their pupils. "

Not particularly, what I do think however is that private to middle and upper class men aren't as easily disenfranchised and are more likely to feel that they need to prove the narrative wrong, whereas I can easily see working class men and boys thinking "well what's the point in even trying, might as well not bother".

I also didn't say or suggest that the impact would be made from teachers towards the pupils directly - bit unsure of where this has come from?
However in the sense that the kids themselves feel disenfranchised and help and support (generally, not just within schools) is more likely to be given to others, however rightly or wrongly that may be.
That's not even delving into the very obvious classism aspect that clearly exists as evidenced by the replies that have come out in this thread.
Do you think this narrative doesn't have an effect on male children, even indirectly?
Children are sponges.
The amount of MN threads I've seen over my time here of people essentially asking advice for how to parent-away "toxic masculinity" from toddler aged boys alone is more than I ever thought I'd see - You think they don't pick up on these things subconsciously?

"However - I'm not a Daily Mail/Telegraph reader who's signed up to all the media culture war BS, so what do I know..."
Nor am I, I don't make a habit of reading newspapers full stop.
Not that that should even really be relevant when absolutely every publication has it's biases?
Fwiw, when I look into a topic I look at it from as many sources as possible as that's how you get the most reliable information, not from one or two - Just as I was taught to in school funnily enough.

Now back to bed for me before the nausea strikes again! 🤘😴

I don't think that should be the case but perhaps have 2 dc and have a partner so there are 2 incomes

The start of the film Idiocracy articulates it and then the film shows the dystopian results.

I feel I might start a thread titled "Don't get old if you can't afford to pay for a private pension". My first post: "These feckless old folk expecting the state to pay them pensions, it's their own fault if they don't earn enough to support themselves in their old age. Let them use food banks and sleep on the streets or better still just throw themselves in a river or under a bus when they're done working. Think of the money it would save the tax payer".

I expect there will be some empty heads who will agree. Good grief, what sort of country do you want to live in? It makes we want to weep when I realise how many people are just plain nasty.

The truth is you need two incomes if you're not a high wage earner.

This about capping the benefit at two dc though not none

Many people find more than two expensive and might choose not to have more

There comes a time when people need to take responsibility and provide for their own families. People don't get a pay rise from employers for each additional child why should they from the state.