To think people on here expect only the rich to have children?

[Geraldinefox]

I've seen so many posts in which people say 'Oh 50k is certainly not enough to raise a child on.'

Or, 'you should only consider having a baby when you have at least a year's salary in savings.'

Many people have children with far less and the reality is they're absolutely fine.

Should care assistants, retail staff, nursery staff etc. Just never have a child then?

Less than half of all working age adults have 3 months' wages in savings. What you say might be desirable but it's totally unrealistic to suggest that anyone who doesn't have this shouldn't have children, we'd barely have a population.

Sometimes parents get longterm sick and cannot work after they have kids, they need to rely on benefits

OP, it's not snobbery to say "don't have children you can't afford", it's common sense. You wouldn't buy a house you couldn't pay for, and a child is a much bigger commitment. Taxpayers already pay towards state education and health, why should they pay even more for other people's lifestyle choice have children?

Can't or don't want to tho? Very very few people are long term ill enough to not be able to do something and it takes two to have a child so without childcare to cover the other parent can work.

We had DS young but even at that age we got no help due to our earnings. All of our friendship group now have kids and no one claims anything yet we are all pretty average.

Of course you shouldn’t have a child if you know you’ll have to claim benefits. That’s not snobbery. You should only have as many as you can afford

I do not think you should have children if you cannot afford them and I don't agree with having more children when you are already in receipt of state financial support. Yes society needs children being born and as such should contribute to them, however the tax contribution to the next generation should be in form of NHS and education for the children, not day to day living costs.

However I also think that a couple both working full time, in any jobs, should be able to afford to have one or maybe two children, and afford to house them without needing to rely on the state to intervene.

In work benefits are effectively subsidising businesses, allowing them to pay lower wages. And paying off mortgages for investment landlords,

The economic set up of this country at the moment is unsustainable. There needs to be major change, however that cannot come about without significant disruption and severe hardship.

I think that people should not have children if they can't provide their basic needs, including emotional.
So a rich person who can't or doesn't want to parent has no more business having them than someone who has children in the full knowledge that they will have to rely on benefits to provide the basics .

i was a higher rate tax payer before having DC. Unfortunately, both DC have disabilities, one severely disabled. Nothing we planned. I rely on DLA/PIP and some carers allowance alongside a part time role I just about manage. How would people suggest someone in my situation is coping? Stick the kids back where they came from? 🤷

Is it OK to have a mortgage or should only people who can buy a house outright be able to buy one?

You could look at children the same way. The state helps the family when children are young but they more than return the investment over their lifetime in taxes. We are an aging society and need more children. With the income distribution that we have and many wealthy people less than replacing themselves, the more people who have children (as long as they bring them up and educate them well) the better.

Obviously, there is a limit to this, but I am thinking up to three children, not a football team.

Obviously that's different and you know that! It's also not nice to bring kids into poverty or to over crowded homes. It's not about having a rigid set of rules for having kids It's just about using your common.

This is exactly the type of situation the welfare state should be there to support.

But it's a completely different situation compared to a couple with 1 child (with no parental or children disability or health issue), already receiving UC, that choose to go on and have another.

All those saying you don't need to be rich to afford kids, just be able to afford them comfortably. How does anyone one in the South East afford them? without a good income. Rents in some places are 1.5 to 2k a month, for a bog standard house. Add on all the other bills and expenses. I am glad I don't live in the South East cause I couldn't afford it.

This highlights how screwed the economic set up of this country is. In work benefits are on one hand a sticking plaster trying to cover ever widening cracks, and the other hand they are the earthquake causing the cracks.

The situation is unsustainable.

Yanbu, I have seen this on here before - I was once told that I couldn't possibly give my children a good life because we don't earn enough for holidays abroad and loads of extra curricular activities etc. We own our own home, don't have any debts and do one uk holiday per year but apparently that's not good enough.

I think I've only ever seen the comment about people not having children they can't afford, when the couple already have children and are clearly struggling but "really want" another one.

@loudbatperson yep. The cost of basic housing has gotten out of hand and need to be solved. This is a significant portion of the benefit bill.

But the problem is we live in a high cost, low wage society. Until wages are raised properly in the same way, say house prices are, you are going to have to accept that we now have a benefits system that supports families.
Well educated families, with professional post-graduate qualifications and careers can still claim UC top up, not just cleaners and supermarket workers. You are simply asking for an elite society of the rich.

The problem is that, if people have fewer (or even the same number of babies), there are two alternatives:

As society ages, we all get poorer, and taxes increase on the few who are working.

We continue to increasingly rely on low cost immigrants to support the aging population.

A small investment by the taxpayer for the future is a good, not a bad, thing. Clearly, the idea is that we provide the social mobility to not have generation after generation relying on benefits.

I think a lot on here have the very snobbish and depressing idea that the wealth producers are always the same families and we have a scrounged class depending on them. That is not what capitalism was designed to deliver. A lot of this belief was founded on the 2008 financial bailout and QE which continued to support the asset owners at the expense of salaried workers. So, a lot of people just cannot imagine themselves being dependent on state handouts.

You seem to have some kind of chip on your shoulder about this imagined snobbery.

Couples can work shifts if they can’t afford childcare. Millions do this. Couples on min wage can also choose to live outside London. Millions also do this.

It is not snobby to say that people should not have kids they can not afford. My parents were poor and it was miserable. What I'm talking about it proper, no money for food type of food.

I actually think some people on this site are so privileged that they don't even know what being poor means and therefore don't realise how damaging it is for kids to grow up poor. I saw someone on this site saying being poor = buying a small house lol.

Type of poor*

Well we only had 1 because we couldn't afford 2 so yes. If you have children knowing upfront you can't afford them then yes that's fundamentally wrong

Boggles my mind that people on this thread can't (won't) appreciate the difference between planning to have children you can't afford + falling on hard times and needing to use the benefit system.

If you know you're unlikely to be able to afford kids without benefits = don't have them.

If you lose your job/ have a disabled child who requires you to limit your earnings etc , benefits should be there to help.

That's the point of a safety net. It's not about funding a lifestyle choice.

Btw, it is a shambles that a family where even one parent works full time can't afford to live but the solution isn't that everyone's wages are topped up by taxpayer. Need to find a way for wages/ NMW to rise.

Being able to satisfy the children’s basic needs, food, shelter and clothing is pretty essential to being able to afford a child. If you can’t satisfy those then no you shouldn’t have them.

Well yes. My mum didn't provide most of things for most of my childhood.

Had no money for food at weekends and had to wait until Monday for the benefits to be collected.

Homeless shelters a few times. I was embarrassed of my clothes as a teenager and used to wear a jacket even in summer to hide much of what I was wearing. I cringe looking back at photos in the awful old clothes I wore.

It's all very well to say poor people should have kids but you think that is easy for a child who can't get away from it and has no choice but to live like that until they're old enough to leave?

I don't think anyone should have kids without the means to pay for everything they need with out someone else I.e. the state to provide it.