Don't have kids you can't afford!

[user793847984375948]

Hi all, this is meant to be an interesting discussion.

I keep seeing people say, “Don’t have kids if you can’t afford them.”

But in the UK, if someone works full-time on minimum wage, the state ends up paying thousands for childcare so that parent can work.
If that same parent stayed home, they would receive less support overall, yet they would be raising their own child hands-on. A single mum can work part-time and get rent and living costs for kids, around 500 a month in support if she works.

Nursery is about 1K a month usually. Then there's the wraparound care before and after school that could also be funded by UC.

So why is one scenario seen as responsible and the other as “sponging”?

Further, do people who say “don’t have kids you can’t afford” actually think only those earning £60k or more should have children, since that is roughly what it takes to cover childcare or a single income? That eradicates the above two scenarios and it's just those with independent wealth

If so, what would that mean for society long-term, both economically and socially? There would be fewer poor people over all and I think this would have an impact on our monetary system and menial jobs getting done.

And if you believe that only the wealthy should reproduce, you are effectively asking rich, white, powerful men to police women’s reproduction.
That is exactly what is happening in parts of America right now.

Genuinely curious how people justify this way of thinking.

Well people name change for this very reason. People trawling through your post history.

This was just another point of view, which I did not follow in my own life but which realistically exist in many non western countries which breed indeed like animals, for better descriptive word

No, not at all. Of course I wouldn't dislike them/you for something that happened at 15/16.

It doesn't change the fact I find it shocking that you apparently knew so little, but that's not a reason to dislike you.

I mean I never was either but did you really not meet any other teenage girl this naive? Really?!

This is how decent people do it.

Turning down childcare help they’re entitled to out of pride? Don’t most of us claim 30 hours childcare, or is that also being a drain?

And developping the last point of view, you will have indeed genetical replacement if the English native think that way. The IDL people might be horrified by that, the rulers on top might need workers and children bearers. It is not that simple as it looks

Honestly? No!

I must have led a very sheltered life if you're telling me that isn't uncommon...

This is very true, but don’t expect to get an empathetic response here.

That’s not possible, that the salaries ‘were never high enough’. Are you implying that your country had to borrow money from abroad?

The uneducated and under-educated have more children, starting younger. It’s a global fact. Their children are likely to repeat the pattern.

If you’re from an educated family, you may well never socialise with people like that. But they exist. The Sun is the most read newspaper in the UK. I don’t know a single Sun reader personally (or a single teenage mother) but there’s millions of them.

@spookyspaghetti

Well indeed, I’m not exempting ‘well off people’, no one should be having 3+ kids unless they’re pretty water tight financially.

It sounds alike you lived in absolute isolation if you've never encounter a naive dumb 15/16 year old (girl or boy tbh!) in your entire life. Or ever read threads on here! There's always a thread about things people's 19/20 year old are doing like putting tinfoil in the microwave but you're gobsmacked that teenage girls exist who naively don't understand the full consequences of having a child or have a rose tinted view of having a baby with someone they think they're in love with. Very sheltered!

Yes, that is a drain, especially when those claiming it work minimum wage/few hours. Or the mums who can’t possibly cope with looking after more than 1 child so send the other to nursery even when on Mat leave with a new baby.

Genetical pool replacement or not, what has to be done particularly in the UK is finding the cultural balance, because international multiculturalism has failed ....we are talking of real children being born....they are not animals....they will have to live here and each and every humans wants to live well -

1. Secure the borders to some reasonable standard
2. Deport all criminals
3. Start paying fair wage to everyone who wants to have a manual job, these jobs are needed
4. Start defending the Christian roots of this country and make all Muslim slogans and cultural behaviours accountable as to what fuels them
5. Make everyone who gets benefits but used to stay home do community work

They forget they were young once, just chance that they didn’t think they’d fallen in love. I also don’t believe all these people knew everything about taxes at 15

Each generation since the WW2 has become and more focused on the present and how to satisfy it, rather than the future and how to protect it.

There's a difference between a young couple, both educated, with good role models around them, an attitude that they should be responsible for themselves, who fall pregnant and decide to keep their duration child...and a woman in her late 30s, who already had 3 kids from different dads, whose never worked in her life, who doesn't know anything else than life on a council estate, relying on benefits who decides to keep her 4th child.

I agree that it's the latter that is of a growing concern. There was a recent thread about not being able to afford swimming lessons for kids. There are many things that parents with multiple children and little prospect of a career won't be able to afford for their kids that would give them a better chance at a happy and fulfilled life, but when it then comes to it, it's everybody else's fault that their children won't have the same opportunities rather than theirs.

It is really worrying for the future...

@user793847984375948 So why is one scenario seen as responsible and the other as “sponging”?

Both scenarios are sponging. Given that the average parent would not care if I died today, I don't think I should have to fund their family.

If so, what would that mean for society long-term, both economically and socially? There would be fewer poor people over all and I think this would have an impact on our monetary system and menial jobs getting done.

Oh no. Wealthy people might have to roll up their sleeves and do their own dirty work for once.

And if you believe that only the wealthy should reproduce, you are effectively asking rich, white, powerful men to police women’s reproduction.

Non-sequitur.

But 30 hours is for anyone earning under £100k, I’m pretty sure everyone uses it?

It just sounds like self-flagellation to me, to choose to pay £1k more a month rather than take a benefit designed for working parents?

Your friends’ choice though at the end of the day.

Of course it is very possible and of course there are Monetary funds

They should certainly not have babies before they’ve completed their education and understand the responsibilities of having children!

I'm sure I've encountered many naive/dumb 15/16 year-olds but what I quoted is far beyond "naive".

‘Monetary funds’ do not grow on trees. They are the result of economic growth and therefore salaries and taxes.

According to a PP that's nothing to do with being able to afford funding the DC of parents who won't! Taxes and benefits are separate entities 🙄

So - I had 4 kids with my husband, nice house, doing fine, worked together in his business. Then he dropped dead in his early 40s leaving me a single parent with no job in a house I couldn’t afford alone. What should I have done differently?