For believing the drop in birth rate IS mostly because people who don't want children no longer have to have them

[CurdinHenry]

"Fertility experts" like Geeta Nargund in the news again insisting that "people still want to have children". Obviously some people wish they could have more children than they get to have. But it's never been a better world for people who are just not into it at all (or try one then realise it's not that much fun).

I don't think a survey asking people in vague terms if they'd like kids one day counts as proof of anything.

I would have had more dc as would the majority of my friends. It was money & stress that stopped me.

Birth control and a desire to have fewer. My ex-H's parents were one of 5 and one of 4 respectively. They went on to have 2 kids. One had 2 grandkids and my exH had only the one kid. She is adamant that she doesn't want any and as she is autistic with significant mental health issues I think she sounds pretty smart on this one. That is a huge shrinking in reproduction across 3 generations. It's anecdotal but not unusual.

When you think about it, it’s quite depressing that we are on this earth just to reproduce and keep capitalism going. Just a cog in the machine.

It's hard having children in a household where both parents want to work. Mine is nearly 8 now and even having worked part time for a few years I'm absolutely spent. I feel like I'm only really starting to get my energy levels, interest in my job and free time back now. I always wanted just one but I'm not at all surprised by families who do it once and are absolutely unable to contemplate going through it all again.

I heard that there has been a slight but significant reversal of the drastically low birth rate in South Korea, and some of that is being attributed to incentives to encourage people to have children.

Of course it remains to be seen if SK will manage to sustain this increase in the coming years.

Completely the opposite in my circle, if we could afford bigger homes, night nannies, housekeepers, reduce our hours etc we would have had more.

We are also all aware of how much uni will cost and house deposits.

@IcedPurplethere has been a slight increase but nowhere near replacement rate.

No for at least 3 of them they were vocally child free and show no indication of regretting the decision. I do know people who had only one child / no child who probably would have had more if circumstances were different (fertility/not finding a partner).

I am not aware of anyone who would cite cost as a reason for not having children/more children but that could be due to my age group/social circle and may be more of a factor for Millennials/Gen Z.

Yes it is definitely a major factor. Plus also more widely accepted choice around number of children eg only having 1 child.

@BigMartinhow old are you? I’m a millennial and it’s very common amongst my circle. What has also happened to a few is they met their partners late & didn’t/couldn't do another pregnancy in their mid 40s.

We were the total outliers in our NCT group as we were one and done (by choice).

There were 8 of us in the group. Two ladies had four children. One had three. And four had two, one of them having both by IVF.

If I knew what I know now about the climate, Brexit, no jobs on offer etc I don't know if I would have my ds at all. I can understand why people don't want kids these days.

Millennials absolutely hammered their health in their teens and 20s smoking, drinking, eating rubbish… I do wonder if that’s had a part to play in infertility… they’re all healthier now but it’s like the damage is done

I believe a significant factor is we, including myself, we sold the dream by celebrities that everyone can have a baby pretty much close to 40. If you just keep yourself healthy.

So I didn’t consider having a baby until age 33/34, cracked on with my career for 10 years, struggled with conception which takes two or three years of whatever method.Then you are aged 37 with a newborn, and the idea in a year or two of going through all of the IVF again almost age 40 is horrendous, so you just stick at one child. I know loads of friends who did that, we adopted, but we didn’t get round to it till I was age 34.

When we were young we were taught that if you had sex there was a high risk of getting pregnant and you must immediately run to get the pill, but it’s actually so much more complicated, that the stars must have to align sometimes. So we all just ignored it and thought we could have sex twice and get pregnant. It’s only now that me and my friends all know that we left it really late, most of us have a child by IVF, or adoption, but it was so much harder and we all left it so much later than we probably should.

My friendship group was about 10 of us, and six of us have one child, one has two kids, and the rest don’t have any. Pretty much all the same stories above.

I’m not being goady but I’m surprised you feel ‘spent’ with 1 child working part time?

I’m not even going to bother saving for uni, I actually don’t really want my kids to go. It’s mostly pointless these days, huge debt for little return (unless they want to do something that demands a degree, like nursing or teaching). I’m privately hoping they get apprenticeships or start entry level somewhere with good promotion opportunities.

I believe a significant factor is we, including myself, we sold the dream by celebrities that everyone can have a baby pretty much close to 40. If you just keep yourself healthy.

Sorry, but anyone taking fertility advice from 'celebrities' is an idiot.

We’ve never had more enjoyment or free time as we do in the last 30 years (although it’s dipping slightly). Internet at your fingertips, global travel, new ‘experiences’ around us all the time. Everyone is constantly doing things. So I disagree. This is a really bleak and paranoid way of looking at it. In 1850 you would’ve had a point.

Those certain feelings only came to you personally when you had a child. It is not a universal truth that all women need to have them to understand the true meaning of life.

I had my only at 35, he's now 3. In my antenatal group, two have two, one is pregnant, the rest are at one. Two of us by choice, one - the youngest - considering another.

Nobody went for "two under two" - my friends who already had kids were shocked because all of them had gone for a two year gap. They all, coincidentally, had girls first, and were surprised that I wasn't going to take on the burden of a whole extra child because I might get a girl (that didn't care about having either way).

Behaviour is actually a bit contagious - when our close friends announced they were having another, we had a fleeting "maybe we should". It lasted five minutes.

It's implying that "infertility" isn't more of a problem than it was in the past.
Whereas in fact it's no more of a medical problem but more of a social problem in that the people who can't have kids want to have them, whereas in the past they might have been indifferent or happy to have no more.

I think it’s true there are a lot of people who don’t have children because they don’t want them.

I also think that most people early 40s and below who do want children/ have children have had one less than they might have liked/ considered - due to cost of living.

Older ppl will be lookwd after by robots

I think it’s a mixture of things. It’s much more expensive to buy a house when you take into account earnings to house value ratios, so people have to wait longer and then only have one child. Women are much more aware that they get landed with all the drudge work and don’t want to do it any more. Men are leaving it later and later to commit and looking for younger women thus leaving a whole generation of women who couldn’t find a partner to have children with.

Employers are driving down salaries of lower paid employees so they can pay themselves more. People are concerned about climate change. People are much less optimistic and more selfish which means they don’t look to the future. People want to pay less and less into the pot which means there isn’t the budget to provide free services. Families help much less which means having children is more demanding than ever before.

I really, really wanted to have children. But if I was a bit more ambivalent about it I’d probably not do it now TBH.

Sorry, I really don't get your point here.

There have always been people who never wanted children. There have always been people who wanted them but couldn't have them. What has changed exactly?

The cost of having children is too high for many people.