Highest percentage of women unmarried and childless by 2030

[Nelly10]

I read recently the way society is going by 2030 they’ll nearly half unmarried and childless women between 25-44.

Apparently this is already a thing in china a lot of women are going it alone solo parenting.

I have my opinions on why, just wondered what anyone else’s thoughts were ?

@frozendaisy I love your response 🤣. Thank goodness we have choices now!

I think women are finally waking up to the fact that they don't actually need men. They are better off without them. Financially, mentally, physically.

And the way things are going it seems men would rather look at porn than actually be with real women.

Who's the loser?

@coxesorangepippin Every single man in your life? Grandfather, father , brother? Or just as partners.

They can’t all be so hopeless, can they?

Well she's not looking to date her father or grandfather is she? I'm pretty sure she meant male prospective dates.

I do think there is a big difference between men today and 20 - 30 years ago in terms of their willingness to commit and their sexual expectations of women, spurred on by the availability of porn.

It's not a huge leap to say that the majority of young men these days watch porn (of course there are exceptions) and talking to women who do internet dating it's slim pickings out there unless you want lazy feckers, perverts or weirdos.

Anecdotally I know four women (including my sister) who are raising children alone after their partners walked out, most of whom never see or pay for those children. So even if you bag one and have children, there's no guarantee they will actually stick around to help.

I think it comes down to the fact that to have it all, women also have to do it all and “it” is becoming increasingly hard to find and expensive.

I met DH young and we married and had children at 23 and 25 so not long after uni, I was relatively junior in my career and we had just bought a house. DH is self employed and we luckily had his income as a constant and I managed to stay in work in a relevant field close - ish to home and be as flexible as I could over the years around childcare. I completed my MA part time and continued to build my career as they grew and I’m now 37, still happily married with just-about teenagers, a decent house and a career. Safe to say I’m exhausted but the boxes are ticked and I’m hitting the point I can reap what we’ve sown over the years and start slowing down a little. It’s not what some would choose but it has worked for me.

BUT I think a lot of young women struggle to find a decent, hard working man who is ready to commit to them aged 25 these days. Dating culture has changed even over this shortish amount of time. It’s very difficult to own a home in your early twenties now. Everything is expensive and taking convenient jobs around childcare or studying in the evenings just isn’t possible for everybody when two people need to be earning as much as they possibly can just to put food on the table and pay the energy bills. Young people know it’s hard out there and don’t expect to be independent until later so having children is naturally delayed. They don’t have the responsibility of running a home and taking care of a family so remain child-like for longer. Things are changing and it’s happened so quickly, within a generation or so.

I think it’s because women are less willing to tolerate rubbish, but men don’t appear to be responding to that. I am a single mum by choice, I had a baby on my own. I wanted a family but no partner. So far, best decision ever 😊

I'm a child the 80s (born late 70s) and was brought up with the message "Women can achieve anything that men can"
My parents went without to send me to private school (when it was still affordable) and I did well. I then ended up in a very very stressful work role and resented it all. I almost wanted to be a looked after woman and a SAHM. I didn't and went back to work after mat leave.
Fast forward 12 years of marriage and 2 kids and my ex-H upped and left to "be happy" in his mind 50s!!
This radically changed my view. I will be forever grateful to my mum and dad for investing in my future. I am able to earn well by myself and concentrate on my kids. Ex H pays his way and sees the kids.
However I am financially stable and do not need to shackle myself to another middle aged man. Which is a massive massive relief given the state of most men on OLD in the 45+ age group.

I’m rooting for women, single, dating, married, with kids or childfree, but I’m not really seeing this ’women won’t tolerate bad behaviour any more’.
So many women, online, here in MN and real life date men who watch porn, goes to strip clubs (both of these are so misogynystic that I don’t understand how any woman can be with a man who does this), doesn’t do 50/50 (only 50/50 most men seem to like is when the woman is paying for half of everything), so many men in relatioonships have made such off comments about women - like they haven’t mived on at all.
All of these men are in relationships.
The bar is so low. So low.

Where are these women who have standards.

This is so true. The answer of course is "well it covers my half".

@Farmageddon Well no, she doesn’t want to date her brother (!) but the poster is implying that women simply don’t need men-financially, mentally, physically.

I think women are finally waking up to the fact that they don't actually need men. They are better off without them. Financially, mentally, physically.

I can’t agree with that. I don’t think that my DH is of no benefit to the women in his life. Same with my DS.

Fine if women want to do everything alone, but that doesn’t mean that most men are of no use to them or their children-because they are in many, many cases.

Don't they always say that the happiest people are single women and the unhappiest are single men?

Yes that’s because women do pretty much everything for men.

I love the opinions on this thread all valid but seems sadly equality is still way way off for women.

And of course, instead of men realising what's shifted and stepping the fuck up...

We get various shades of the incel response...

Im 50 and childfree by choice, back in the 1990s i could see what was coming down the road and how much harder it was going to be for women. (ive bought this months Red which is their 25th birthday issue which is why i bought it and it has an article about how life has changed for women in the last 25 years and yes its got harder. Over £7000 a year for a nursery place now. So vindicated But you could see it coming. Two wages just to afford to buy a place now even more recently its two wages just to afford RENT in some places. I didnt want the hard relentless slog of both working AND being a mother (and childcare expectations still fall on the woman) so i chose the one the Government forces you to do lol. Because what was being sold to women as HAVING it all was really DOING it all and there was a minority of us who could see that at the time.

I'm sure many men in general are great, that wasn't really the point she was making though - it's the potential dating pool of men, potential life long partners where women find many issues.

It's not that most women wouldn't love a great partner, but they're not willing to put up with less than they deserve just to be paired up and so many men just don't seem to deliver good value in a relationship.
I'm sure your husband is great, but that doesn't take away from the fact that many women have repeated bad experiences with partners, or struggle to find good men who are willing to be committed, respectful partners.

Yep - this will be me. I'm not sure if I've finished grieving or processing it yet, but I'm too old to have kids now, and my body is telling me that the shop is now closing.

When I left my partner of over a decade, I accepted I might never meet anyone else in time, and my current economic circumstances and covid have been major contributors to that. I just didn't want to risk having kids with someone that would make me sad, someone who didn't respect and cherish me like I should have been. I just realised that no amount of stability would be enough for my partner to not be a stressy, irritable grump and realised that I just didn't want to have kids with him. I couldn't bare the thought of coming home to 2 or more copies of him, all glued to their computer screens.

Im in my late 70s and decided to be childfree while in my pre teens. In fact as soon as I read the "facts of life" booklet my mother gave me. Having children seemed like pretty much a horror show. I had the following conversation with my father when he refused to support me to stay on for A levels.

Dad: whats the use of educating a girl? Your just going to leave home, get married and have babies.

Me: Ive decided that I will never have children.

Dad: You'll have what God gives you.

Me: No, Ill have what I take for myself in this world.

Never regretted not having kids. I dont hate children but they do not interest me. Ive had two solid professional careers and now run a successful international business at a time when most are retired.

Ive had other women suggest I am "selfish" for not having children because they (children) do not serve my needs in any way. Or that I am jealous of families. Well family life looks pretty much a shit show from where Im standing. I didnt get a Ph.D. to cook and clean for some idle bellend and pick up his dirty undies from the bedroom floor.

You seem to be bemoaning the fact that many women don't start having kids in their early 20s anymore/at this point.

A few points;

1. Peak fertility - for both men and women - is mid twenties.

1. Even if women & their partners leave it til "a decade and a half" into typical fertility to start TTC, at 35, the vast majority still have 4 good yrs of fertility, and reduced but still feasible fertility for a year or two after that.

1. 90% of women aged 39 and under actively TTC are pregnant within two years. The chance of a an average 40 yr old woman TTC is 44% within a year.

There's a pregnant 40 something women on the pregnancy choices board here every week, saying she thought she wouldn't get pregnant.

Peak fertility is only that - peak. Peak oil passed years ago but the whole world is still running on oil.

The vast majority of women who TTC if they start "a decade and a half of fertility passed" will successfully conceive the typical two kids couples aim for now.

So I'm not sure why you seem to be targeting women for no longer typically having kids from their early twenties.

And men are doing exactly the same thing in terms of having kids. Fertility clinics don't usually take sperm from men over 39, ever wondered why. Yet your post only appears to focus on women; "women are adult and fertile for only ..."

Men might be able to produce kids for longer but all genetic material ages, and their aged material makes conception less likely, miscarriage more likely, abnormalities more likely, autism much more likely etc etc etc

So why exactly is it only womens fertile range you're focusing on, and apparently bemoaning that they don't have kids from their early twenties now (typically)?

Back on the general topic, I think that a greater awareness and appreciation of human rights, or equality etc has made so many men appear to be poor partners now.

My grandparents were married for 60 yrs u til my grandfather's death.
My grandmother is an intelligent woman who had no opportunities really.
My late Dad described her as "the brains of the operation" in ref to their relationship/household.

My grandfather regularly called her a stupid woman, in company, and ordered her around and was chauvanist etc.

He tried to kiss young female relatives on the lips when greeting/taking leave.

She showed me letters from their early dating days which suggested he was playing the field or trying to.

She actually started dating him by staying with him when her friend, who was supposed to be meeting him for a date, took exception to his behaviour, and left. She stayed.

Those are all things that women now - entirely rightly - would be taught to be red flags/unacceptable. And would've led to the relationship not starting or not progressing to marriage and kids or breaking down if it had. Not a 60 yr marriage.

And sadly don't think the world is any less full of entitled, sleazy, chauvanist, verbally abusive, arrogant etc. men.

Their behaviour is possibly even worse than before due to porn and very available/accessible prostitution (a few seconds on your mobile) and a backlash against whatever equality/rights women have got in recent decades.

Men have also been poor quality partners, most of them.

Now, with contraception, and opportunities to earn their own money and not have to marry in order to leave their parents home or be able to do anything but share a flat with other femaies indefinitely or have any standard of living ..... Why wouldn't women be rejecting them.

What we do here and now shouldn't dictate the terms of the study

Why not?

Society is always evolving and changing.

Why should a norm from 60 yrs ago, based on women's lack of opportunities and options, dictate a study in 2023.

And as I've already said, the change doesn't stop the vast majority couples having the no of kids they'd have now anyway.

This is fantastic news! According to all evidence, childless unmarried women are the happiest, and this will also reduce world population.

Bring it on!

Because how can you assess the reasons for here and now if you're using it as your baseline?

I have no life. I have work, housework, cooking, shopping, elderly parents, teenagers and in-laws.
I can’t remember the last time I had a nice day.
I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t exhausted and overwhelmed with guilt.
Tomorrow my only day off I have so much to do I’m going to need to get up at 4.30 to achieve the bare minimum.

I love them beyond measure but I honestly cannot say I would get married or have children had I known the life I would have.
I hope my daughters don’t.