Birth rates / Fertility

[mathematics]

12 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

I want a cut if it happens!

Is it a Jewish porno?

[The Moonster]

4 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

A growing number of women absolutely do hold this view and they are perfectly entitled to hold that view.

A lot of them are silent because they are under tremendous pressure to get sprogged-up from friends, family and wider society.

What are you basing this on?

[Empty It]

I don't have kids.
To suggest there is some sort of selfishness involved in this is offensive and archaic.
 

Surely its more selfish to attempt to force people to have children who don't want any?

[DMCs]

1 hour ago, oaksoft said:

To be fair I specifically excluded city centres when I said the following. 

In 1990 I was paying about 33% of my disposable income on rent.

Is it as bad as that now for most people?

Those in cities on low incomes? Probably yes.

 

Also, it doesn't need someone earning £60k.

It only requires a couple earning £30k each and that sort of wage is around the average.

A single person should not be renting a city centre 2 bed flat at those rates.

I was paying 33% of my take home pay on a single room in a shared house on the outskirts of a city. THAT is the fair comparison to make, not some random single person living in their own 2 bed flat in an expensive city centre. So a single room in a shared house for a single person for comparison in Edinburgh would be around £400 quid. That tells a bit of a different story.

It's undeniably a lot more expensive than it used to be. I don't think it is the main reason that people are having less children but I think it may be a big factor in why certain expensive cities are seeing big declines in young families. Places like Brighton and York have seen large declines in the number of children from the 2011 census to the one released this summer.

France was arguably the first country to have a fertility rate decline in the 19th century. The main reason seems to be the rise of secularism.

[DA Baracus]

41 minutes ago, mathematics said:

Is it a Jewish porno?

Talk to my agent.

36 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

I can spot sarcasm a mile off. 

When you want to rent a flat and want to see what it will cost you compared to your wages do you:-

a) Visit Zoopla

or 

b) Grab the latest edition of "Average house price statistics 1974-2022"?

Personally, I choose the former but if the latter works for you then wire right in chief.

Like many other folk, I could easily afford a mortgage.

However, like many other folk, I can't afford the huge sum of a deposit, not to mention the rip off/scam fees (which easily run over £1k, probably closer to £2k, these days) involved in securing a mortgage.

[Alert Mongoose]

Pretty much falls down to a dispute of the meaning of life. Are we;

a) here to enjoy everything we want to do

b) here to ensure the ongoing survival of our species

Almost every other species goes for b) but we are ever so smart that a growing population selfishly opt for a).

Special criticism should be reserved for those who think that 'bringing up a dog' is a suitable alternative.

[Todd_is_God]

1 hour ago, oaksoft said:

@Todd_is_God, you can red-dot me all you like but when you put 3 "nots" in a single sentence any confusion is on you mate. 

I don't think there is anything grammatically wrong with the sentence?

[DA Baracus]

18 minutes ago, Alert Mongoose said:

Pretty much falls down to a dispute of the meaning of life. Are we;

a) here to enjoy everything we want to do

b) here to ensure the ongoing survival of our species

Almost every other species goes for b) but we are ever so smart that a growing population selfishly opt for a).

Special criticism should be reserved for those who think that 'bringing up a dog' is a suitable alternative.

Is this a serious post?

[JamieThomas]

Right wingers have made life unbearable.

Normal people don't want to/can't afford to have kids

Right wingers cry about it incessantly.

thumbsup.png

[Theroadlesstravelled]

14 minutes ago, JamieThomas said:

Right wingers have made life unbearable.

Normal people don't want to/can't afford to have kids

Right wingers cry about it incessantly.

thumbsup.png

Of course.

Right wing bams always put the economy ahead of the environment and sustainable living.

 

[bobbykdy]

59 minutes ago, Alert Mongoose said:

Pretty much falls down to a dispute of the meaning of life. Are we;

a) here to enjoy everything we want to do

b) here to ensure the ongoing survival of our species

Almost every other species goes for b) but we are ever so smart that a growing population selfishly opt for a).

Special criticism should be reserved for those who think that 'bringing up a dog' is a suitable alternative.

Taking this pish at face value there are plenty folk out there who I wouldn't trust to look after a dog never mind a child and if they made the decision not to have kids there would probably be a whole lot less suffering as a result.

[GNU_Linux]

NHS doesn't have enough machines that go ping to handle an increase in birthrate.

[throbber]

My old next door neighbour (who was on a pub crawl yesterday and posting live updates on Facebook) told me him and his Mrs sat down doing an excel spreadsheet figuring out if they could afford to have kids or not. I assume they decided it wasn’t for them.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

8 hours ago, The Moonster said:

What are you basing this on?

Think oakys writing a bluey version of this.

 

[ICTChris]

1 hour ago, throbber said:

My old next door neighbour (who was on a pub crawl yesterday and posting live updates on Facebook) told me him and his Mrs sat down doing an excel spreadsheet figuring out if they could afford to have kids or not. I assume they decided it wasn’t for them.

There are some people who don’t want to make the trade off that having children involved, not just the cost in terms of money but the cost of not having as much personal freedom, not having as much time to do what you want, go on Facebook-updated pub crawls etc.

The cost of childcare and the requirement of most people to have a two income household is real though. My wife and I are very fortunate in that we have one child, who has the entirety of his childcare funded by the Scottish Government which allows my wife to work part time to a larger degree. Before he qualified for funding it was a big struggle though.

[throbber]

4 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

There are some people who don’t want to make the trade off that having children involved, not just the cost in terms of money but the cost of not having as much personal freedom, not having as much time to do what you want, go on Facebook-updated pub crawls etc.

The cost of childcare and the requirement of most people to have a two income household is real though. My wife and I are very fortunate in that we have one child, who has the entirety of his childcare funded by the Scottish Government which allows my wife to work part time to a larger degree. Before he qualified for funding it was a big struggle though.

I was the same as me and the Mrs don’t have anyone around us to help out with child care - we were paying 600 a month on it for 3 days a week whilst the Mrs worked and now my daughter has been free for a while we are paying about 500 for our son until he’s 3 at end of 2023 then we’ll be so much better off. 
 

Running about doing your job whilst getting the kids to nursery is crazy as well. By time both of you are at work you’ve already put in a shift. Also during Covid times nurseries would just shut down if someone tested positive, sometimes we a minutes notice but you’d still need to pay the full amount regardless. Good times. 

[ICTChris]

9 minutes ago, throbber said:

I was the same as me and the Mrs don’t have anyone around us to help out with child care - we were paying 600 a month on it for 3 days a week whilst the Mrs worked and now my daughter has been free for a while we are paying about 500 for our son until he’s 3 at end of 2023 then we’ll be so much better off. 
 

Running about doing your job whilst getting the kids to nursery is crazy as well. By time both of you are at work you’ve already put in a shift. Also during Covid times nurseries would just shut down if someone tested positive, sometimes we a minutes notice but you’d still need to pay the full amount regardless. Good times. 

Yeah a mate of mine has three kids under 3, or around that age so he is shelling out over £1000 a month on child care.

We only have our son in nursery two days a week so our has essentially been free since he turned three. The free nursery hours must be one of the policies that fits best into the pro-Natalia policies suggested earlier in the thread. I do feel a bit of guilt about it though as my wife and I could afford to pay the fees but it would be much more difficult and there are many who wouldn’t.

[Dons_1988]

5 pages it took for having kids to become a left vs right issue. 

Well done to all involved. 

[throbber]

14 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

Yeah a mate of mine has three kids under 3, or around that age so he is shelling out over £1000 a month on child care.

We only have our son in nursery two days a week so our has essentially been free since he turned three. The free nursery hours must be one of the policies that fits best into the pro-Natalia policies suggested earlier in the thread. I do feel a bit of guilt about it though as my wife and I could afford to pay the fees but it would be much more difficult and there are many who wouldn’t.

Yeah its just about how much time/money you are willing to give up. I know lots of you t parents who have their own parents nearby to help them out and I can’t help but feel a little bit jealous as they don’t pay childcare fees and get at least a night a week free to do what they want. I have had 4 nights away from kids in the last year and one of the nights off was when I was moving house so it wasn’t like I was chilling out in any way.

[The Moonster]

15 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

I'm betting it's exactly the same thing you are basing your opinion on.

Well if you would answer the question we could find out.