Reply to Do you think DINKs are the future?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We are millennial DINKs. Couldn't be happier.  Own a home. Max out retirement accounts. Take multiple trips per year. Have very little debt except a mortgage. Sleep until 10 AM on the weekends.

Kids ruin everything.  I paid $85k off in student loans. I will absolutely NEVER pay another college bill again in my life. F that.  Then they gouge the crap outta you for $3000-4000 per mo for childcare. Ridiculous.  [b]There's also no guarantee your kid won't turn out to be a F up even if you raise them right.  I know so many kids raised in good homes who ended up becoming opioid addicts, so one robbed a bank, and others popping out kids out of wedlock by the time they're 21.[/b]  The worst ones are kids who get into serious trouble and the parents blow their entire life's savings on legal fees or rehab to save their precious little Hunter or Emily.

Nope, nope, nope.  Finally getting ahead in life because of no kids. [/quote]

I support anyone's choice not to have kids, for any reason, but the bolded is just something bad parents say to feel less guilty about how poorly they parented their kids. I know people who point at their kids and say "gosh we did everything right and no one could have predicted they would turn out so poorly," and, uh, they did not do everything right and many people could have predicted what might happen with their kids.

Which is actually why I firmly support anyone's choice not to have kids. Having kids is hard! I love it, but it would not be worth the sacrifice if I didn't. You have to be ready to make your kids your life's work, not just something you did to fit in or because people told you it was time or you worried you might regret it if you didn't.

I don't think DINKs are "the future" because, uh, whose future would that be? But I very much support the idea that we should make parenting a totally optional choice. I think we should then make sure the parents who choose to do it are well supported and that the kids have good opportunities, because we all stand to benefit from a society of well raised kids.

That's the secret sauce to some of these economies with low birth rates but still very functional societies -- they channel a lot of money and support to children, and even people who don't have kids support the idea that society needs to spend money on childcare, education, supporting parents, healthcare for kids, etc. That's the piece Americans miss. There are lots of childless people in Europe but you don't often hear them complaining about their taxes going to children. They know those kids are future nurses and engineers and bus drivers and other people who are desperately needed by society, so they don't resent it. In the US there is this very short-sighted attitude that people who don't have kids should never have to support or accommodate children because "kids are a choice." I mean, yeah they are, but that doesn't mean we don't all have a fundamental interest in making sure they turn out okay.[/quote]

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