Assuming you are on this forum you probably make 6 figures. have nice parents, and a good spouse. You probably don't even need your spouse to be working if you're ~28 - 30 and in IB/PE/etc.
Lots of discourse from people on the internet about how kids are too hard so they don't want them. Or how they'll lose freedom (lol).
I agree kids are very hard if you make $70k a year. You can't afford extra help, and can't afford to buy things that make babies easy.
But we are on WSO where everyone makes $$$. The $$$ are there to make things easy.
So have kids! It's very easy to have a baby on that budget - assuming your child is healthy and I guarantee you'll have a lot of fun.
Too many of my friends, who make more than enough to have kids, have been gaslit by dumb broke people into not having kids!
Same thing applies to marriage. If marriage is hard, you're married to the wrong person.
Yes, it’s really really easy lol. It definitely made my life a lot easier than prior.
probably helps that my wife used to be in credit, and I am a moron that is super disorganized
she is the perfect other half 😂
You sound like a simp, bet you are Asian
Agreed. Co-signed.
Have you always known you wanted kids or were you previously of those who are gaslit? While acknowledging that kids are indubitably expensive and money is a scarce resource, it's not the money making me apprehensive. I'm more concerned with the freedom that you mentioned, as I have so many things that I enjoy filling my time with. My nieces and nephews (all under 5) can be such a joy (when they're happy) for about 15mins, but I feel depleted after that. I wish I knew for sure one way or the other whether I wanted kids; rather, needing to make a deliberate decision opens the door for regret (probably a moot point because all the girls I come in contact with seem to want kids, alas).
I wasn’t dead set either way. After meeting my now wife I was a lot comfort with it.
Enjoy not spending time with your kids.
Elon....is that you?
What about 10 kids?
based, as the kids say
Most people who are 28-30 are not in IB/PE anymore I feel like...maybe it's my own situation speaking but I make about 50% of what I made when I was 3 years younger unfortunately (was in PE previously). I honestly don't feel like that's great money with the paycut now and the last thing I could afford right now is children or supporting a non-working spouse. Agreed though if you're still in IB/PE after 5+ years, you can easily support it. I made all the wrong choices and ended up in a shitty exit spot now.
Looking to switch to Med school (which yes will be a long haul) but after that, even with the debt, I'd feel far more comfortable with a family relying on me than shitty finance where outside of IB/PE/HF/AM no one makes that much money while relatively young. Went on a tangent but that's the truth no one wants to hear.
My wife was making well into 6 figures working like 30 hours a week at a bank in credit. There are lots of very chill jobs that pay well.
I’m not the commenter, but mind sharing these roles?
It’s also difficult if you’re a degen
Dude I think you got it the other way around. Its all the broke people that are having a shit load of kids, and all the college educated/middle class earning households that are not having kids. Look at the fertility rate stats in America. At this rate, the country will be overrun with all these broke lower class people, either immigrants or some white trash West Virginia type rednecks. Thats literally the playbook for both parties to divide and attract these large swarth of votes for their respective party.
I digressed. But yes, smart educated people should have kids. But then if you’re smart and educated, you’d realize kids are pointless…
You are a midwit.
Thank you for purifying the future gene pool of your genotype.
The MAGA really pushing hard for people to have kids lol. I don’t know wtf OP is trying to talk about. Having kids 100% restricts your freedom.
And only truly shitty parents dump their kids off to the help and continue living like they’re single.
If that’s your attitude, and you’re like OP, please don’t have kids.
Nice try but I'm probably one of the most left leaning ppl on this site lol
Throughout the overwhelming majority of history, children were indeed ‘offloaded’ to extended family, or for the most part, left to their own devices around the property when the day’s work/chores were completed. Your standard of child-rearing is a self-defeating anomaly, just like everything else in our fleeting post-industrial societies.
Rather hilarious but fitting that you instinctively associate the very basic instinct of reproduction to the ‘right wing’. Glad to see you instinctively recognize which genotypes will be around in 100 years.
Of course, because right wingers are the only ones to try to tell you how to raise a family.
Also, right wingers need to start making babies, since the lefties are all poor and pop out 4-5 kids these days.
This is a pretty biased take and definitely isn't applicable to the broader population. As someone who intends on having kids, and meets your alleged criteria for it to be easy, I can assure you it is the furthest thing from. Are you seriously implying that a guy making $100k can support himself, his wife, and a child in LA? You are making blanket statement assumptions.
Lets talk about the flaws of your argument:
Emotional tole on relationships: Contrary to what you say, having children objectively takes a toll on all relationships, no matter the strength. According to Parent Data, reported levels of stress increase 10% when examining couples with kids vs. those without.
At this point, I am sure you will retort that the simple solve is that you have one parent stay at home while the other works, at which point I would ask you, how? I have four friends or family members who recently all had children, four couples of high earners, all making over 6 figures each (average of ~240k per couple). NONE, I repeat, NONE, of them are staying home, both parents are continuing to work, despite strong desires from at least some of the moms to be stay at home moms. These are not slackers, these are ivy league educated consultants, engineers, and some of the most successful people I know. Why are they all continuing to work, because before college, family vacations, and other key considerations, it costs ~$310k per child in America. Throw in some student loans, maybe a car payment, and a down payment (you need to have security in where you live once you have children, right), and suddenly the costs become overwhelming.
This posts reeks of naive boomerism.
Agree. Have tons of friends with kids now and their whole life revolves around their kids. Recently moved to a city where my best friend lives. He's not struggling at all financially, but he has no time outside of work to do anything but cater to his wife and kids.
It is a big flip flop in lifestyle. First major change is being committed to a wife, which is probably the single most important choice in your life. Then kids really tie you down. Which isn't the worst thing. After marriage, I would like at least a few years to enjoy being married without kids for a bit. Then when finally deciding to have kids, to give all my effort into being a good father and husband.
All very good points, as usual Isaiah :)
I think you hit on another huge point, which is your social circle deteriorates as you barely have time to see any friends for a decade long period.
Further still, you are quite frankly exhausted all the time. A friend of mine is like you and is a freak athlete, he runs full length triathlons. He is one of the toughest people I've ever met, mentally and physically. 3 months into his first newborn and he is beyond exhausted every time I see him, it looks like he can barely keep his head up. For him to struggle so much with one kid and the support a loving wife who does a ton of the heavy lifting is a sign of just how exhausting it is. That level of exhaustion objectively impacts relationships too.
In my OP I specifically called out people on this forum in IB/PE/HF. Nobody working those jobs is only making $100k.
A little silly to say my post reeks of being a boomer given I'm almost definitely younger than you.
BTW, most of what you pointed out is solvable or WAY less painful with money. That was the point of my post.
People making $100k - $250k will try to gaslight you into thinking kids are hard, but if you're in PE/HF/IB and pulling $400k+ a year, their situation is not applicable to yours lol. Yes they are "work" but you're fkng up by not having them because of financial concerns.
Fair counters all around, my b. I may have read your initial post and oversimplified a bit. From purely a $$$ perspective, absolutely agree only one member of the family needs to work and having children will not be a financial burden, but may be a bit of an adjustment depending on QOL.
I assumed you were a bit older given the CEO of PE tag, so could be wrong on the age assumption too.
This is so stupid. Americans have it so damn easy that they’ll complain all day about how hard it is to do the one biological function they were put on Earth to do while making multiple 6-figures in the most advanced and prosperous time in the history of the world.
Absolute clown take, dude.
How do you know humans are “put on earth to reproduce”?
This is a typically transactional take for a WSO post. Completely ignores the emotional and mental aspect.
Kids are tough. Babies require constant attention, even if it's at a low level. Sure, you can pay someone to watch your kids 24/7 so you can work a 12 hour day and have time to go to dinner 4 nights a week, but at that point, why even bother having kids in the first place? Moreover, maybe your wife is happy to be a glorified babysitter, but many of us will end up with women (or men) who want to continue in a career. How do you juggle that? How do you decide who gets Saturday night off?
I agree that the financial implications of having children aren't terrifying for the average person in their late 20s or early 30s who works in a job that this site caters to. But that ignores all the most important parts of raising kids. Anyone who has had a child knows how amazing it is to hold them when they're young, to see the first smile or hear the first word or watch the first steps. At the risk of employing a cliche, those are things you simply can't assign a dollar value to. Yes, you can hire someone to raise your children, to take them when they cry and feed them when they're hungry and bathe them at night, but it sort of feels self-defeating to wholly outsource childcare in that manner.
And, as mentioned, babies restrict your freedom. Gotta plan your nights out, because you need to line up babysitting. Tough to have those couple cocktails after a late Friday night dinner, because your kid will be up at 6:30 the next morning for swim practice and that means you're up too, no matter when you went to bed. The indirect "costs" of having children are really high. And that's fine, and may not even matter - by the time I was in my mid 30s I couldn't stay up til 3am anyway, so that was no loss, but that may not be everyone's experience.
Again, most people historically —regardless of family income— were raised fairly hands-off, at least relative to our standards. The children of nobility, lower patricians, wealthy merchants, etc usually spent most of their time with various tutors. Those rural-born were expected to labour around the property until the day’s responsibilities had been dealt with, at which point (if that point came) they would be off the hook. Not prescriptive, just a reminder.
Their parents had them in the first place for the purpose of, well, fertilizing the next generation, fulfilling a mammalian instinct. I recall that Goethe briefly wrote describing his wife interacting with their children. It’s the sort of letter that makes you realize people back then didn’t purely regard their children to the end of estate management and retirement planning. And while it certainly helps to have more hands around on a farm, consider that it wasn’t particularly uncommon for a mother in industrial London (a polluted, overcrowded cesspit) to have given birth to almost a dozen children. The only issue being that infant mortality resulted in anywhere from, let’s say, 0-6 surviving into adulthood (0 being rare), however this is still clearly far higher than anyone today. The point here being that even urban couples would conceive very often, especially considering the absence of immediately practical reasons to have many children in a factory city, as opposed to agricultural settings.
As for losing ‘freedom’ and the mental toll otherwise, that’s certainly true. Even if the grandparents are around and willing to help (and they’d better be), that really only goes so far. There isn’t much to say about that, comes with the territory, and some deal with it better than others. It would be easier if there was even a modicum of appropriate pro-family social engineering to help prepare people, all the tools are there. Public school and sex ed exist for a reason. Though I’m sure all the harpies in relevant government positions would be sure to remind everyone why it’d be ‘problematic’. After all, the Adolf Hitler (!!!) raised Germany’s birth rate.
Either way, seems intuitive that trading the ‘freedom’ of consumerism (be real, most people don’t have hobbies that aren’t passive) in exchange for the love and youthful energy of one’s children is a no-brainer. Many people are unfortunately afraid of taking the first step, and more than ample fearmongering is disseminated to justify inaction. There is also the lack of means, w.r.t. dysfunctional social environment/skills. Putting aside video games and online dating and whatnot, why, for example, are so many males just unable to properly speak to women, let alone flirt? Well, how many of them have sisters, or any siblings at all? How many regularly get together with older kinsmen showing off their new baby? Without intervention, low fertility is self-reinforcing and leads to mass psychological sterilization.
“At that point, why even bother having kids in the first place”. Wrong question, but you’re close. If you barely have time for your own life, let alone your kids, why bother having this particular high-status high-demand job in the first place? If it’s just ‘love of the game’, refer to the above and hire help —or forgo children entirely, just don’t raise the tax rate in 30 years. Though as it stands, the overwhelming majority of people here are only in it for the money and exit opps [hint]. In other words, do you work to live, or do you live to work?
Nooooo kids, I must consoooooooooooom!
Modern women have been completely gaslit into “careers above all”. The 37yo with panic in her eyes as she sees the end of her fertility and tens of thousands of $ in fertility expenses is ridiculous and hilarious. Most people, even educated ones, end up hating their career, and you’re telling women to slave away for a corporation, bosses and shareholders that wouldn’t even come to their funeral, but to not bring life into this world that they’ll cherish more than anything. Amazingly modern-liberal naive.
No, this is your take on it as a man who wants his partner to stay in the kitchen.
The be-all and end-all of a woman's life isn't being a mother, any more or less so than it is for a man to be a father.
Yes, most people end up hating their career. How in the world this is an argument for women to cut theirs short, instead of a man, is beyond me. Casual, totally unexamined misogyny at it's finest.
Male here. Neutral politically. What if someone were to jack up your hormones for 9 months, pot you through excruciating pain, then have you take maternity leave for 6 months. What do you think that will do to your career and how are you supposed to compete with someone who donthave to go through any of that?
Having a community, extended family, and community around you makes having kids easy, not the amount of money you earn. I have relatives in Singapore and Nepal who are doing fine with 2-3 kids, with half the take home pay of an 1st yr analyst (more like 1/50th for the latter) but they have strong social networks, and that makes all the difference.
Do most of you never end up understanding the reason why individualistic modern western families regardless of ethnic origin trend towards less kids/no kids in the first place? It's the lack of true friendship, true community, true relationships. Your "boys" from undergrad or your analyst days, aren't true friends becacuse you've gone to portugal together, or K holed in Vegas one time. "The girls" at brunch aren't supportive either. Western societies have weak interpersonal relationships because that's how secular protestant culture evolved, and because these societies have had it too good for too long. This isn't an archetype or population of people that will be self-replacing through procreation.
You need a village, or a sense of one to raise a kid easily. Not what most young professionals have today.
Yeah. I have family near me and I even moved to a higher tax location to be near my extended family + parents and it's helpful and fun for everyone.
[this app is incredibly buggy]
It is rather silly to blame Protestantism for an observably cross-cultural phenomenon. The fertility rate in Singapore is literally 1.0. Nepal isn’t a particularly industrialized or otherwise affluent state, and is still just hovering above ~2.0. I don’t think their current birth rate is indicative of a standard of living equivalent to 1985 Japan. Both of the aforementioned states are trending downwards, while all their neighbours are either at the same level or further down the line. Apparently, these are the hallmarks of cultures that promote robust social networks.
“They’ve had it good for too long” Historically collectivistic East-Asian societies are experiencing an even deeper fertility crisis, while having only recently undergone industrialization, and post-industrialization (to varying extents). Just 60-80 years ago, all of these were still by far predominantly agrarian societies —consider that ~1940-50 North Korea used to be the industrial centre of the formerly united peninsula.
When looking at Japan, you can basically pin-point the plunge around the time women began entering the industrial workforce. Their modern work culture is also notoriously demanding, both w.r.t. workload and especially social obligations to higher-ups. China’s ‘One Child Policy’ sealed its fate, and produced an alarming male surplus due to post-birth ‘abortion’ sex bias (similar issue in modern India, though to a lesser extent and independent of such fertility controls). Imagine being left out in the snow literally because you were born female. So much for personal relations. Additionally, South Korea is the best example of a post-industrial corporate dystopia on the planet, and the effects of this are self evident —lowest birth rate of any state on earth, comically dysfunctional inter-gender relations, etc.. Please remind me again which populations won’t be reproducing due to their inherently weak interpersonal connections.
The reality is that today’s societies socialize the benefits of child-birth/rearing, while privatizing virtually all of the costs —which is objectively unsustainable. In addition to confusing sex education, anti-natalist propaganda (the og, Ehrlich’s “The Population Bomb”, media fearmongering, etc), this just breeds apathy or outright hostility in the meantime, while there is still enough ‘runway’ to kick the can down before shit really starts hitting the fan.
Excellent reply. I do think this hits the mark in a more factual and technical sense, my response was to state the pseudo-cultural reasons as to why western UMC professional families weren't procreating, perhaps It could have been a bit more fleshed out.
To your point about East Asian societies. I recognize the absymal fertility rates. Nowhere did I say, or imply I believe, that they were any more collective than the west, though I suppose my Singapore example might be the culprit.
I buy it. Privatizing the costs is something I've heard of before but this is a good crystilization of that concept.
I woud like to believe having a modern "village" in the sense that it can be achieved would no longer keep the status quo of the family bearing the costs into perpetuity. I also have no clue as to what that would look like in the modern age whatsoever.
Happy to have this level of analysis and discourse on this site :)
Wow...great sad analysis, but spot on.
Preach brother
I had my first child when I was making in the $60-70k range. My wife was a teacher prior to having our child, and afterwards became a SAHM. I married a woman who sees greater fulfillment in raising our own children than in raising other people's kids (as a teacher) or in some fluorescent corporate job.
Were things tight? Frankly- not really. I was still saving 20-30% of my gross income. We were in a modest (safe, but not upgraded) 1br apartment, drove (still drive) unsexy reliable cars, only dined out a few times a month. The "kids are expensive" trope assumes that you are a good consooomer and not thrifty and value-conscious. It also must be back-loaded, since on a run-rate basis we have not spent anywhere near the $30k/yr they estimate per child.
We also have not "gotten lucky" with low costs- due to various things, we've hit our out-of-pocket max on healthcare costs essentially every year since having our first child. I just max out my HSA contribution and plan to never see that money again.
Now I make more than 4x that prior salary. We live in a modest home, drive modest cars. I save ~40% of my gross. We have a few kids. I text my wife that I am headed home from work and give her an ETA. When I get home the kids come running out the house and give me hugs. My little girl wants me to hold her. They tell me about their days. They saw a turtle yesterday and were excited to tell me. One kid makes up wild stories about his day that are not remotely true.
We sleep a lot less than we used to. Travel is more difficult. It takes a frustrating amount of time to get out of the house to go anywhere between finding shoes and clothes and getting everyone buckled. Going out as a couple costs 2x when you factor in babysitter costs.
But to be the steward of these kids' lives- for them to tell me they love me and to have a good day at work, to get to take them to ball games and to golf and to see their faces on Christmas morning.. It beats "getting to be a foodie" and "going to bars" and whatever other day-to-day life childless people have. We travel less than we otherwise would- I'll give you that.
Having kids made it hard to relate to other 20-something year old guys who were obsessive over sports- but interestingly, made me so much more relatable to the 40+ crowd at work, and my career has benefitted greatly from being seen as a mature adult and not a "young guy".
Don't let the propaganda get to you- we've been simultaneously told that having kids sucks, that it is so expensive, the world is overpopulated, etc but also that we need to import unlimited people to keep up the ponzi scheme. We need to see through that shit- having kids orients your view to the long term, to shaping the world to be a better place even after you die, to becoming someone who will be a good parent and grandparent, etc. That is what society desperately needs right now.
Wishing you all the best and a prosperous career and family. It's people like you (who I plan to be in a few years) that deserve all the plaudits.
Nice bro you’re blessed
Probably the only decent comment in this thread.
I could not love this take more. Maybe it's just self-serving, since my life looks a lot like yours, but it is wonderful nonetheless.
I also think of myself as a steward for my children. I understood that my life shifted when my kids were born; I stopped being the main character in the movie of my life, and I became a supporting character in theirs. I realize that some people might see that as a disappointing turn of events, but I promise it's been quite the opposite for me. Nothing has given me more fulfillment in my life than being a father (and I don't mean just checking the box of becoming one, I mean the day-to-day life of parenting).
Proselytizing isn't normally my thing, and I don't go around telling everyone that they should be parents. I also realize some people would love to be parents and can't, and I don't like adding to the colossal unfairness that brings. But Jerry Seinfeld, of all people, has a take on parenting that I align with: "One of the nice things God does, is that he doesn't let people who don't have kids know what they're missing."
Unfathomably based post. Cheers.
70k a year, 1 bedroom apartment that isn't in a dangerous area, multiple cars, dining out multiple times a month, having kids, and still saving 20-30% of your gross income?
I understand this was probably before inflation, but how? Living in Iowa or something?
600sqft apartment- it was ~$1k/mo. It was not in the trendy area, but was not dangerous. Large southern city (Phoenix/Dallas/Atlanta). At the time I was driving a new-ish corolla/civic/sentra. My wife was driving a 15 year old corolla/civic/sentra. Dining out meant that we'd go to Chilis or local sit-down burger joints.
I was saving 20k a year at the time- some to my 401k, some to my HSA, the rest on hand.
$70k gross
~$9k taxes (married filing jointly with a kid)
$20k savings
$15k rent and utilities
$5k payment on my car
$3k to my student loans
$18k to the rest- kept groceries to $50/week (lots of chicken), sought out free entertainment (museums, hiking, etc), packed my lunches. We'd drive home for holidays. We tracked all our spending and it was tight but not in a stressful way since I knew I was saving nearly 30%.
I'm very much with this take. Have kids when your financial situation is shored up. A babysitter for weekly standing date nights will save your marriage. If your wife is SAHM, a day or two off (e.g. montessori) can save your wife's sanity when you've got a toddler. A family vacation or two gives wifey something to goal towards.
I live in NYC now. People my age do not have kids here. Sometimes it feels like they feel bad for me? I'm living a dream life right now. They just know nothing about this world.
Modern women are so soft, haha. Need a day or two off when being a SAHM…you people are absolutely nuts.
Good grief, please don't reproduce.
I’d like to have kids if I could find a wife that is 100% content with being a homemaker. I feel that is hard to find in NYC vs. the south. Women would rather hang on to their ~$40k per year marketing job than be a stay at home mom and live in a McMansion in the suburbs, while I pay for everything.
Yeah bro all of these uppity fucking broads with their goals and shit. Who gave them the right to vote?
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