Maybe if we had paid family leave women (and men) might choose to have children in their mid 20s.
And here is a thought... one factor may be that more women are choosing not to have children period.
Maybe if we had paid family leave women (and men) might choose to have children in their mid 20s.
And here is a thought... one factor may be that more women are choosing not to have children period.
Right huh?
For info I had my two children in my forties and no ivf or anything.
For the economists out there...is this a bad thing? How bad is it?
Off the cuff, it seems like some population decline in the next couple decades will be desirable. With climate change, and ever increasing demands for energy and consumer goods it seems like a smaller population would be more sustainable.
While this may be bad for the economy in the long term, my children (who are under three) should have a lot of individual economic opportunity when they come of age. Or maybe they will be saddled with supporting the millennial generation in retirement (although I also read the millennials are better overall at saving portions of their income).
As have a lot of healthy active females. However, we're talking about females who have the body of a 50 yo at 25 then add career goals that come first for many women; when your climbing that ladder 18 hrs a day there isn't much time for a 2 hr run. Even with fertility science these women aren't going to conceive. Will all make choices.
NahSon wrote:
Ok chief, good luck going on a first date at the age of 28, making 50K, and telling the lady you strive to be a stay at home dad.
There is no romantic love. Everything is about money and resources and very single statistic shows women only marry across or up.
Well, I'm not suggesting that you present yourself as a wanna be gold digger obviously. Nor would this be the kind of discussion you would have on a first date. All I'm proposing is that if you are in a relationship with a women who has serious professional career aspirations, then being willing to step back from your own career to help raise children would be appealing to that women and make you a better marriage prospect in her eyes. I'm also not suggesting that said man needs to become a permanent "house husband", just be willing to be the partner on the "mommy track" in a two income marriage/household.
Said another way, who is a more appealing potential husband to a hypothetical high earning women (say a lawyer at a big city firm earning ~$175K per year):
A) A guy earning $50K who insists that she scale back her career so that his is unaffected and he can someday be making $100K; or
B) A guy earning $50K who is willing to take 6 months off after a child is born, and who is then willing to seek out roles with flexible, non-excessive hours upon returning to the workforce so he can continue to shoulder the majority of the "homemaking" duties even if it means his long-term income potential will be more limited (say to $75k).
I guarantee you the great majority of high performing professional women would choose B over A in a heartbeat. Sure, all else equal a hypothetical man earning $500K+ per year might be more appealing, even if the women has to limit her career prospects. However, Joe Average $50K isn't realistically becoming Chad Hedgefunder $500K+ anytime soon is he? By the time your 28, most guys (and the women they date) have a pretty good bead on their long term career prospects.
And there is one giant flaw in your example, this woman will never, ever make it to date number one with this guy, no matter which way he presents himself. The vast majority of high income earning, career driven women will not slum it with a lower earning male, end of story.
Neither.
A women earning that much in a high powered law firm is not messing around with high school teachers/social workers/low level government administrators. That is the point people are making. I would love to hear from a women who is dating a guy making less than a third of what she does.
High powered women are unrealistic in what they are looking for in a child rearing partners. On the flip side, it is hard to blame them. What would two people with such different backgrounds have in common?
No way, jose wrote:
High powered women are unrealistic in what they are looking for in a child rearing partners. On the flip side, it is hard to blame them. What would two people with such different backgrounds have in common?
Lawyers and surgeons are people, too. You make it sound like a lawyer and a high school teacher have nothing in common. It's perfectly normal the other way around, so that tells you right there it's not about different backgrounds.
pointmetotheunicorn wrote:
And there is one giant flaw in your example, this woman will never, ever make it to date number one with this guy, no matter which way he presents himself. The vast majority of high income earning, career driven women will not slum it with a lower earning male, end of story.
You don't know many career women do you?
Having worked for many year at a high end professional services firm (think McKinsey) at one point in my career the two biggest buckets of men my female co-workers dated and married were:
#1 - Male co-workers, which is obviously highly connected to proximity.
#2 - Men earning less than them. I met plenty of male teachers, PhD students, engineers, and similar significant others. All of these men earned less - sometimes much less - than their female partners and none of these career tracks would ever surpass those of their partners.
Education level was far and away a more important than income. You almost never saw such couples where the male partner hadn't at least completed college unless there was some extenuating circumstance (e.g. high school sweethearts). This is probably highly related to the potential for shared interests, as such things as taste in entertainment, food, and hobbies are highly correlated with education level.
Sliding Scale wrote:
For the economists out there...is this a bad thing? How bad is it?
Off the cuff, it seems like some population decline in the next couple decades will be desirable. With climate change, and ever increasing demands for energy and consumer goods it seems like a smaller population would be more sustainable.
While this may be bad for the economy in the long term, my children (who are under three) should have a lot of individual economic opportunity when they come of age. Or maybe they will be saddled with supporting the millennial generation in retirement (although I also read the millennials are better overall at saving portions of their income).
The problem in the US is retirement is a big Ponzi scheme. You put money in, and the government spends a lot of it on something else. When less people are putting money into it, it is laid bare that the government has been cheating the system.
This is not the kind of thread a guy who has women friends around the age of 40 would start.
Breadwinner and Breadmaker wrote:
You’re right wrote:
My kids were born when I was 32 & 36. I wish I started earlier.
Same here, I wish I had kids when I was in my 20s.
Both me and my wife have rather demanding careers and delayed having kids until in our mid 30s. I have been both the breadwinner and a stay home dad. Staying home with the kids does not suck, I actually enjoy it quite a bit, for sure more than my wife does.
As other have mentioned, the rate of infertility (and genetic defects) skyrockets with age for men too.
Totally different here.
I had kids at 27, 30, 32. They turned out great but raising them while trying to move up in the world was pretty challenging.
Then I had kids at 54 and 56. It is so much easier this time around. I have no career concerns. Still working but the level of flexibility that I have now is 100x greater and everyone in the household benefits.
The amount of women seeking this arrangement would be very very low I think. High earners aren't the only one not having kids.
Bread Face wrote:
Totally different here.
I had kids at 27, 30, 32. They turned out great but raising them while trying to move up in the world was pretty challenging.
Then I had kids at 54 and 56. It is so much easier this time around. I have no career concerns. Still working but the level of flexibility that I have now is 100x greater and everyone in the household benefits.
Holy crap, I can't imagine having a toddler and a newborn at age 56. My hat's off to you.
Bread Face wrote:
Then I had kids at 54 and 56. It is so much easier this time around. I have no career concerns. Still working but the level of flexibility that I have now is 100x greater and everyone in the household benefits.
But if you had them at that age they must have been retarded or autistic, right? Because that's what letsrun says.
There is a growing education gap between men and women. And I think it folly to pretend that this makes it anything but tougher to find suitable men educated men for women to marry. K-12 schools are generally speaking no longer helpful to achievement by boys. (This does not mean we should do anything but celebrate, however, achievement of girls). I went to elementary school in the 60's and early 70's, a typical boy - ADD - distracted - erratic in my studies. But competition in school - whether it be math games (the prospect of winning would quickly motivate) or reaching advanced reading levels in SRA reading kits - was constant. I only stayed interested because of the competition. And yes, I ended up doing exceedingly well in academics, graduating from two top schools. In today's elementary education world, I likely would have been labeled a miscreant (from a single mother home) and been forced to Ritalin or some such thing.
I have two daughters - patient, quiet, studious - both recent Ivy League grads. They were monsters in school not only because they had they mother's talent but also because they were just designed to churn out the endless make work and projects their schools threw at them. Today's school environment was made for them. National Honor Society at their high school was a mind trip - it was 80 percent girls (again, bravo for the girls). I see these things and there is no doubt there is an education gap.
Would you like to change any other of your criteria to further fit your beliefs that many posters have weighed in on to inform you are not the norm? Now you toss in education level as another caveat and then use Phd students and engineers as an example of low income earners? This has very little to do with education level and much more to do with career potential. Yes, there are the rare exceptions out there and of the many professional, career driven, successful women I know I can count the number of low earning, stay at home, husbands on less than a single hand. I'd dare say in that case it's more a result of lack of options for the woman (and man) than anything else.
Feels like you and some previous posters are throwing up the strawman of an economically dependent, house husband just so you can knock it down. Let me be as clear as possible:
It is my experience that men who are willing to shoulder the burden of childcare and household duties at least equally with their partners are more desirable to professional women all else equal, and professional women with such partners are more likely to want to have kids. Not sure how you can argue that. Of course there are many factors that come into play to determine who couples, with overall compatibility (shared interests, similar educational attainment, similar levels of ambition, similar level of looks, etc.) likely chief among them. Back to my original thesis, if a man's income potential is limited (and holding fixed looks, education, etc.) then he can increase his desirability relative to other men with similar income limitations by offering to contribute to the partnership in other ways such as taking on a larger share of childcare. I would suggest that more men pursue this path rather than continuing to complain about women being too picky on message boards.
Not necessarily true. The women will still be high risk and often will need a surrogate. It can ends up being more expensive and there are no guarantees.
My best friend had 3 children while doing a orthopedic surgery residency and fellowship (first kid at 31). Dropped the first and was back in the hospital 4 days later. It all depends on if you really want children. Career is no excuse and it’s not how all women roll.