alt Hacker News> Children are expensive, but highly subsidized, and just not expensive enough to explain the whole picture.
Highly subsidized? I have to assume you're not talking about America. I pay $3200/mo to send my kids to a very middle-of-the-road preschool. That's almost $40k/year just in childcare costs so that my wife and I can go to work. The difference between a 1-bedroom apartment and a 3-bedroom apartment is an extra $20k/yr or so in my area. Then there's health care premiums, taking them out for activities sometimes, etc.
I can ballpark the cost of having preschoolers in my area as $30k/yr each. And I don't know about you, but I don't exactly see any government subsidies helping me carry that burden.
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Get poorer, or get in a better location. Preschool is covered free here, with a pittance for after-school care (which is covered if your income is below something like 3x the poverty line).
Having kids is wildly subsidized for the poor - plot all the bennies available to a family at 2x the poverty line.
Jesus Christ! I don't have children, but if that is what it would cost, then I would definitely never have a child. It would feel like sacrificing my entire life, just to produce another generation. No, then I'd much rather just enjoy life, and melancholically look at the families who have to struggle every day to make ends meet due to their children. It is really quite sad. But I guess nature in its wisdom, transforms a person who has a child, so that that child becomes the only meaning in life for that person. If not, there simply would be no children and we would not be able to write this.