Are low/falling wages now threatening the American family and the ability to have/raise children?

[Union Yes]

Is growing poverty due to outsourcing/free trade/low wages/unemployment having a negative impact on birth rates in today's America?

Is it becoming unaffordable to bring a child into this world nowadays?

Are people not having children because of growing poverty?

Most people nowadays are struggling to make ends meet. Many folks can hardly fend for themselves nowadays, let alone trying to raise a child. It's becoming a challenge just to feed/clothe/shelter ourselves.

Falling wages are a prime suspect. The purchase power of the working class is in a state of freefall due to waning earning power and unemployment.

I recently talked to a lifelong friend who's been married for 8 years. Him and his wife are in their mid 30's. He told me that they aren't planning on having any children any time soon and perhaps never because he said that they can't even afford to hardly eat and he can't even afford a prescription medicine that he's supposed to be taking.

They don't have any children and aren't planning for a family because of their impoverished situation. It really got me thinking. How prevalent is this problem throughout our society.

If you've read this far..

Do you know of anyone that this scenario applies to? Look closely at America in the past 30 years. Especially since NAFTA and free trade began outsourcing almost every good paying middle class job. Manufacturing gone. Along with it, the middle class. Gone.

Is it becoming nearly impossible for working class Americans to raise a family nowadays?

Are low/falling wages and growing poverty impacting birth rates in America?

[Dawgs]

1. People not having children is the best thing that could happen to this world.

Overpopulation will bring 'the end' before 2100.

[Union Yes]

2. I agree that overpopulation may be humanity's #1 crisis..

but empoverishing humanity isn't the way to address the problem.

I'm not saying that you implied that. You didn't. Just sayin.

[slay]

19. I agree

well that and predatory capitalism.. and stupidity.. but overpopulation is way up there too! it's impossible to even talk about with most people though - especially overly religious peeps.

[SPedigrees]

3. If lowered wages reduce the birthrate, it will be the only positive

side to our bad economy. Judging from statistical rises and falls over past decades, the birth rate is likely declining in accordance with the sucky economy now.

[cbdo2007]

4. Probably not.

It doesn't really cost anything to have sex. That's about as far ahead as most of us see the baby having process.

[Dr Morbius]

5. I doubt it.

I think smart and responsible people look at their economic situation and think it through carefully before having children. I also think smart and responsible people will never, ever constitute a majority of the population.

The low wages are indeed threatening the American family, but not to the point of reducing the number of families. Rather, increasing the overall level of misery.

[SocialistLez]

6. Even people who don't have children

are being hurt too.

To answer your question, yes, low wages and growing poverty are impacting birth rates in America.


Even if I was really rich, I wouldn't want children.

[proudohioan]

7. You could be on to something there.

If I were contemplating having a family right now, low/falling wages would certainly play a big part in my decision. Or at least weigh in on whether I wanted one or two kids.

Having been a single mother for the last 12 years, I can tell you that providing for even the most basic necessities is a huge struggle. And that may factor in why my 21 year old daughter says she never wants to have kids.

Walmart: falling prices=falling wages!

[Union Yes]

10. Exactamundo.

I was hoping a DU parent would reply. Thanks for the informed reply. Informed through experience.

Agree 100%.

What you replied is exactly the points I'm trying to make in this OP.

Thanks for adding.

Peace

:hi:

[proudohioan]

12. You are very welcome...

and I love your screen name!

Peace back to you!

:hi:

[SocialistLez]

8. Wouldn't it be better if we had less children?

There wouldn't be so much competition for jobs.

[Union Yes]

23. I'd be repeating reply #2..

Family planning, access to reproductive health for women etc are the best ways to combat overpopulation.

[SocialistLez]

28. No disagreement here. NT

[NeedleCast]

9. Nope

People are still having children whether they can afford to or not.

[sinkingfeeling]

11. No. The US birth rate is not falling, but increasing.

http://www.susps.org/overview/birthrates.html


U.S. fertility first dropped to less than replacement level fertility in 1972,11 and by 2002 had dropped to a record low.19 (Replacement level fertility is 2.1 children per woman because of infant mortality - see terms). During most of the 1970s and 1980s women gave birth to fewer than 2 children on average, a rate insufficient to replace the population.11, 12 Because of population momentum, U.S. population would have increased to 255 million by 2020 and then gradually declined.11

In 2000, births increased 3% over births in 1999 - the third straight increase following nearly a decade of decline from 1990 through 1997.12 Now, the average number of children born to women over a lifetime is at 2.03 - slightly below replacement level.12

[Hannah Bell]

13. the increase in the birth rate since the 70s is entirely due to the large increase

in immigration since the 70s (immigrants from countries with higher birthrates); but their birthrates decline in the second generation, & despite this, the birthrate remains near replacement rate.

[sinkingfeeling]

16. So, they shouldn't be counted in USA birth rates? Or the recession wouldn't have any affect on them?

[Hannah Bell]

22. you seem to have missed the point.

[lumberjack_jeff]

14. The opposite is demonstrably true.

Birthrates decline when standard of living increases.

[SPedigrees]

29. The baby boom generation would refute that.

After the war, jobs were plentiful, it was easy to earn a living wage, the American dream of home ownership and two cars in every garage was becoming a reality. The population took off like a rocket.

Conversely, during the great depression, the birth rate was down.

[Greyhound]

15. Ever see Idiocracy? n/t

[HughBeaumont]

17. Pop pop pop pop pop pop pop! Like Rabbits.

Surely explains the 59 or so million who voted for the Failure Fuhrer . .. twice. And out of that, the 57 million people who thought President Sarah Palin was a great idea.

[uponit7771]

18. YES!!! We pay 400 a week car for our twins...it's overtly expensive and I live in Texas

[jxnmsdemguy65]

20. From what I can tell, the only people who can afford to have kids are doctors...

and some others involved in the medical industrial complex (MIC) as well as those poor people who can still qualify for what's left of state and federal child support programs (WIC, Head Start, etc). The rapidly-shrinking middle class and increasingly impoverished workers just can't afford to do it. Hence the rise of alternative - some would say hedonistic - lifestyles without children. For many, it's their only chance at fulfillment.

[Union Yes]

21. I agree 100%

Very interesting perspective and also very true.

Thanks for adding.

:fistbump:

[REP]

24. Money didn't make me change my mind about procreating

In fact, having money and health insurance allowed me to make sure I'd never have any children. Education equals lower birth rates, not lack of money.

[treestar]

25. No, counterintuitively, it is the other way round

The more financially secure, the fewer children people have.

The first world has fewer children than the third.

There is a higher survival rate for the children. In the insecure old days, people had many to insure that some survived.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

26. The middle class was destroyed long ago.

But people who can't afford children are having them anyway.

The corporate bosses decided to depress wages, make sure momma and daddy BOTH had to work outside the home, and then they could blame it on feminism.

It ain't feminism, it's simply greed.

[cap]

27. People are being paid below subsistence

that's the point. We were at this point prior to unionization during the Industrial Revolution in the 1800's