At least two incomes are pretty much a necessity for most families. But childcare itself is expensive AF, and the boomers that didn’t step out during the great resignation are probably going to working until they meet the grave, so we have no generational support like our boomer parents did.
It’s a damn hard choice between “pay more for daycare than than the lowest-earning parent earns” or “put one of the parents careers on pause for 5-15 years and never be able to meet their childless peers in salary”.
Especially when you consider there are plenty of potential parents well into their thirties who are still struggling to get ahead on their student loans. I’m fortunate enough that we are able to get by on one salary and my wife was a SAHM for 6 years. Now she’s 33, working part time in retail (completely unrelated to her degree), and it burns every month paying her student loans knowing that there’s absolutely 0 return on the investment from a decision she made when she was barely more than half her current age.
It’s kind of ironic that “the pill” was the catalyst for women’s rights that got them into the workforce in near-equal numbers, which ultimately reduced the value of labor enough that it made two-income families necessary, which makes it more difficult now to actually plan a family in the first place.
Edit: in case it’s not clear, I’m not faulting women, women’s rights, or birth control here. These are all great things. For lack of a better phrase, “It’s the economy, stupid”.
This is a huge part of it.
At least two incomes are pretty much a necessity for most families. But childcare itself is expensive AF, and the boomers that didn’t step out during the great resignation are probably going to working until they meet the grave, so we have no generational support like our boomer parents did.
It’s a damn hard choice between “pay more for daycare than than the lowest-earning parent earns” or “put one of the parents careers on pause for 5-15 years and never be able to meet their childless peers in salary”.
Especially when you consider there are plenty of potential parents well into their thirties who are still struggling to get ahead on their student loans. I’m fortunate enough that we are able to get by on one salary and my wife was a SAHM for 6 years. Now she’s 33, working part time in retail (completely unrelated to her degree), and it burns every month paying her student loans knowing that there’s absolutely 0 return on the investment from a decision she made when she was barely more than half her current age.
It’s kind of ironic that “the pill” was the catalyst for women’s rights that got them into the workforce in near-equal numbers, which ultimately reduced the value of labor enough that it made two-income families necessary, which makes it more difficult now to actually plan a family in the first place.
Edit: in case it’s not clear, I’m not faulting women, women’s rights, or birth control here. These are all great things. For lack of a better phrase, “It’s the economy, stupid”.