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Comment by nhebb | Hacker News Reader

> Many 40+ year olds have families or other life obligations outside of work

Why is this a (seemingly) common belief? It seems backwards to me. I had a lot more obligations outside of work in my 20's and 30's when my kids were young than after 40. I'm in my early 50's, and I have more free time now than ever.

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I suspect it's because many people are having kids later in life nowadays due to career, education, circumstance, priorities, happenstance, etc.

I personally know tons of people in their late 30s and early 40s having their first child, or maybe their second.

I assume the average age-at-first-child of tech workers in urban areas is 30-35. That makes the early 40s still fairly busy. Still no excuse not to hire anyone.

I am a few months past 40 and never felt busier. My first child was born when I was 35, FWIW. I don't know many people who had kids in their 20s.

The first few years of childhood are absolutely time consuming. You have less and less obligations as they get older and reach teenagehood. They want to spend less time with you!

I'm in my mid 20s and i don't know any friends my age with kids.

It's just not very common to want a family before 30.

Not sure why people downvoted you... "mean age of first time mother" is climbing and is nearly at 30 years old in most of the developed world now.

http://time.com/4181151/first-time-moms-average-age/

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/11-630-x/11-630-x2014002-eng.ht...

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2016/03/09/pregnancy-around-...

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