Price to income ratios before covid were within normal variation, not even 25% higher than normal iirc. Easy to find sources I'm on my phone:) they are a bit higher now but birth rates were low before, too.

Of course the fact that the developing countries/ poorer immigrants / poorer past generations / poorer but religious groups within countries / you name it, have higher rates should make this obvious.

I personally don't have kids because for me, they would be a pointless boring chore. But I guess many fellow coastal bubble dwellers cannot admit it and need a cope ;)

An anecdote, someone from Russia asked me how big our house was when we bought it after getting married. Without going into the details, that was the smallest house we were possibly considering for 2 people, I said 1100sqft. They said, oooh, so you are planning to have many children then, with so much space! Nope, we are just spoiled ;)

People have historically lived in a much severe poverty than now, yet the birth rates were much better.

> basics like housing costs 10x more than with the previous high-baby-having generations

Thank you. I'm a millionaire. I want kids. I see no near-term path to having them without their costs rivaling that of financing multi-million dollar boats [1].

The fundamental problem is children are extremely expensive, particularly for the ambitious. (I'm putting aside the enormous liabilities that arise from e.g. one's child being disabled or trans or simply rebellious in some parts of the country.)

[1] https://cpag.org.uk/sites/default/files/CPAG%20Cost%20of%20a... page 8

Also the standard of raising kids has risen a lot as well.

It is fairly easy to have a lot of malnourished illiterate children, but people choose to have healthy kids they send to college, which is a lot more time consuming and expensive.