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I've heard this over and over but don't see it anywhere around me (NYC, likely overeducated, doing fine but not wealthy).

I know a lot of couples that have a kid but face major financial constraints. Up and down the socioeconomic spectrum, it's expensive as hell to have a family, house and educate them, and that's a major part of the calculus for even moderately well-off families.

You don't see declining fertility rates?

People young enough to be having kids often don't have a sense of what was normal a few years ago, much less decades ago.

>Women are realizing that stay-at-home wife/motherhood is a really bad job.

I've heard a lot of the opposite, women realizing that work sucks and that being stay at home is a realistic out for them.

>you may find yourself with nothing or worse, a pile of debt.

I also see women generally winning when it comes to divorce. I have close acquaintances that married rich and divorced rich.

>That's just not something that is going to happen anymore and only men are having a problem with it.

I see women with "buyers remorse" a lot. They lived their independent life and now realize they want kids after all but are getting too old to start a family.

> The whole 'trad wife' meme fed into this dream of coming home to a hot meal, a adoring wife, and obedient children. That's just not something that is going to happen anymore and only men are having a problem with it.

As opposed to young women, who expect men to earn more than them, adore them, and to do all that while caring for kids? Part of the problem here is that young men's desires are constantly castigated as bad. In particular, coming home to an adoring spouse is something both sexes ought to want, and it should never be castigated as bad for a young man to want a wife who adores him.

Well, either way it doesn't really matter. Yes young men today will be sad, but ultimately, this is a self-correcting problem. The women that do this are not going to be represented in the next generation. Their choice of course. It's a free country.

> As opposed to young women, who expect men to earn more than them, adore them, and to do all that while caring for kids

Not anymore, that's my point. Women's dreams are changing now that they can make real money. Men's dreams are not catching up.

> Yes young men today will be sad, but ultimately, this is a self-correcting problem

Self correcting in many ways but it is often 'corrected' by oppression and violence. Women did not forbid themselves from going outside or showing their faces.

> Not anymore, that's my point. Women's dreams are changing now that they can make real money. Men's dreams are not catching up.

What should men dream?

I honestly think the truth of the matter is that women's dreams change the moment they have a baby. Literally every women I know suddenly has a change of heart on how their future ought to unfold the moment the baby is born. Part of the problem here is that couples are not even crossing that Rubicon, so to speak .

I count myself as a man who probably dreamed what you think men ought to have. My wife and I married young, yes, but we both envisioned working full time. Then we had the baby... and suddenly your wife is obsessed with this little person in a way you never thought possible. My wife in particular never counted herself as a 'kid' person, but it's different when its your own, especially for women. Suddenly, it seemed like the only sane option was the traditional one. But I scorned those who told me that before that happened to us.

I think we should just be honest about the effect of hormones on women's desires. It would be kinder to men and women to do that.

> What should men dream?

Anyone can dream anything but they shouldn't respond with outrage and fury if their dreams don't come true.

> I honestly think the truth of the matter is that women's dreams change the moment they have a baby.

Not in my experience but that is immaterial in the context of the current discussion.

Women are not having babies. Not in the US, not in east Asia. In their opinions they've got better things to do.

> they shouldn't respond with outrage and fury if their dreams don't come true.

Who is responding with fury? I see no widespread male fury? On the internet, you'll always find someone furious enough.

> Not in the US, not in east Asia. In their opinions they've got better things to do.

Fine with me. Their ideals and cultural preferences won't be present in the next generation. A self-fixing problem.

> Fine with me. Their ideals and cultural preferences won't be present in the next generation. A self-fixing problem.

The governments of Japan and South Korea disagree.

> Self correcting in many ways but it is often 'corrected' by oppression and violence. Women did not forbid themselves from going outside or showing their faces.

Where in the western world is this happening?

Nowhere in the west of course, but in the mid-east they found their own way to 'correct' liberated women.

Saying something is 'self-correcting' is not the same as saying that the correction is something that you are going to like.

This is ridiculous, not all populations that have a healthy birth rates are forcing women to coverup.

Western culture as it stands today, promotes individualism driven by capitalism and ignores the collective, others promote family values and builds support networks to sustain it.

No one in Israel is beating women.

No one in Israel is beating women.

But of course they are. Women are beaten everywhere.

There's certainly nothing special about Israel in this regard.

At vastly different rates. You’re talking about an extremely rare and legally and socially heavily discouraged behavior.

One could just as easily say “women kill their young children in every country”, because some mentally ill women sometimes do so. That’s not the same as societal acceptance of the practice.

Or we could generalize any negative behavior to any group that has members that do that behavior, which would obviously be an incorrect generalization.

Of course there's extra detail, and one can parse out all sort of things based on what the commenter might otherwise have said.

I just find the choice of phrasing -- "No one in Israel is beating women" -- to be weirdly idealizing.

Great points. And an interesting idea that it might be a self correcting problem on a society wide level, although I’m not sure how heritable relationship preferences might be, versus being culturally transmitted.

> if you leave or the company goes under, you may find yourself with nothing or worse

Untrue. Alimony, child support.

> Men, particularly young men, are having trouble adjusting to this.

I see just as much anecdotal evidence that men are often (who knows what the percent breakdown is) the ones no longer seeking relationships, and articles authored by women lamenting the availability of highly desirable male partners.

> 24/7, room and board only

This seems like an overly negative view. All the work isn’t done by one partner, income is spent by both, the female partner often spends a higher percent of the income statistically (not implying anything by this, they may just be the one shopping for groceries), they share in what the income buys and the lifestyle of the couple, they also keep half of the asset appreciation, etc.

> Untrue. Alimony, child support

Not guaranteed in any way. Depends very much on courts, lawyers, and the ability of judgements to be enforced.

Who would take that over a job with a 401k that moves with you?

> I see just as much anecdotal evidence that men are often (who knows what the percent breakdown is) the ones no longer seeking relationships, and articles lamenting the availability of highly desirable male partners

See the 'incel' movement. See the Joe Rogan listeners. See the responses to any post about dating sites and the fury that women get more matches than men.

Young men are angry.

While alimony is not guaranteed, Elizabeth Warren shows in her book 'The Dual Income Trap' that you can be pretty much assured the government will get all that is possible from the husband. This is more true today than ever.

But you're not totally wrong. Part of the problem is that we disincentivize staying home. For example, you don't get to contribute to a 401k if you don't work but are at home with kids. You also don't get to qualify for social security.

In my opinion, if a woman or man stays home (but let's be honest... it's mostly women), then she should qualify for significant tax breaks on retirement accounts (if not a funded government account) and also the quarters she spends caring for kids should count for social security at the working spouse's wage or a government-mandated minimum.

> See the responses to any post about dating sites and the fury that women get more matches than men.

This is hardly a new thing. Literally the entire history of humankind is explained by men being highly desirous of basically any women and women desiring only a certain subset of men. 'Incel's have a long history.

> Elizabeth Warren shows in her book 'The Dual Income Trap' that you can be pretty much assured the government will get all that is possible from the husband.

Is there any evidence of this outside Elizabeth Warren's book? Most reports say that at most 10% of women get alimony.

> This is hardly a new thing.

Not new, but I believe that it's getting worse.

Warren's book doesn't say all women get alimony, it says that alimony is heavily enforced and that the courts extract as much as possible. If a woman is not getting alimony it's either because she worked (in which case she might still get child support, that's different) or because the husband is simply not earning enough to support two people, which would be a problem even without alimony.

Basically, if a non-working woman divorces, she is highly likely to get about as much as she would have had had she remained married, which stilly might be nothing, if the husband is not earning a whole lot.

I'll stand by my comparison. Absent every other consideration, do you think more people would want a job with retirement benefits and severance pay, or a job where you have a 10% chance of getting part of your employer's income - which may are may not be all that much.

I'm pretty sure I know what Jack Bogle would recommend.

> Is there any evidence of this outside Elizabeth Warren's book? Most reports say that at most 10% of women get alimony.

Do you have a source for this claim? (anon291 provided at least one source...)

> alimony awards have always been very rare, going from about 25 percent of cases in the 1960s to about 10 percent today

From 2015, but I don't think there's any reason to think they've gotten higher

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-women-divorce-alimony/how...

Maybe only 10% of women stop working when they have kids, so few of them need alimony?

And again that’s separate from child support. I’d bet the child support number is 80%+, with the remainder being women that earn huge amounts of money or who decide not to be in their kids’ lives and have zero custody.

They probably haven't stopped working when they have kids because it's a terrible social and financial decision.

Which is why they don't want kids. Which is why fertility is declining.

> Who would take that over a job with a 401k that moves with you?

Just going to say that the perspective of having kids and getting to spend your time not working, or stressing about work, and instead spending it with family and raising your kid, doesn’t seem like a hellish job to me, and besides that it isn’t clear to me the father would be the “employer” in that context, rather both work in the way they agree to within the context of their relationship for the benefit of their child. Many men would like to raise their kids while someone else goes to work.

> not working

> (not) stressing about work

> instead spending it with family and raising your kid ... while someone else goes to work

Right. 'Spending time' with your family and kid is not work and is completely stress free.

Another reason women do not want to become stay-at-home wives/mothers, no one respects you or the work you (pretend to) do .