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Comment by bananalychee | Hacker News Reader

Is the cost of child care a cause, or is it a symptom of a deeper problem? The decline in the fertility rate is not an isolated phenomenon, and it spans many disparate cultures. I know this opens a can of worms, but perhaps we should be more open to the idea that maximizing the labor force participation of both sexes by outsourcing child-rearing is a suicidal model. It manifests as a gradual change in behaviors that we, in our hyper-individualistic society, tend to attribute to personal choice, but I don't think so many people would go "child-free" if we didn't frame child-rearing as a low-value trap that isn't worth sacrificing a professional career over. The supply constraint is a consequence of that value shift.

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I think your presumption that parents rather work than be a stay at home parent seems flawed compared to a reality that having a dual income household is a requirement to a middle class lifestyle. I know very few parents that would rather work than hang out with their kids.

>know very few parents that would rather work than hang out with their kids.

But they would work to increase the odds of securing a house in a more expensive neighborhood to increase the odds their kid is surrounded by more well heeled children for myriad reasons which then results in higher chances of getting into the best schools to increase the odds they are able to earn a high income due to possessing the right signals and knowledge.

And they would reduce the number of children they have to maximize the odds for the one or two they do have.

That opportunity is for a very exclusive set of parents. Most folks just want to be comfortable, have a good life for their kids, hang out with friends and family and do something special from time to time.

I think people fixate on the directionality too much, at this point it is a self-reinforcing cycle. I don't know how to break it, but I'm not optimistic about the half-hearted attempts of some countries to address it via subsidies and tax breaks.

> I know very few parents that would rather work than hang out with their kids.

Work being a proxy for resources, most people want both. The value shift I mentioned earlier affects the extent to which we prioritize one or the other. Given the same economic environment, a society where family is viewed as more important than material comfort would have more families sacrificing income rather than just talking about it.

> The value shift I mentioned earlier affects the extent to which we prioritize one or the other

You need resources to raise kids. So the discussion about values is beside the point in a society where in a couple both people are expected to work to have a normal life. In our society any system that values family is fighting the economy. Best of luck with that.

> if we didn't frame child-rearing as a low-value trap that isn't worth sacrificing a professional career over.

In reality, it makes you dependent, very vulnerable and poor. The think is, it is not just value shift, it is women making active decisions so that they life does not become very bad.

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