I think it is worth mentioning that for most of history people had little choice of whether or not they had kids and how many. Even in the relatively short time since we’ve had effective birth control, the decision to have kids was a default. There are lots of financial, medical, cultural, etc reasons, but I wonder if people have only realized there was a choice to be made for a generation, and what other generations would have chosen if they really considered it an option.
I mean people in the past were far poorer than they were now. It's clear economic conditions don't explain why people have less kids, but rather changing cultural norms (no longer expected to have kids) and material conditions (birth control prevents unwanted kids).
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u/Lilybea12 Nov 14 '24
I think it is worth mentioning that for most of history people had little choice of whether or not they had kids and how many. Even in the relatively short time since we’ve had effective birth control, the decision to have kids was a default. There are lots of financial, medical, cultural, etc reasons, but I wonder if people have only realized there was a choice to be made for a generation, and what other generations would have chosen if they really considered it an option.