More that young(er) folks could afford to live on a single income for the pre-school years. Or, I guess, that there's extensive parental leave and support for the parent doing primary caregiver.

▲

cvoss 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Mixed in with all this, and possibly preceeding all this, is declining marriage rates. It's significantly riskier, financially and relationally, to have kids without getting married.

▲

bombcar 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

There are many solutions to different aspects of the problem - if we define the problem something like "people get together older, and have kids older, and have fewer."

But even if everything was "easy and perfect" (arguably some other countries have this) - you still have something that is generally discouraging people from having kids.

The median Amish family income is about $65,000 and typically has six to eight children.

▲

jleyank 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The Amish aren't on the consumer treadmill. They have amazing social support from their community. They tend to be "traditional families" so there's no question re: child rearing. So I guess that satisfies both of the original conditions... But I figure people would prefer a more commercial lifestyle. Particularly on places like HN.

▲

amanaplanacanal 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The Amish aren't becoming scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs. As a society I don't think the Amish lifestyle is something we would embrace.

	▲	jpadkins 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I disagree. I think there is a lot we can learn from Amish society. Main of the 'ills' of modern society don't exist in their community. I believe that we can learn and apply aspects of what they do well without losing our ability to support entrepreneurs and engineers.

▲

watwut 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

By all estimates, they have also fairly high rates of domestic violence and abuse rates. Which to be fair, traditional families also frequently featured.

▲

assaddayinh 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You need a positive life affirming story in your life to set up kids and the current core does not have that. "You will be either a concentration camp guard or a prisoner, in a apocalyptic war" is not a life narrative, its a contraceptive.