Opinion & Commentary
Now is the time for fecund thoughts
It's easy to find reasons to put off having a baby. You want to travel first. You want to have a career first. You want to buy a house first. You want to maintain your independence for a while longer. You can't afford it. All good reasons, but none negates the harsh reality that we cannot have everything all of the time.
Women have a limited time in which they can expect to fall pregnant relatively easily and safely, and carry a healthy baby to term. We live longer these days but female fertility has not been similarly prolonged. It's still a case of use it or lose it. Those people who have children would know that this makes perfect sense because pregnancy and childbirth are traumatic experiences even for healthy young bodies. Recovery takes a long time and looking after a newborn is hard work.
Twentysomething women of Australia: if you think you might want to have children some day, start thinking about this now. I'm not suggesting that you go out and get yourself knocked up by the next unwitting bloke that comes along. Caring for a baby is hard enough with a supportive, committed partner, let alone on your own.
What I am suggesting is that you have a plan. If you're working in a job that does not offer paid maternity leave, either change jobs or start saving.
Don't think you can afford to take time off work and maintain your standard of living. Lower your expectations for a while. Maybe move to a cheaper house in a different suburb. Consider eating out less often and try to live more simply. And don't put off having a baby because you think you need to buy everything Babyco has to offer. You don't.
Federal Liberal Party treasurer Malcolm Turnbull, in describing the long-term costs to a society of declining fertility, implies that raising children is a public good. That is, well cared for, well-educated children grow up to become good citizens and taxpayers and this benefits everyone, including the childless. If this is agreed, then having children is not a lifestyle choice and parents ought to be supported.
Compulsory paid maternity leave, however, is not the solution. This is useful only to the small number of employed women who plan to return to work soon after giving birth. It helps neither those women who are not working before they have a baby nor the large number of employed women who do not want to leave their children in the first few years of their lives.
Any public support for parents must be universal and of an amount that is meaningful. My colleague Barry Maley has proposed an amount of $3000 per child per year to be available to all families. This amount would be a great help to mothers who forfeit earned income to stay at home with their children, and would subsidise the childcare costs of those mothers who decide to return to work. Such a scheme would give mothers the freedom to do what they think is best for their children and themselves, and would not be means tested.
Women who scoff at $3000 a year ought to be honest about the real reason they are not having children. If you think $3000 is a drop in the ocean, you can afford to take some time off work without financial assistance, because used wisely, this amount goes a long way. It would buy a year's supply of nappies and baby wipes, cover any routine doctor's visits, as well as necessary clothing, laundry detergent and the extra costs of electricity and water.
But even without this kind of assistance, it is possible to give a child a comfortable and loving home. Take it from me: babies don't care about freshly painted nurseries, matching furniture and designer baby-wear. Many women could afford to have a baby if they and their partners were prepared to make even just a few lifestyle changes.
Despite the good intentions of many, policies that encourage people to have children will be a long time coming. Meanwhile, stop making excuses, stop blaming employers and the government and take some responsibility. No one says it's easy, but I challenge anyone to find a parent who says it's not worth it.
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About the Author:
Jennifer Buckingham is a Policy Analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies and author of Families, Freedom and Education: Why School Choice Makes Sense.
LETTERS
How very refreshing to read it is the lifestyle choices that influence the decsion to have or not to have children. It has become increasingly more difficult in every generation to achieve a reasonable quality of life. What is required now however is a degree of vision on behalf of all governments that will permit not only this generation but many yet to come to achieve a reasonable quality of life. Some decades ago it was suggested that decentralisation would ease the economic and environmental burden. Unfortunately this was allowed to die "stillborn". We need to decentralise if we are to prosper and grow. What better can we do for young couples than to make it possible for then to acquire a home at an affordable price. How can any nation hope to prosper if it devotes 60 per cent or more of its disposable income in meeting mortgage repayments? Build a high speed rail link to serve the eastern seaboard and encourage the growth of rural cities.
Peter Kornek Canberra, ACT
Finances are important but children are a 20 year commitment. The investment in time can't be costed. They have to be cared for, counselled and loved. Gary Carroll Torquay, VIC .
