Should the Poor Be Denied the Right to Bear Children?

The poor and indebted have it tough. They may have the right to buy a gun, but they can't get much else. They can't afford down payments, so they're not able to buy homes anymore. And since they can't afford to live in a good neighborhood, their kids aren't allowed to go to the best schools. And we've all heard how they can't afford adequate health insurance.

It raises the question: if they can't afford it, should the poor be allowed to have children?

So what does it really cost to raise a child? The USDA Center for Nutrition Promotion & Policy publishes an annual report that tries to answer just that. I analyzed this data to determine whether a lower-income family could afford to have a baby.

After a parent has taken care of their own personal expenses, housing, and savings, he or she would need an additional $1,000 per month (before taxes) to raise the average child from a lower income family. This assumes that extra money beyond monthly expenses are invested at a rate 2-3% higher than inflation. Regardless, it's an enormous bite out of the average low income earner's paycheck.

The good news is that if the family puts away about $60 extra per month, it amounts to a large amount of money over 18 years and can pay the majority of tuition at a public four-year university.

But $1,000 is the minimum. They'd need more if they lived in the Northeast or West Coast, more if they lived in a city, and more if they want to raise their child like their middle income counterparts. And way more if their employer doesn't provide family health insurance.

In other words, unless you can pony up at least an additional $1,000 a month for the next 20 years, you'll end up falling into a debt trap or depriving your child of the minimum needs to compete in the real world.

So should there be a childbearing policy? In India, they want to reduce the birthrate by promoting television. A British study recently showed how contraception is the cheapest way to cut carbon emissions. Last year, a Louisiana legislator actually proposed sterilizing poor women.

Here in America, could we better protect the environment, reduce crime, and increase school performance if the poor had fewer children? Maybe.

But, regulating childbearing for the poor seems wrong (and probably a little racist), even if economists can prove it's "efficient." Before we start telling people they can't have kids, let's consider other strategies to make everyone better equipped to tackle the financial challenges of raising a family. Here are a few:

Automatic Savings Account Enrollment. The last thing on the minds of new moms and dads is dealing with excessive paperwork related to pre-tax savings accounts. We should automatically enroll children in college and health savings accounts with contributions deducted from their parents' paychecks. Often parents discover these benefits far later than they should.

Credit Card Debt Warnings. Parents should receive warnings about excessive credit card debt and its potential to jeopardize their child's future opportunities. Financing a family with credit cards is rarely a good idea.

Better Baby Showers. Instead of registering for a $1,000 baby stroller, the laws should allow a reasonable amount of gift-giving to a child's educational savings account. Friends and family spend a lot on toys and clothes -- let's give them new options to invest in something more meaningful.

Prenatal Financial Counseling. Nonprofits and health care providers should partner to provide counseling for expectant parents so that they can understand how the finances will change, including the potential need for disability and life insurance. Unfortunately, lower income people often don't take advantage of dependent care and other tax-advantaged plans. Better information can help fix this.

The bottom line is that having a child is expensive. Instead of denying people the chance to be a parent, let's do everything we can to help people better plan their new family's financial future.

Comments

[Ashok Hegde]

What is 'sickening'; I'm quite curious. At one level, handing such power to the state, or state bureacracy sounds terrible. But, those who procreate and have no financial stability are also entering into a sickening future. Isn't is "sick" to willfully lead a child into harm, which is what a life of financial insecurity is?

There have to be methods of socializing responsible procreation. The state, or 'society' will never raise someone's child properly. Depending on handouts, charity, government programs, and any other largesse is irresponsible.

[cautionbug]

Perhaps it's not a matter of financial standing that should be considered; but i'm all for restricting people too stupid to recognize their inability to support a child financially, emotionally, educationally, etc.

[Rosy]

I'm sure there are a number of successful people, contributing to society, who were brought up by lower-income parents who would be interested to know they should never have been born.

[wisewomcat]

I think I first thought about this problem after watching "Idiocracy." In an ideal world, the smarter people in the world would reproduce more, and the less intelligent wouldn't. This line of thinking quickly gets to the "should we limit who can have babies" and that's generally where it stops -- because the thought of telling anyone they can or can't reproduce goes against everything we believe.

I think the best we could do would be to provide free birth control to people under a certain income level (and make it very easy for them to get, like mailing it to them). Most people probably know if they are too poor to really afford having a child. If we were to give birth control to women for free, they would probably take it willingly. Same for men -- if there was some form of it for men other than a condom. If men could take a pill every day, I'm sure a lot of them would.

[Rosy]

The concept of sterilizing poor women is absolutely sickening. I'm not saying we should actively encourage anyone to have kids they can't afford, but the sterilization thing is just wrong.

Additionally, there's no "magic" income level at which a child suddenly becomes "affordable." Everyone's situation is different. I kind of disagree with the $1,000 a month thing. For a rough estimate, my husband and I spend $500 a month on our childrens' daycare, maybe $200 more in food than what we would buy just for ourselves. But the tax breaks we receive for them offsets some of that. And some people have a relative who will watch their children for free, so that expense is eliminated. It's not possible to say "a child costs X per month."

[unitron]

This is by no means an idea original with me, but a big reason poor people tend to have lots of children is that sex is one of the few available means of recreation for them.

[Rosy]

Some good points. Although I disagree on the emphasis on saving for college. I was raised by middle class parents, and they never saved a dime for my college education. They couldn't. I paid for it myself with loans and a part time job. Not community college/living at home either, a 4 year degree at a state university 200 miles away. And it was interesting there--you could tell the difference between kids who were paying for it themselves and those whose parents were paying for it. The kids who were paying for it themselves were overall more likely to take it seriously and less likely to spend all their time partying. I never felt my parents "owed" me a college education. I don't feel I "owe" it to my own children either--especially if that education is going to mean those kids will have to support me in my old age, as I will not be able to save as much for my own retirement if I am paying for their college.

[oustfan]

Wow. I clicked the link because I assumed it was Glenn Beck's newest idea. I didn't think it would be discussed as an idea that's on the table and something that should be considered.

Absolutely sickening stuff.

[unitron]

They, and a lot of other people who technically have enough money to not count as "poor", should be personally responsible enough to not have children which they can't afford, and, when doing the math on that, should consider the possiblility of something being wrong with the child that will make raising her or him a lot more expensive than "normal".

In other words, don't make babies anyone else will have to finance.

But, of course, we aren't going to be able to count on that level of personal responsibility from a good sized chunk of the population regardless of their financial status (do you really think Paris Hilton's parents had any business reproducing?), so the question becomes what, if anything, is acceptable in the form of legislation, and who in their right mind would want to get involved in trying to enforce it?