Struggling financially and getting frustrated?

[ChrisCBR]

The pill was supposed to free the women but in reality the guy said "Now we don't have to worry" and the manufacturers said "If she works for a few more years we can sell them more stuff." The couple got used to the extra income and kids became an inconvenient expense. Enter the world of later life parenting and daycare, another expense.

In the past, people (especially woman) had to be careful when having sex outside of wedlock. Societal stigmas and the fear of being outcast was very real. Today its not such a big deal, the government will just pay for it.
The pill had nothing to do with manufacturers selling more product to woman who could "work for a few more years"
The pill was introduced in 1960. Only about 25-30% of woman participated in the workforce in 1960 (and how many of them worked part-time?).
Feminism told woman they can be empowered and that they dont have to have kids or that they could put kids off until a later time.
Corporations promoted feminism as it introduced a vast supply of labour into the workforce, creating downward pressure on wages.
(Why do you think woman are being pushed into STEM, IT, Softeng etc Look how expensive labour is for those 3.

Daycare??? It was nanny if you were rich and granny if you were poor. Now granny is an old boomer that has better things (In her mind) that babysitting the rest of her life. Daycare it is for your most important resource but with the same price point as a can of Spaghetti.

The greatest happiness for people in their later years is arguably getting to spend time with grandchildren. I cant ever recall meeting anyone that age with grandchildren who "had better things" to do.

The problem is
1. People are becoming grandparents at an older age nowadays when they have less energy.
2. Life has gotten so expensive that people are working later in life
3. Cost of living is so high that families live further away from each other now.
(Very few young couples and afford to buy a house and have kids in the city)

We don't breed enough replacement stock to take care of us in our old age so we import (Immigration). Then we resent them for getting ahead because they don't do what we do.

There's a thread The USA is ******. No, us too.

We dont breed enough replacement stock because life is so expensive. People are starting careers several years after people a couple of generations ago did. Wages havent kept up with the cost of living. Add a housing adjustment into inflation and see how far behind wages are vs decades ago.
People are spending much more time on their education and coming out with debt into a world where getting a good job is harder, where houses cost 2-4x as a ratio to income with what they once did.

Have you taken a look at immigrants who have been coming here over the past couple of decades? They are not all poor and starting at the bottom like I think you believe. There are tens of thousands of well-off immigrants who are here from China/HK, Africa, etc and they are resented
because they came here ALREADY AHEAD and have contributed to the rising cost of living here.
Case in point from the news the other day of Mr Wei Wei who came here 10 years ago under the investor-immigrant program and was busted running that unlicensed casino in Markham. Apparently he owns 50 properties in Toronto.

Filipinos tend to be the immigrants that "take care of us in our old age" and they really dont get ahead. They tend to be nannies forever but are happy people who dont complain because they can provide for family back home and being poor here is a better life than back home

I dont think boomers really understand how lucky they had things.
They could leave school at 16, get a decent job with no education, buy cheap houses, cottages, raise a family on one income.
Nowadays its leave school at 24 with debt, $1m houses, poor job market, high rents, everyone having side gigs/hustles, competing with investors/foreigners for housing.

"But but but my generation never had an iPhone"

 

[backmarkerducati]

For daycare, we first did infant/toddler care with the City of Toronto. This was a stop gap as it was around the corner from the condo, we knew we were moving and we knew it was uber expensive (basically 1700/month for one kid). But at the same time we could easily afford it.

Once we moved into the house and now had two kids... we switched to a daycare provider that provided care in their homes. It was a company that employed many multiple stay at home moms to provide care in their homes. Very well screened and we interviewed a few before we picked one. If your provider was sick or for whatever reason could not do it one day, the kids went to another provider in the system that was also nearby. We had top notch care and she even took our kids to and from kindergarten (there was no before and after care for under grade 1 then, this was above and beyond the usual agreement). Funny, we were known as the people with the "white nanny" when she dropped the kids at school.... This was way cheaper than any regulated centre, a little more than paying someone directly but you were not stuck if they were not available. It was the best of all worlds for us.

Once before and after in the school was available the kids did that.

We were very lucky or maybe just did our proper due diligence, regardless, it is one of the most stressful things as finding and keeping good care all comes with a large amount of uncertainty IMO.

We even had friends with a live in nanny from the Philippines that thought they were all set, then a family member of her's got sick back home and she left, they were stuck missing work and scrambling for months until they could get it all sorted.


Edit, many people who can live on on income will have the mother (but sometimes the father) quit working and stay at home due to daycare. While there are advantages this adult (specially if they had a career). will feel completely useless once the kids hit early teens and no longer need them like they did. It will be very hard to re-enter the workforce and it will be 15 or so years behind and outdated. Far too often I see them get caught up wasting time and money in MLMs as they a sold the dreams of big income.... also does not play well in the end in getting ahead financially. Short term vs long term.