
Research suggests many US parents will lie when saying kids made them happier - wallflower
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/06/many-americans-will-tell-you-having-kids-made-them-happier-theyre-probably-lying/
======
rday
I'd really like to see a study specific to female happiness with children. I
live in the US, and I think men and women's experience with children is
entirely different.

When my wife worked, she missed our kids tremendously. Almost 75% of her take
home went to day care. She was pretty miserable.

Now she stays home. She gets a lot of off-hand comments from other friends
with kids about "how bored they would be if they stayed home". Or from friends
without kids about "how they feel like they are doing something with their
lives".

Now she feels like she isn't doing enough with her life.

Maybe she needs thicker skin, or maybe the societal pressure for women is
immense.

Men working is expected by society. IME, the dads I know who stay home get
more of an "awesome bro!" type response when they say they stay home.

I just feel like no matter what I do, I will feel happy with kids. No matter
what my wife does, she feels like it isn't good enough.

[Edit: so many links to books! I've exhausted my audible credits for the
month. Thanks for the support!]

~~~
sosuke
No data to back up my feeling that most of the pressure stay at home women get
is from other women. My wife stays at home and we buck any negative comment
together to keep those feelings at bay. We show we are proud of it, not
ashamed by it and we aren't willing to let anyone else belittle our choices.

Any negative comment, any off-hand comment needs to be squashed immediately.
Same thing happens with self-esteem issues I think. If the negative comments
don't stop from 'friends' you have to make the sometimes tough choice to find
better friends. I make sure to say with force how much she does, how helpless
I'd be or what a mess I'd be without her help at home.

I think like yourself my mental state is strong enough that I choose lowering
myself to lift her above the haters.

~~~
inanutshellus
It seems there's no "bright" side. There are some stay-at-home moms in my
wife's family and they were... defensive... when my wife went back to work.

So either way, you find a way to be resentful or ashamed.

Go back to work and miss your child's first steps/words/laughs. Go back to
work and someone else raises your children. Someone else uses your child to
teach _their_ child how to be a leader. Someone else (accidentally) gets
called "mom".

Stay at home and barely manage to tread water financially compared to your
dual-income friends. Stay at home and watch your career disappear (unless you
chose one of those "never need to skill up" careers that're considered "safe"
for women, like teaching). Stay at home and prepare for a lifetime of
resentment about men being further ahead than you career-wise. Stay at home
and propagate stereotypes.

I guess though, in the end, there's no doubt that someone that chose their
career will regret it at some point in their lives, where you _might_ be able
to escape without regret having chosen to stay home.

~~~
ams6110
_tread water financially compared to your dual-income friends_

Screw that. Don't judge your life by how others live.

My newest car is 12 years old. I have a wife, kids, and a good job and could
easily have new cars every few years but instead I have no debt other than
mortgage and I put the money into my retirement and college savings. I don't
begrudge the choices of my friends who like to buy a lot of new things but I
also don't feel any obligation to live the way they do.

~~~
linkregister
Clearly you don't live in the Bay Area or you bought in before the house price
jump.

Treading water financially _is_ an accurate way to describe life in the Bay
Area for families with a stay-at-home parent. The modest standard of living
you describe about yourself significantly exceeds what could be expected for
the median software developer in the Bay Area. Families with incomes below
that would not be able to sustain their cash flow without a commute that
exceeds 90 minutes or exposes them to unacceptably high levels of crime.

~~~
dwaltrip
Maybe more people should move out of the bay area? Especially if they have
kids? It's so much cheaper essentially everywhere else. Even with a salary cut
I would imagine it's worth it in many situations.

~~~
linkregister
Yeah, I'm not disagreeing that the economic unit versions of these families
would move to a place with a better salary/cost-of-living ratio. Moving takes
time; the advent of eye-popping living costs in SF is less than 4 years old.
Moving a family is a big deal. There is data that suggests that moving
children in their teens more than doubles their risk of mental illness and
criminal behavior. Certainly the U.S. has the lowest barriers to relocation,
but it's not a trivial undertaking.

------
djrogers
I found several problems with the article, and the conclusions of the study.
Basic science says correlation != causation, but the study clearly set out
with a specific bias in mind.

Case in point, this quote:

 __“We know that these problems have been endemic for decades now, and we’ve
watched the maternal employment rate in the U.S. steadily erode relative to
other countries.” __

A higher maternal employment rate is now a yardstick for societal health? If
that 's not evidence of a clear bias on the part of the researchers I don't
know what is. The personal fulfillment and societal value of working moms vs
stay-at-home moms is a matter that can be debated, but to display such clear
bias toward the latter as the 'correct' option makes one question all of the
study's conclusions.

------
balls187
Basic armchair psychology will tell you, nothing can make you happy. Your
happiness is your own responsibility.

Not all parents may understand that having children may mean drastic changes
to lifestyle, and may not have been prepared for the ~27 years of stress that
having children bring on.

Oddly enough, having kids gives me a purpose in Society, that otherwise being
a 36 year old man would not have. Too old to join the military, too young for
end-of-life services, too set in my buying habits for marketing to care at all
about me.

As the wise Stringer Bell once said, you're like a 40 degree day.

But being a dad, society is all about that: my lack of physique is called
"dadbod" and women can profess to fetishize about it, my asanine advice to my
kids are subject of a comedy twitter account, my no-more-give a dame attitude
for fashion sense is celebrated, and I even have a national holiday to
celebrate being a Dad--which gives me a legit excuse to do what I want to do
(which for most dads involves cooking food on a grill for their families)

~~~
infinite8s
27 years? One would hope by 18 years of age one's child (in the descendant
sense) would be fairly independent.

~~~
Ma8ee
But then it gets worse! They'll continue to do things that you consider
stupid, but you can't control them any more.

------
616c
My personal situation is complicated, but I think children make specific kinds
of people happy.

I have a child, and I really enjoy learning. And we here at HN love the
Feynman style "you want to learn, then be able to teach" paradigm.

I want to say I am often inspired by far smarter parents than me here, as my
son is still less than 5. But I doubt I can catch up to teach him robotics.
One man here once quipped he and his son were bonding over the shared
development of typed programming language.

When my son reacts to input and adapts, he is the ultimate compiler, and I am
part of one scraggly development team. When you look at parenting this way, I
find it to be that cheesy "most rewarding achievement of your life" commentary
far less trite and I feel it internally and beam with pride.

I would love to hear counter-arguments, but HN has show me anecdotes where I
feel I am reading, coincidentally, the parenting tips of future world leaders
and specifically movers and shakers in the CS world by virtue of how they
inspire their kids.

------
JoeAltmaier
Anything worthwhile is hard. Was I happy day 6 on a weeklong hike on an island
in the rain and mosquitoes? It didn't seem like it at the time. Yet I'm going
again. Its a silly question really.

~~~
zzalpha
_Anything worthwhile is hard._

Not to be too harsh, but this is Calvinist BS.

Listening to great music isn't hard. Watching a great film isn't hard. Simply
spending time with loved ones isn't hard.

All are, in my view, worthwhile.

Yes, there is a satisfaction in accomplishing something difficult. But that
neither makes it inherently worthwhile, nor does it mean all worthwhile things
are hard.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
There is no personal accomplishment to hedonistic pleasure. I would call them
pleasant, even broadening which I guess is worthwhile, once in a while. So
maybe I should say it with many more words and more detail, so non-Calvinists
can get it: many very hard, very demanding things are worth doing even though
not constantly pleasurable.

------
stcredzero
I think our first world society accidentally got arranged "bass-ackwards."
We've inherited patterns of academia that were developed in a time before
mechanized industry and telecommunications -- when mass communication
technology consisted of auditoriums and only wealthy young men were expected
and could afford to attend.

Why not invent another life-stage past childhood for young adults, during
which they are expected to learn, find mates, _and raise young children?_
Really, we're most of the way there with college, but with the weird and
biologically contrary expectation that the students avoid having children. Our
biology and our psychology seems to encourage human beings to have children at
a younger age than our society would have it. Also, the removal of children
seems to reduce sexuality to only its hedonistic dimension, which I think is a
bit out of balance. (Nothing wrong with hedonism, but that aspect exists in a
larger context of life.)

Why not restructure colleges and vocational schools in this way?

------
louprado
"While it's _honestly the best thing, having kids_ , if you take away one
thing from this lecture, remember this: There are a lot of things that are
easier to do before you have kids than after, many of which will make you a
better parent when you do have kids." PG, [1]

Even a disaggregation of the OP data is unlikely to assist in the decision of
wether or not to have children. Instead, hearing a personal experience from
someone with whom you are reasonably familiar is more relevant. This also
assumes you know yourself fully so you can perform a comparative analysis.

That said, I find the above PG quote personally useful. I decided to delay
children until I am over 40 (PG was 46 when he had his first child), able to
make my own schedule, have financial security so one parent has the option to
stay home, and made a solid attempt of most of my major goals.

Those requirements do create a risk of becoming too old for children. But for
those of us who have time, why not take sincere advice from someone well known
that made it work.

And if you never have children, just forget the PG quote and take comfort in
the OP conclusion instead.

[1]
[http://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec03/](http://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec03/)
Edits: grammar, clarity

------
greyman
As a father, I still cant believe how someone might be happier without
children, or kids have not made him happier... it is a most fulfilling thing
to have a relationship with ones own kid. I also do not personally know anyone
who said kids didnt make him happier. I am from Europe, not USA, but it is
unlikely people are that different there.

~~~
Dirlewanger
It _may_ make you happier, but at what cost? Having children is a monumentally
massive physical, emotional, financial, and psychological investment. What if
there's a problem in the womb and they're born with a physical defect? What if
there's a problem at birth and my spouse is now physically scarred for life?
What if I get divorced and my wife now legally fucks me out of everything I
own, and grooms the children to despise me (something that has become so
common in family court that there's a term for it: parental alienation
syndrome)? What if a couple years down the road they turn out to be highly
autistic? What if they get hit by a bus in their 16th year? What if they turn
into a drug addict when they're 19 and never speak to me again?

The "what ifs" can go on forever. At some point one has to rationalize whether
or not all of this is worth it, to invest so much of oneself into another
human being without first considering themselves.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
That's called 'FUD' and it drives lots of decisions. What if ... all of those
are small possibilities even added up?

Instead let me ask, What if you, as a thoughtful and responsible person _do
not_ raise another thoughtful and responsible individual? And instead leave it
to the thoughtless and irresponsible. We have to live with that too.

~~~
Dirlewanger
The outcome without kids is 100% up to me though. With kids, one can still
raise them to the best of their abilities and still turn out awful for one
reason or another.

The second part to that is a different question entirely, and one that goes
beyond just one's own happiness.

------
a2tech
My friends with children after they've had a few drinks have all told my wife
and I to not have children.

I know this is a small selection of college educated people with comfortable
lifestyles, but when every single person I know discloses to me when they're
in a truthful state that we're better off not having kids..it makes you think.

~~~
phkahler
>> My friends with children after they've had a few drinks have all told my
wife and I to not have children.

Because getting out to have drinks with friends becomes so rare. In that
moment, you are fulfilling one of their social needs that has been so
neglected it seems like the only thing that matters. What they're really
saying is that by not having children you'll be able to continue as you are
right then. Take it as a thank you from them for having that drink.

~~~
Dirlewanger
>What they're really saying is that by not having children...

Maybe they're actually saying _not to have children_. I don't understand all
the projection.

~~~
phkahler
>> Maybe they're actually saying not to have children. I don't understand all
the projection.

Thanks, I like your response. I thought I was just offering an alternative
interpretation for why they said it, but maybe I need to get out more with
friends ;-) OTOH I do not regret having children, nor do I advocate that
people avoid having them.

Note to self, consider weather speculation is actually projection.

------
spaceisballer
I think a big part of it is that a lot of people think that having kids is
expected of them. I applaud the people who know what they want and follow
through no matter what expectations are put on them. Be it with not getting
married or not having kids (or vice versa). I wanted kids and so did my wife,
our views were the same and we ended up having two kids. It has brought
immense happiness to me (and sleep deprivation). I wish I could see them more
but I value the time I have with them when I'm home from work. I would never
tell anyone they have to have kids or get married. I can share my experiences
but how the hell am I supposed to know what makes you happy, you need to find
that out and stick to it.

------
eevilspock
The article seems to cite public policy as the source of the difference. I
don't think public policies are the root cause, but rather the underlying
values of the culture that gave rise to them (as the article later seems to
suggest). I'll bet that the U.S. end of that chart tends to be characterized
by cultures that put individualism above all else, while the other end much
less so.

Individualism is good; I'd never want the other extreme. I think Asian
cultures subvert the individual to the group far too much. But the extreme
individualism of the U.S. has led to an ever more selfish, narcissistic and
cold society, where material gain and personal comfort trumps everything.

~~~
wmt
The Nordics, where having kids also increases your happiness, are also very
high on individualism as opposed to collectivism. The key difference to the US
are the public policies that allow families never to stress about things like
arranging daycare to the kids from the day they born.

These policies are not there to combat individualism, but to enable it with
taxpaid support networks. Most of them are not poor aids, but state benefits
that everyone enjoys, like the free or cheap high quality daycare used by the
poor and rich alike.

~~~
JackFr
Maybe it's the difference between individualism and narcissism.

------
petewailes
Hypothesis: people mostly say having kids makes them happy, because they know
that's the right answer and they've never actually stopped to evaluate that
statement since the child was 2 days old and the joy hadn't worn off.

Like most things, I suspect it's an opinion that's formed and then never
reflected on unless something major comes along to force a correction of it.

As an aside to this, there's a lot that society and governance can do to make
life easier for parents both in the short and long term. Places that do that
make the statement more likely to be true, as the article suggests.

~~~
theseatoms
> As an aside to this, there's a lot that society and governance can do to
> make life easier for parents both in the short and long term.

And further subsidize child-bearing? Property taxes already directly fund
public schools in most localities in the US.

~~~
whatshisface
Children are an absolutely massive financial net-negative for all quality-of-
life levels above the poverty line, and a few below. They will contribute to
society far above their cost, but never pay back their parents. Maybe we
should subsidize childcare _more_? Surely, that would better align parent's
benefit with civilization's.

~~~
greyman
> Children are an absolutely massive financial net-negative for all quality-
> of-life levels above the poverty line

Not in my experience. My kid cost me money, but quality of life increased a
lot since everything is now much more enjoyable. Also, kids do not pay back
their parents with money, but they pay back much more with their love, and
making life much more enjoyable for the parents.

------
chaostheory
I don't feel that anyone disputes that children make parents happier
(cuteness, inadvertent humor, fulfillment ...) but the responsibilities
associated with them (sleep deprivation, education and care related costs,
...) stress everyone out which everyone acknowledges as well

~~~
rconti
It's probably because happiness is a difficult thing to pin down. I could see
them as decreasing happiness, but increasing fulfillment. But then, since
fulfillment is a big component of happiness, perhaps I'm just defining
happiness wrong.

------
jonheller
Jeff Atwood's "On Parenthood" is by far the best and most honest piece I've
ever read on what being a parent is like.

[https://blog.codinghorror.com/on-
parenthood/](https://blog.codinghorror.com/on-parenthood/)

~~~
5ilv3r
Thanks for the link. That was some really interesting stuff. The "getting the
first four years of your life back" bit was pretty spot on.

------
wapapaloobop
Children don't make you happier but they do make you develop as a person. I
enjoy the company of my children and it saddens me how keen most parents are
to offload theirs onto minimum-wage carers (ironically at great expense).

------
xenadu02
There is definitely a pressure to lie and say everything about kids is great
all of the time; that is clearly not the case.

I would say that "small" happiness is less due to the huge amount of work and
stress. On the flip side "large" happiness (or fulfillment) is higher. Whether
that makes sense is a very personal decision.

I'm also very early in the journey. I have no idea how it will turn out in 15
years. I am happy that I'll have someone to hand things down to. I'm also
happy some of my genes will survive even if all other evidence I existed
disappears.

~~~
collyw
I would be surprised if anyones genes survive a few more generations the way
we seem to be messing up the planet.

------
WWKong
I'm curious to see how they surveyed for "happiness". As a parent the initial
years are rough just providing care. In the thick of it if someone comes and
asks, "are you happy?", the answer is irrelevant (I understand that the
question won't be as direct, but the outcome will be similar). IMHO the best
question is, "if you could go back in time would you still decide to have
children?".

~~~
ashark
> IMHO the best question is, "if you could go back in time would you still
> decide to have children?".

No way you'd get a straight answer to that since it's way, way too close to
"do you wish your kids were dead?" It'd probably be tough to come up with any
question that probes that sentiment that wouldn't be strongly affected by that
problem.

My answer would be "go back in time and decide to have _these_ children? 100%
yes, no reservations. Go back in time but no guarantee (or even likelihood)
that the kids will be the same? Probably would not want kids." Maybe shifting
the question to focus in the direction of that second part would help, though
I doubt it'd be enough to make it useful.

~~~
WWKong
Yes. It should be more inline with , "Go back in time but no guarantee that
the kids will be the same". Though it will be better than, "are you happy?",
it might still not provide a good result because many would have convinced
themselves that they need to have kids because "that is how it works".

------
ajmurmann
I think the stress and financial cost that having children in the US creates
are much larger than in other western countries. I currently don't have
children and would not think of moving back to my home country Germany.
However, if I had children I would be back in Germany in no time. The entire
education system is on average more reliably good and much cheaper.

~~~
kgwgk
I don't know if the situation is worse in the US, but people is clearly more
averse to having children in Germany:

[http://www.oecd-
ilibrary.org/sites/soc_glance-2014-en/03/02/...](http://www.oecd-
ilibrary.org/sites/soc_glance-2014-en/03/02/g3-03.html?contentType=&itemId=%2Fcontent%2Fchapter%2Fsoc_glance-2014-8-en&mimeType=text%2Fhtml&containerItemId=%2Fcontent%2Fserial%2F19991290&accessItemIds=&_csp_=98f35a84cd0975abae8ceba800c9d78d)

~~~
ajmurmann
Birth rates are definitely some of the lowest on the world in Germany.
However, I think that has more to do with how important having family is seen.
I also believe that the country being much less religious has to do with it as
well.

------
tezzer
My daughters make me very happy, and I'm a better person because I'm trying to
make sure they're smart, well adjusted and have good lives.

The point of the article is the U.S. has a weak social net to help parents
compared to Europe. I feel that. In the short term I'm broke and worried all
the time (because day care and housing in Silicon Valley will kill you). In
the long term it'll all be fine, and maybe I'm mostly chafing against having
to budget (both money and time) for the first time in my life.

------
Dirlewanger
Not a surprise. Ann Landers asked back in the 70s: If you could do it all over
again, would you have kids again? Something like 3/4 said no.

~~~
markc
I've often wondered if this response really means "I regret having children,
it was a mistake" OR "I've now experienced the path of having children. Even
though it was good, I'd like to experience that other path".

They should have asked people without kids "If you could do it all over again,
would you have kids this time"?

------
jpm_sd
My wife is incredibly fortunate to work for a federal agency that allows
flexible part time schedules (20-30 hr/wk) on projects that she finds
interesting. We have three children (3, 4 and 6 yr old) and while we are
spending her entire income on child care, it's a good investment in her future
employment (and sanity).

I wish part time work were a good option for more people.

------
Kristine1975
_> The researchers caution that their findings don't mean that American
parents are less happy than other parents around the world, as some media
outlets have reported_

Like for example the headline of this very article. I guess it was not written
by the author.

------
jstewartmobile
They could have just posted the bar chart and called it a day.

Why is it that when there is so little money out there for real research,
there always seems to be plenty floating around for BS like this?

~~~
Dirlewanger
Maybe because the article has more to say about the issue than just the bar
chart?

Is this your first time reading a news publication or something?

~~~
jstewartmobile
Aside from the cost of raising a child, the bulk of the data in that article
was in the chart. Everything else was idle speculation over an arbitrary
measurement of "happiness".

If they just kept giving Minsky the money like they should have, we could have
strong AIs Terminatoring us right now, and we could just get it all over with.

------
Overtonwindow
I do think people have children for the wrong reasons, most of them selfish.
Honestly I want kids so I have someone to play legos with, or whatever they
want to do.

~~~
buckbova
What is a reason to have children that is not selfish unless your doing it to
please your SO solely?

Of course there's adoption.

~~~
beachstartup
you forgot the big one -- to please the would-be grandparents.

~~~
buckbova
Ha! Having children to get your mother(-in-law) off your back? At which point
these grandparents now criticize the way you raise your kids at the same time
spoiling them. Worth it? Maybe because, let me guess, the grandparents are
willing to babysit or provide daycare so you can work.

The reason I'd have kids is for that connection only a father can have to his
child and the joy a large extended family can bring as my children eventually
have children and so on which is completely selfish. But I'd say there's
nothing wrong with it in my eyes.

------
campground
"Happiness is for idiots" -DeGaulle (maybe)

