Families say cost of housing means they'll have fewer or no children

https://www.npr.org/2025/10/31/nx-s1-5551108/housing-costs-birth-rate

by toomuchtodo • 9 months ago

31 45 9 months ago

Families in the U.S. and around the world are having fewer children as people make profoundly different decisions about their lives. NPR's series "Population Shift: How Smaller Families Are Changing the World" explores the causes and implications of this trend.

https://www.npr.org/series/g-s1-94348/population-shift

angmarsbane• 9 months ago

My peer set is opting to have babies in apartments even though we all grew up in single family homes because the homes we grew up in are out of sync with our wages and/or too far of a commute. We're running out of time to have kids, so it's now in apartments or never.

My parents home was a 45 min commute to the city when they bought it in '93, now it's 90+ min. Their home is worth $1.2M, which both of us being tech workers we could afford but if one of us lost our jobs the other can't float us for very long. A home, with that commute, is not worth the precariousness. All that money, all that time away from your kid (plus complicated logistics getting to / from day care that closes before our work day ends) it's not worth it.

So, babies in apartments. We actually love it. Everything is walkable, there are parks, playgrounds, pools, elevators for strollers, we walk to the market, the pediatrician, the library, daycare etc. BUT there are NO 3 BEDROOM APARTMENTS. They do not exist, whether for small families, young people starting out and splitting rent, couples with remote jobs who want separate offices. 3 BEDROOM APARTMENTS DO NOT EXIST so, there will be fewer children.

amluto• 9 months ago

They do exist (in California even in expensive tech cities), but there are far too few of them.

1659447091• 9 months ago

BUT there are NO 3 BEDROOM APARTMENTS. They do not exist [...] 3 BEDROOM APARTMENTS DO NOT EXIST

I am not sure if you somehow mean something different, but 3 bedroom apartments absolutely do exist. I know for a fact that they exist in California, Texas and Florida. I don't have direct experience with them in other states however.

bdangubic• 9 months ago

I own a three bedroom apartment in DC, they are very rare. it is a rental and when it is listed usually I get 50+ applications within few days

estimator72924• 9 months ago

My local part of Cincinnati just put up three or four buildings including 3BR

boredatoms• 9 months ago

Also, where are the 4 bed apartments!!

betaby2• 9 months ago

There are not many them in Montreal, and they are disproportionately more expensive. Even 3 bedroom apartments are rare.

RiverCrochet• 9 months ago

Where I live there are numerous apartment complexes, but the only thing that's in walkable distance are fast food places and cigarette stores.

alephnerd• 9 months ago

3 BEDROOM APARTMENTS DO NOT EXIST so, there will be fewer children

Idk where you are, but I grew up in a 3 bedroom apartment as a kid in the Bay Area in the 1990s and 2000s - we couldn't afford a house until I entered HS (nor did my parents want to take the risk until they had a GC, which itself took 12 years).

I also had friends who grew up in 4 person households with 2 bedrooms (also fairly common).

There were a lot of apartment complexes filled with us 1.5 gen immigrants, as our parents came from India, China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Israel, and Russia on H1Bs, L1s, and EB1s.

Growing up in an apartment was a fairly common story for a large segment of us Californians of 1st and 1.5 gen immigrant descent.

Gibbon1• 9 months ago

I discussed that with a friend who does real estate project management. She previously worked for organizations doing low income housing projects.

I asked her why developers don't build 3-5 bedroom flats anymore. And got a bunch of answers. I said so this is basic failure of the free market to provide what society needs? And she said yes absolutely.

yesfitz• 9 months ago

The lack of large apartments in the US is at least partially caused by building codes requiring two means of fire egress (meaning two separate stairwells in taller buildings) which limits the size and layout of individual apartments.

Here’s a video on the subject: https://youtube.com/watch?v=iRdwXQb7CfM

Long story short though, modern fire mitigation techniques (materials, sprinklers, fire doors) greatly reduce the risk posed by having just one staircase, which would open up a wide array of apartment layouts.

anon2913• 9 months ago

Honestly dumb. You don't need more house for more kids. The average home today is larger than anything our grandparents had.

I mean, do whatever you want just stop blaming everything else for it. You don't want kids. Don't have them.

betaby2• 9 months ago

The average home today is larger than anything our grandparents had

Gen Z is living in smaller apartments than their grandparents were living.

estimator72924• 9 months ago

My grandparents had a 6BR 4bath triplex. Even with tech salary, i'll never be able to afford that in my life

ares6232• 9 months ago

Not wanting kids in the current moment could be due to decades of seeing how everything is and realizing that kids are not realistic.

If you think about it, it is impressive how we’ve managed to practically drown out nature’s sole driving force of life itself. That’s how beaten younger folks feel.

anon2913• 9 months ago

It's totally fine to not want kids. I'm a 'younger folk' having kids right now. It's a choice. If you want kids have them. If you don't, don't. The data are pretty clear that no amount of material wealth makes people who don't want kids suddenly have kids.

In America, most of the people without kids don't want them and blame external factors instead of being honest.

Saline95158• 9 months ago

In every rich country, real estate prices have grown much faster than wages. Besides, metropolization means that you can't live easily in the countryside, where it's cheaper, anymore.

anon2913• 9 months ago

True in aggregate, not true at all rurally.

burnt-resistor• 9 months ago

Costs generally and insufficient wages are the real causes because Reagan murdered the middle class by decreasing corporate taxes.

arcbyte• 9 months ago

Corporate taxes shouldn't exist. Tax people.

dragonwriter• 9 months ago

Corporations are separate persons, legally, so corporate taxes clearly should exist, as long as corporations do.

seanmcdirmid• 9 months ago

If it really was just Reagan the rest of the developed and almost developed world wouldn’t be having the same or even worse problems.

bdcravens• 9 months ago

Recent right-wing ideology in the US would fight back against this. JD Vance made a comment a few years ago saying that votes should tied to the number of children one has. Elon Musk has several posts on X decrying birth rates in the US, sounding alarms about the need to counter. Perhaps these are little more than bad ideas that will fade away, but that's less certain in today's policy climate.

add-sub-mul-div• 9 months ago

They can pass executive orders but they're not disciplined enough or sophisticated enough to do much with actual legislation. They couldn't even repeal the ACA when they had control of all three branches. Vance can tweet whatever dumb shit comes into his head but I wouldn't give it any chance of revamping how our voting works.

redwall_hp• 9 months ago

Now where have I heard that before...?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebensborn

Saline95158• 9 months ago

Natalism isn't a nazi ideology, every State has dealt with it as some point of its existence. Romans passed many natalist laws and heavily discussed it, for instance.

joemazerino• 9 months ago

Probably elsewhere, too, but that doesn't lead to calling the current administration Nazis.

Saline95158• 9 months ago

Giving more votes to the family to align with the amount of children they have isn't far-right. It's a reasonable policy to correct a problem in democracies, where young citizens have no representation and are as a result often the fifth wheel of the cart.

Currently western democracies are dominated by 50+ years old, who tend to vote more conservative policies, which benefit them.

Why would we spend very large amounts of the GDP to support old people through health and retirement programs, but refuse to fund quality daycare, schools and child-oriented infrastructure (playgrounds, sports clubs and so on). Especially given that a healthy and educated youth will create tomorrow's prosperity for the country. Unlike the old who have already lived their lives.

If you think that I'm exagerating, I'd suggest listening to what happens in city councils, in retired-dominated cities: they often refuse improvements for families to fund their own programs. It's not a myth, I saw it with my own eyes, and it's very rational.

estimator72924• 9 months ago

So if you don't have kids, you only count as three-fifths of a person

raincom• 9 months ago

The developed world should solve the cost of living crisis, as the job market deteriorates forever. Demanding more wages forces companies to become efficient or offshore.

jinjin2• 9 months ago

It seems like a problem that will self-correct. If too expensive housing is keeping couples from having children, then population will decline, which will free up a lot of housing stock making prices drop, and then people can afford having children again. Maybe it is just cyclical?

ares6232• 9 months ago

You underestimate the landed gentry’s determination.

Even now landlords will prefer to keep a building empty rather than lower the rent.

arresin• 9 months ago

Immigration

rufus_foreman• 9 months ago

It's being taken care of.

estimator72924• 9 months ago

Population demographics is not zero-sum. Very soon the fraction of people who are too old to work will be larger than the fraction who can. We'll lose a shit ton of able, working bodies all across the board. This will tank the econony and quality of life for everyone.

This is the exact problem Japan is facing. You should go read up on how well that's "self-correcting" (it isn't)

scoofy• 9 months ago

The housing crisis is going to make this nation so poor. It’s just depressing. It’s just open rent seeking, pure and simple.

Families say cost of housing means they'll have fewer or no children

Related Stories