Three Kids? You Showoffs

Washington Post ^ | Apr. 6, 2008 | Pamela Paul

[Alouette]

My husband and I are getting ready to do what many couples in these brink-of-recessionary times would consider unthinkable. No, we're not buying a Martha's Vineyard retreat or planning a month in St. Bart's or eco-decorating our house.

We're planning to have a third child.

What shocks people, when we tell them, isn't the thought of hauling three kids onto a place for a vacation, or even the idea of coming home every night to a houseful of runny noses and homework assignments. What gets them is the sheer financial audacity. Raising kids today costs a fortune. Last month, the Department of Agriculture estimated that each American child costs an average of $204,060 to house, clothe, educate and entertain until the age of 18.

[ladtx]

Feed ‘em at Taco Bell, and put ‘em one bed — your cost will drop dramatically,

[Bushwacker777]

Muslims always think I’m cool when I tell them I have 8 kids.

[MrB]

3 cubed = 27
3 squared = 9

I commend any CONSERVATIVE family that has a lot of kids - just don’t let the government indoctrination centers ruin them!

[TCats]

Seems a little high. Bet they are taking the ‘Fixed’ costs like the home, utilities, insurance, etc. that would be expended, kids or not, and spreading them out to the ‘Average’ size household (Something like 2 parents and 2.1 kids).

[absolootezer0]

and when are you gonna have one?

[wagglebee]

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[Tax-chick]

Diapers.

[Carpe Cerevisi]

I have 6 kids. I must be nuckin’ futs.

[subterfuge]

Last year, novelist Molly Jong-Fast mused in the New York Observer, "Are people having four or five children just because they can? Because they feel that it shows their wealth and status? In a world where the young rich use their $13,000 Birkin bags as diaper bags, one has to wonder."

Hypenated New York "writers" are so out of touch. It doesn't seem as if they're from the same planet as the rest of us. They "muse", "feel" and "wonder." This article has the stench of elitism all over it.

[Graybeard58]

Actually, a showoff cubed.

Showoff³

[Alouette]

Yeah well, I’m out of the baby business, now. Collecting the dividends (20 grandkids)

[MrB]

The bureaucrats can’t even fathom the idea that a mother would stay home with her children, and that the incremental cost of more children doesn’t add THAT much.

This may be a bit “tinfoil hat” of me, but do you think that the combination of car seat requirements and CAFE standards was supposed to limit population growth?

[Ben Chad]

Pffft - 0-18 is nothing. 18-22 is the killer.

[Malacoda]

I have three — if it weren’t a life-and-death issue, I’d have more the old-fashioned way. As it is, we’ll be adopting more.

[Tax-chick]

Does anybody know the basis of this claim, and whether or not it's BS?

If you phrase it as "People spend ... for each child," then it's statistically more or less accurate. If you consider it as a cost one can't avoid (by living in a reasonably-sized house, for example), then it's BS.

[tiredoflaundry]

18-22 is the killer.

I did not have a gray hair until my oldest reached 18...........now, all I have is brown highlights! ;o)

[Squidpup]

Hey me too!

[KayEyeDoubleDee]

I have 9 kids, that makes me a super showoff.

Do you have any sisters or cousins or friends who are young and single?

[RockinRight]

You’ll be the first to know.

Well, not the first, that would be gay. Maybe the third or fourth to know.

[MrB]

I think they’re up to 16:

http://www.duggarfamily.com

No debt. Homeschooled.