A generous welfare state (like the Nordics or Switzerland) does not necessarily mean that the middle class is well off with lots of resources for kids. Usually it's the middle class (+upper class) that pays for the generous welfare state, but gets almost none of the benefits. You don't get/need the welfare, if you earn enough to be considered middle class.
Expensive to have kids is a symptom, not a cause of the issue.
Fewer kids == more investment per kid == more competition for high quality everything == more costs.
Also, more workers in the labor force (aka fewer SAHM’s, etc) == more competition for labor == lower cost for labor (vs historic trends) == can buy less with an hours labor.
The ratio of pay for an hours work to a daycare hour is at historic highs, and there is a reason for that.
If you look at women’s participation in the workforce and overlay it with ratios of worker pay vs buying power, it’s a pretty obvious correlation. There is a reason that labor has been losing ground since the 70’s, and it’s largely because birth control means that women can put off having kids (while still meeting needs like having sex and being in relationships) in order to work and make money and be independent.
The issue here is - whatcha going to do about it?
Most women I know eventually want kids, but then they get screwed by all the younger women who don’t yet want kids making the market, ahem, not very amenable.
And they’re caught in the rat race, which is its own kind of miserable, especially when everyone is competing for the same slots, instead of the roughly half that was the historic norm.
There really is no free lunch though - plenty of horror stories from before too.
My former friend in Finland finished med school, "for free", while living in a really nice apartment "for free", receiving ADHD medications "for free", and then went to a business school "for free". He has not worked a single day in his life and he is in his very late 20s.
I got downvoted, and you replied this... when tuition is not free in most European countries, at least not for higher education. In my country, med school used to cost over $18k, which is probably higher now.
Also the very hidden caveat of low or no tuition fee in some other countries is that you study in their language, not English.
