I’m seeing a pattern. I could be wrong, but it feels like some people treat millennials who don’t have kids as if it’s something to be ashamed of.
I get the logic: get your finances in order before taking on childcare, limiting travel, and adding long-term expenses. Clearing debt first sounds sensible.
Is the desire for early retirement pushing millennial couples to skip kids? If you buy the headlines, you might think so — like the idea that child-rearing should be left to debt-accepting neighbors.
That often-cited $500k to raise two kids figure sounds huge. And yes, having kids would pause any plans to laze on a Bali beach for at least 18 years.
Then there are the realities of actually having kids — messy, chaotic, and still full of smiles.
Mr. Money Mustache is the icon of the early-retirement world: a flannel-wearing bike lover I respect. One of his most controversial posts suggested that having just one kid might be enough.
For parents of multiples, deciding on one kid feels impossible. We kept both our twins, for the record.
On a serious note, the world does have population and consumption problems. Our waste and consumer habits hurt the environment — that Pacific plastic patch is massive. So I see why people raise the issue beyond personal finance. Widespread family-size limits might conserve resources and reduce some conflicts, though that’s a complicated and fraught idea.
Kids can also strain a marriage. Mrs. Cubert and I tried hard to keep our relationship center-stage before the twins arrived, but the last five years have been something like 90% kids, 10% us.
Date nights help, but you have to commit to each other through the hard stretches. Two little kids bring a lot of “hard.”
To his credit, despite the headline, Mr. Money Mustache reminds readers that having or not having kids is a personal choice. It’s between partners, and nobody should force the other into more children than they want.
Nothing about parenting is easy. Small tasks become big chores with kids aged 0–6.
How do you open a screen door while holding a baby carrier? The stoop feels too small for twins. Who planned this house?
When they’re toddlers, they whine about pushing the thumb latch themselves, so you finally let them in — after they start hitting random keys on the keypad lock.
Once inside, sand, mud, water, and something slimy gets smeared across the kitchen, dining room, and living room faster than you can set down keys, purse, coats, groceries, and a giant watermelon.
Take a breath. That kind of stuff happens every day.
But did I say kids aren’t all bad? It’s true. Past the scary parts — especially for the expectant mother dealing with major emotional and physical changes — there’s real joy. Raising kids gives you immediate purpose and meaningful struggle.
You’ll be tired and pushed to your limits, but you’ll also meet surprises that make you laugh and swell with pride.
Their drawings improve: scribbles turn into stick figures with eyes, nose, mouth — and, if your son is being mischievous, an added crude penis.
For me, one of the biggest surprises was getting to be a kid again. I admit unabashedly how much fun it was to dig out my old LEGO for the twins. The internet even helped me find lost instructions for those ancient space sets — now to find the missing pieces…
We have a regular at-home movie night with popcorn and smoothies, and I’m rediscovering classic Pixar films. I’m counting the days until they’re six so I can show them Star Wars. They’d better love it.
Reality check: kids do cost money. That viral “$233K per kid” figure gets debunked easily, but most expenses are front-loaded.
Childcare is expensive when both parents work. We didn’t get into real estate investing to swim in cash — the money went straight to a nanny for four and a half years.
I know we were lucky to have options others don’t. I should’ve said that upfront in some of my earlier posts where I sounded preachy and smug.
Earning six figures while living minimally is a privilege. We chose less stuff now to buy more freedom later. If you want to retire early with kids, that trade-off is often necessary — unless you’re a highly paid doctor who can pull off FatFIRE with fewer sacrifices.
The millennial generation includes lots of thoughtful, capable parents. Many of them grew up during scary financial times, so delaying kids is understandable — especially after houses foreclosed or stayed underwater after 2008.
This isn’t new. The Great Depression shaped the generation before ours, and people still talk about it. Don’t be surprised if future millennials grumble about their own tough times.
Research and journalism suggest millennials are mostly just waiting longer to marry and have kids. I remember the same buzz about my Gen X peers delaying family life; millennials are simply pushing it a bit farther, often into their early to mid-30s. That seems fair.
Articles sounding alarms about millennials not having kids often overstate things. Yes, it raises questions for some markets — like whether Boomers can sell big suburban homes — but many millennials prefer different lifestyles like tiny homes or mobile living. That’s a choice, not a crisis.
My take: millennials who aim for early retirement aren’t less likely to want kids than others. They tend to follow the broader trend of having children later.
Mrs. Cubert and I didn’t start our family until our early 30s and 40s — we’re latecomers, really — but we made that choice.
My obvious advice: don’t let the pursuit of early retirement stop you from having kids if that’s what you want. If you can have children, know they’ll bring both struggle and joy.
Balance shifts a lot after two kids, depending on your situation.
Darrow Kirkpatrick of Can I Retire Yet? put it well: even though he retired early and enjoys FI, the years he worked and raised his son were among the happiest of his life — full of purpose, adventure, and joy that’s hard to find later. He has no regrets about raising a child, even if it meant working longer.
We hadn’t even heard of early retirement when our twins were born in 2013. Even if we worked until 65, I think raising kids brings enough purpose and joy to make it worthwhile.
If you choose not to have kids, that’s a perfectly valid decision. No one should guilt anyone into or out of parenthood. Expecting people to produce grandkids is an old-fashioned idea.
I’ll admit I sometimes miss the freedom to travel or relax without kids. It’s hard work and the stress is real.
Research suggests that having children or not doesn’t change overall life satisfaction in the long run — it comes down to personal priorities.
Still, I hope the many bright, thoughtful millennials planning early retirement consider having kids. We could use more good people out there.
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