[speakfreely]

> people who are poorer and have gone through extreme hardship prioritize family and having children far more regardless of their financial status

Yep, nailed it. It's an expectations/reality gap for the developed world. Any of these people can physically have children, raise them in their financially hobbled state, and still provide more comfort on average than the majority of the families in the developing world. The difference is that in the developed world people are delaying or canceling their plans because their expectations of what parenthood should look like is radically different from what they believe they can afford.

Maybe you won't be able to send your kids to private school, or pay for their full ride to private university, or the best daycare, or live in the perfect house you grew up thinking you deserved. But you can afford to have a family. You just can't afford to do it with all of your requirements.

[Apocryphon]

> You just can't afford to do it with all of your requirements.

Yes, and as I mention upthread, to drop those requirements is essentially telling middle class youth that they have to accept a regression in living standards compared to their parents', which runs counter to the messaging they were raised on. Not only parental/cultural expectations but the developed world middle class suburban ethos of "work hard and you'll live a good life", the whole post-Cold War End of History that humanity was supposedly marching towards.

[d4mi3n]

This is part of it. I think the rise in fertility options plays a part here as well—many people are choosing to start families later in life than was realistic or possible 20 years prior. This has been a well observed trend that has been going strong since the 1980s.

If you're female and want to pursue a career, you can now do that and wait until later in life to have a family. Wasn't long ago where that choice was binary.