[pwagland]

This has always been true. We have talked about the costs of raising children forever.

What is different now, is twofold: 1. Bigger financial impact of having a child, both through less government support, and because more women are working. This combined means that to have a child, often, one of the parents needs to stop working, which severely impacts SoL. 2. Less social impact of not having a child. It is far more common to not have children than it used to be, and so it becomes much more of a choice as to whether to make that SoL sacrifice or not.

[schnitzelstoat]

I think it also becomes a sort of social contagion - in that you are much less likely to have a kid if you don't know anyone that recently had a kid, it feels like a much bigger leap into the unknown.