Given that for once in history, we’re the ones holding power, I think our demands are actually extremely reasonable
October 31, 2024 5:02 pm(Updated 5:03 pm)
The Chinese Communist Party is basically begging women to have babies. Within two decades it’s gone from a one child policy which functionally forbade people from having more than one baby, to ringing them up when their first turns two and compelling them to consider having another child.
They’re not the only ones getting desperate either. Japan rolled out a slew of policies in 2023 to try and convince couples to marry and reproduce. Taiwan has spent more than $3 billion trying to get people to breed. Italy and Greece have trialled baby bonuses. In 2019 Hungary introduced interest-free loans of around £23,000 for newlyweds; if they have two children, a third of the loan is forgiven, and if they have three or more, the whole thing is forgiven.
If you’re wondering why this is happening, I can tell you in absolutely no uncertain terms. The birth rate is falling because women have gone on strike. And given the working conditions and pay, can you really blame them?
Technically in this strike I’m a bit of a scab. Despite being morally entirely on board with motherhood refusal, I do actually have a two-year-old and I’m quite tempted, now the memories of childbirth and breastfeeding are dimmed by time, to have another. So, given that I’ve already crossed the picket line, I thought I’d offer to come to the table and help with negotiations. If the world needs more babies, what do we want in return?
Well obviously, there’s the big ones: better funding for childcare; better maternity provisions to reduce levels of birth trauma; affordable, accessible housing so that we have somewhere to put any kids we kindly provide for the world. But we all know that when it comes to strike negotiation, it’s not just about the big hitters. Soft power solutions are also enormously important. So I’ve come up with some goodwill gestures which might get women back on board with having kids.
Firstly, compensation. There’s very little you can’t fix with some freebies. I bumped into a pregnant friend recently, wandering around Westfield looking like a rosy picture of health, resplendent with bump and lots of shopping bags of tiny little babygros. Everyone should get the chance to do that. Do I think the Chancellor’s Budget can spare a couple of hundred quid per child-bearing-age woman for a morale-boosting pre-birth shopping day? No. Would I be dramatically more willing to provide another child if I could spend at least one afternoon in West London’s boujiest shops picking out teeny little rompers and then having a nice lunch? Yes.
Once the babies are born, I’d like a babysitter stipend. We know that couples are more likely to stay married if they spend quality time together, and staying married means more babies. So, we need a monthly budget so we can gaze at each other over a candle and then share a crème brûlée, please.
Next, improved working conditions. My union would like to discuss the state acquiring and improving some soft play centres. Soft play is, in theory, the best thing you can give a person who has children: huge spaces devoted to children, permitting them to jump and run as much as they like, while making lots of noise, without upsetting anyone (providing over-threes stay out of the baby area). Unfortunately the UK’s current provision of privatised soft plays has fallen into a dire state, which means paying about 10 quid per kid to enter a poorly maintained, often risibly small, space filled with all of nature’s most pernicious bacteria.
I would suggest that a well received goodwill gesture would be to make sure that every UK town had a soft play with capacity for hundreds of children, which is soaked in Milton solution every night, so we can send our kids into a ball pit without fear of E.coli. Also, while we’re at the negotiation table, they all need a decent coffee provider. Free flat whites, at least four different plant milk options.
Our demands aren’t all about money though. I’d also like to discuss the standards and expectations currently placed on anyone who does pop out a kid. South Korea has thrown vast sums of money at their ageing population problem, assuming that the reason women don’t want to have babies is financial. Not so, apparently. The money hasn’t helped, and women are still resisting the imploring of the government to breed. Social commentators suggest that this is about unrealistically high standards for parenting – that women think it’s only worth having a baby if you’re going to do it perfectly.
It’s an attitude I recognise, and certainly not one which is unique to South Korea. I would suggest that we ban people complaining on social media about parenting. If you’re not worried about becoming a Reddit thread where people call you an arsehole because you tried to take your family on a week’s holiday to France via an EasyJet flight, you’re probably more likely to enjoy the parenting experience.
Lastly, legislation. One of the major reasons that women aren’t having babies is because they don’t have someone to have that baby with. Of course most of the focus in this discussion is placed on women because, well, patriarchy. But on an anecdotal level I know literally dozens of wonderful women in their late twenties and early thirties who desperately want to have children but are with men who are holding out on them or, even worse, men who date them for a decade from their twenties, claiming they eventually want marriage and babies, only to dump them when the reality of either becomes close.
I suggest that we bring back breach of promise legislation. Until 1970, women whose fiancé broke an engagement off could sue them; this 2024 version would have men pay a financial penalty to any woman they claim they’re intending to marry or have a family with, but who they then chuck.
Obviously this is just an opening gambit, and I’m sure the rest of my union are willing to negotiate. But given that for once in history, we’re the ones holding the power, I think our demands are actually extremely reasonable.