Babies and other stupid ideas

Yes, I've been slack, dawdling in my other world and trying to find new and exciting ways to sort out my life.

But at least I haven't resorted to this line of thinking: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,1801611,00.html
So, in the UK they have a problem. Something about pensions, blah blah (I blame the baby boomers that have had everything in life from free tertiary education to refusing to relinquish their jobs to us whippersnappers and then complain after creating a user pays society for my generation that we are not prepared to (or cannot afford to) pay for their pensions. Shrug. Perhaps that's more the situation at home but through my tourist eyes it doesn't appear any different to me) Anyway - the brilliant solutions - FREE IVF FOR EVERYONE. Because babies will solve everything. Never mind that some people are intentionally having smaller families as they can't afford large families. One income families are a thing of the past which means childcare costs, education, and trivial things like feeding/clothing and providing a roof over their heads. Some people like their lifestyle too much to have children. And if we are going to make horrible generalisations, it could be said those in lower socio-economic groups that are having larger families, regardless of whether they can afford it.

I get annoyed by these sort of articles, including the delightful scaremongering ones where they try to frighten women into conceiving by over-emphasising the risks of later childbirth, whilst often not providing the support in the workplace required for either parent's family duties. There's also the ones suggesting they should offer a cash incentive for people to procreate - which I think is also dodgy territory (although I know some people who would happily be paid to practice procreation but that's a different sort of industry).

No government is going to dictate to me if/when/how many children I have. Also, like most kiwi girls I'm not going to be stupid enough to dawdle around here to raise my children - the second my urine turns a strip blue I'm on a one way ticket home. Not that that's going to happen any time soon [touch wood].