Voluntary childlessness or childfreeness is the choice to neither conceive nor adopt children. Use of the word childfree was first recorded in 1901 and entered common usage among second-wave feminists in the 1970s. The suffix -free refers to freedom and personal choice to choose not to have children. The availability of reliable birth control, the desire for greater financial security, increased life expectancy, and the ability to rely on one's own savings have made voluntary childlessness more common.
Reasons and challenges Reasons for being childfree depend on the individual. These can be personal, social, philosophical, moral, economic, or a combination thereof.
Fear or lack of interest Some people simply dislike children's behavior, language, or biological processes. Others may experience fear or revulsion towards the physical condition of pregnancy (tokophobia), and the childbirth experience.
Adverse childhood experiences Some people who have suffered child abuse by their own parents have decreased interest in being a parent or proliferating their family's genes. They may also fear the continuation of the cycle of abuse or other defects in parenting styles.
Other caretaking responsibilities Some childfree people wish to spend time with the children in their family, or to provide childcare and babysitting services. Some also take care of elderly parents. Taking care of a pet might also be chosen in lieu of having children. In South Korea, young couples in the 2010s were more likely to have pets than children. The phrase "fur baby" was first introduced in the 1990s and steadily became more commonplace afterwards as millennials came of age.
Medical concerns Some childfree people carry genetic disorders, have a mental illness, or are otherwise too sick for parenthood. Even among healthy couples, new parents are often sleep-deprived. Pregnancy and childbirth might come with complications and lasting effect on personal health, including, but not limited to, weight gain, hemorrhoids, urinary incontinence, accelerated cellular aging, and even death. Substantial neurological changes in both parents during and following pregnancy could lead to feelings of insecurity and inadequacy, or postpartum depression.
Economic factors
Cost The cost of raising a child may impact a person's decision to have a child. A lack of adequate support for working mothers is a major concern for women. Childfree people might prioritize their career, retiring early, making charitable donations, having more leisure, or being more active in their community. For many people, children would be considered a distraction, an unwanted expenditure, or an undesirable commitment. Some find themselves too exhausted with work to be parents.
Pensions Many countries have a pay-as-you-go pension system which depends on the total fertility rate to be sustainable. For these pension systems, low fertility rates due to voluntary childlessness results in lower pensions, higher pension contributions, higher retirement ages, or a pension crisis. Higher pension contributions by voluntary childless individuals increases the sustainability of pay-as-you-go pension systems, such as in the German long-term care insurance. A German 2014 opinion poll found higher pension contributions by childless people was voted in favor of by 76.7%.
Taxes Tax laws in some countries differentiate by number of children, for example a tax on childlessness. Some have also questioned the fairness of tax credits for parents (such as the Earned Income Tax Credit in the United States), paid parental leave, and public education.
Ideology
Members of the countercultural or feminist movements in the 1960s and 1970s typically had no children. Some feminists consider the traditional family as "a decadent, energy-absorbing, destructive, wasteful institution." Similarly, in China, women have become much less interested in marriage and children, viewing these as burdens. Another school of thought known as antinatalism asserts that it is inherently immoral to bring people into the world. In their view, refraining from reproduction is an act of compassion for the unborn. Since parents can never secure the consent of their unborn child, the decision to procreate would be an imposition of life, a source of suffering, and a form of narcissism.
Environmental concerns
Having fewer children or no children at all drastically reduces one's carbon emissions compared to other methods such as owning a fuel-efficient car or avoiding air travel. A subset of environmentalists opposes anthropocentrism and supports deep ecology. Some even call for voluntary human extinction, viewing it as an act of empathy. In their opinion, human existence inflicts harm not just upon humans themselves but also other species via predatory practices. Some have argued that the conscientiousness of childfree environmentalists is self-eliminating since they only aid in the deterioration of concern for the environment and future generations, though this argument assumes that attitudes are heritable.
High expectations of parents
Modern societies often have high expectations of parents, which some people consider distasteful. In English, the (pejorative) term "soccer mom" is used to described women obsessed with being mothers. In general, as a society becomes better developed, it is generally true that parental investment per child goes up, causing fertility rates to go down. In countries where having children out of wedlock is either highly unusual or socially ostracized, such as China, having trouble getting married is a reason why most choose to not have children.
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