We are a lot better off than we were. Quality of life is so much higher than it was. And it should continue to be so. Automation could mean we are free to do as we please or it could simply allow us the time to work on bigger and better things.

It doesn't change my premise: as long as each child costs a high percent of the available resources(time, money, energy) of a family unit, the number of children will stay low.

Let's give semi fictitious numbers. I've seen numbers passed around saying that the average cost of raising a child is around 250,000$ in the USA. No idea if that's true but it will serve for demonstration purpose. Let's round at 1000$/month.

If a family get 5000$/month after taxes, each child cost 20% of the total household income. After 2-3, you need to start cutting corners everywhere to make ends meet. It doesn't matter how much more you can do with 10%. You can get high speed internet, cell phones for every family member, a streaming service or two, heating, cooling and electricity costs, gas for 2 cars instead of only land phone, cable, heating and electricity (no cooling) and gas for a single car.

You clearly have more luxuries for the same price, but the high % is the determining factor. And it will most probably be time or energy rather than money that will be the ultimate bottleneck.

It still becomes a very real question: will one or more of:

• lower quality food
• cheaper vacations
• worse medical coverage
• cheaper education
• worse retirement plans
• less personal luxury items
• less or cheaper hobbies
• less time to do those hobbies
• less time spent with each other family member or friends
• etc.

be worth it to have an extra child?

For most families, the answer quickly becomes a no, hence smaller families. There is no incentive to have children other than the personal fulfillment of the parents.

It also no longer depends on "Oops. Because I love having sex with my spouse, we're pregnant again and will have another child in a couple months."

If having an extra child doesn't bring extra happiness, but has a very real chance of lowering it, why do it?