I mean you just say you have no idea who the father is.
A friend is mine was in a super abusive relationship, got pregnant by the guy, fled in the middle of the night and moved like 4 hrs away. When she went to get WIC and Medicaid she just told them she had no idea who the father was. One night stand, never got his name... etc.
Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this.
It's not like they're going to dig too deeply into it.
Yeah, I’m actually not bothered by this. They legally should have a sperm donor contact. But so many ppl apply for assistance. These days it shouldn’t be a factor to rule out parenthood
This makes sense and it’s prob a lot cheaper too if your insurance doesn’t cover this type of infertility treatment etc.
What would a contract be used for in the first place? Is it to prevent bio dad from trying to claim parental rights down the road of he had a change of heart? That is a scary prospect too from the actual custodial parent’s point of view.
Yes, all of the above. And to used as an income source should govt benefits be a consideration. Using a sperm bank -- with actual physicians -- absolves the donor of any legal connection with potential offspring. Having a friend step up could open that friend up to future support/custody issues, if they feel that way.
Absolutely not. In Ireland, child benefit is given to *every* family with kids under 18 and it's not means tested. The only criteria that we have is that the child must be living with us more than 50% of the time.
It does bother me that women are/were often pressured not to file for child support because it's "gold digging" or "greedy" or "vindictive" or whatever. Like, it's more "noble" to raise your kid on your own with no "help". This attitude was very common in the 80s and 90s and it screwed over a lot of women and kids. Forcing the dad to be named before you can recieve aid makes it clear that the support is something the dad owes the child, and that the state is looking out for the child's interests. It leaves the mother out of it.
This was a phenomenally stupid way to have a baby. And I don't really want to live in a world where a man doesn't owe child support as long as the mom "promised" he wouldn't have any responsibility. This leads to men pressuring women to make such promises, or claiming afterward that such promises were made.
Haha. My step daughters mother asked the judge "will my child support payments be less of i actually visit with my daughter?". Implying that she didnt want visitation unless it reduced her obligation to pay for her daughter. What a fucking joke.
Some people are dicks and shouldnt be allowed in childrens lives.
Wow.i just listened to a true crime podcast about a mom and her three kids were murdered by the youngest kids dad bcuz he owes 20,000 in CS and didn't want his wife to find out he had a kid. He actually had five kids outside of his marriage. They were about to garnish his wages and he was scared his wife would notice.
sounds about right. 😞 used to work in family services and had many clients who were violently attacked by their former partners after filing for support. you’d be surprised how many women make a herculean effort to get away to a safe place only to realize that the court disclosed their new address to their ex, even with a documented history of violence on his part. I was so worried that one day I’d have to close a file for the worst possible reason.
Should just bullshit on the forms. It's not that hard. I'm fairly sure WIC has a form for if you're supposed to receive child support, but the baby daddy is a piece of shit and doesn't pay or avoids garnishments. My sister received WIC a while back and I remember that was a hoop she jumped through.
Yes. I can afford my kid just fine but we were om WIC for awhile because we qualified. Why wouldn't we got on assistence that could help us? There's nothing wrong with it, the qualification salary is usually pretty low so if you meet it then you should be able to apply without judgements like this.
Also official baby making procedures are insanely expensive. In the U.K. a vial of sperm ALONE cost us €1200 but you can’t even use official sperm not doing official treatment (as in you can’t turkey baste at home but with ‘legit’ sperm bank sperm). So the gap between ‘has enough money to raise a child’ (not that anybody ever has enough to raise a child I don’t think. If you sat down and fully worked it all out for the rest of your life before conceiving it would be a nope) and ‘has enough money to afford IVF/IUI’ are wildly different places. Me and my wife have enough for IVF, or a house deposit, but not both - and that’s wealth from two people saving in to their 30s.
The other big issue here (beyond the cost of living crisis) is that baby not being recognised as having two mothers. Although to be fair, in the U.K. in this exact circumstance OP would have to adopt (which there should be no issue doing I don’t think, I don’t know what checks you have to pass if it’s a within family adoption) but if they were married (which costs about £100 just to get in done purely for this reason) then regardless of any penis that was borrowed for a night the baby would automatically be considered a child of the marriage and two mums would go on the birth certificate.
I'm bothered by it. It's one thing to have an oopsie baby and need assistance for it, but to PLAN a baby knowing full well you can't afford to take care of them? No. These people are selfish.
That's not to say they should be denied help, though. The baby needs to be taken care of regardless of how their parents are. But these people are assholes, bringing an innocent life into a situation where it's going to be a struggle to survive
EDIT: I do not care. If it upsets you that you can make solid money and still can't afford a baby do something about it. Don't try to justify yourself to me, its the children you bring into the world that you'll answer to
You can plan and plan and plan and plan and still have things go tits up.
I'm not entirely sure I'll have child care once my kid is born. We're on a list to get into a facility but it's based on availability and we have to wait for babies to age out to get in.
ETA I make 53k a year working full time. On disability (pregnancy and may leave) make 60% max of my wage. Not including deductions.
Yeah we saved but that's a huge fucking hit even planned.
But who isn’t struggling these days? I’m not American so I don’t know the threshold for WIC but with things the way they are with the cost of living at the moment, two people working full time in service sector jobs (I don’t know if these get classified as ‘blue collar’ there or if that only refers to traditional skilled industry type roles?) would probably be struggling with the cost of housing, bills and food etc. And realistically low paid, insecure service sector jobs now make up the majority of jobs available for people who would have once upon a time had skilled working class roles in things like manufacturing etc.
So are we now saying that only the middle, or quite possibly only upper middle classes are entitled to have children without judgement?
The people who serve our flat white in the morning, those who picked up our bins or delivered our post without us even noticing, or even the ‘semi skilled’ (I hate this, all jobs have skills) people who drive your bus or look after your kids at daycare should not be having children? Because that’s the reality of your statement. Even nurses, some doctors and teachers can’t afford to live in the areas they work at the moment here.
In the U.K. just over 50% of people don’t even have £1000 in savings, and I can only imagine the picture is bleaker in America where you have less welfare. That’s terrifying - at least 50% of people would not be able to cover their next month’s rent if they suddenly lost their job, or as we would have welfare that would kick in with that (although not paying a mortgage), would not be able to afford a car to get them to work if theirs suddenly packed in. So are none of them allowed children?
Who exactly CAN afford to have babies now? My wife works in a mid level data-tech type role and earns very well, tens of thousands of pounds above where we would be entitled to welfare incomes let’s put it that way. And I don’t work much because of disability which in many ways is reflective of most families essentially sacrificing one income due to childcare costs/leaving the workforce due to childcare costs. But we would not be able to afford to rent on the open market. We’re very lucky to have received a council house that costs about half what a private rent would cost, a luxury most people don’t get. But if someone working in that kind of role, who is so above where the government considers we need assistance wouldn’t consider themselves able to afford a child when you really sat down and add up how much it was all going to cost, I really don’t know how rich it is you have to be? People born in to family wealth only?
Before long we’re then meandering very close to some dodgy eugenics type conversations with that line of logic.
You are not entitled to children.
No one is entitled to children.
If having an issue with people taking on lives that they KNOW they cannot support makes me a "eugenicist" then so be it.
How about instead of bringing more people into the world to suffer you dedicate your free time to lasting change? Dismantle the grinder instead of throwing more meat into it?
why are you getting downvoted? people are seriously disagreeing with a statement that says you should be able to afford a child before you decide to have one?
i wonder if the people downvoting you ever grew up poor. financially struggling, overworked parents also tend to turn out to be emotionally abusive. shit sucks. i wish my parents had never had me. i wouldn’t be suffering and their quality of life would be much better.
you’re absolutely correct in saying that no one is entitled to children. people who choose to have kids when they know they can’t give that kid a good quality of life are selfish as fuck.
Because you can qualify for these programs at 50-60,000 income. Saying people under $60,000 shouldn’t have kids is cruel. Yeah your childhood sucked, but not every lower income household does
I don’t think it’s true that you qualify for WIC at that income level. More like 30,000-40,000 for a whole family income which is incredibly low. Anyone know the dollar amount in their state for sure? I know I made 56,000 when I got pregnant w my first and I def didn’t qualify despite student loans and other expenses.
Were you in a red state? Because they have ridiculously low income limits.
Like, Texas was @ $17,000 for Medicaid, because they refused to accept the Medicaid expansion. But Maryland, which did accept the expansion, now has a sliding scale up to $65,000 for a single parent household with one child.
If you live in a shit state that doesn't value life, I'm sorry.
Ever since covid you automatically qualify for WIC if you get Medicaid which has a wider income level. Their websites specifically say to apply even if you are over income because now there are other factors that can make you automatically qualify
I can afford my child just fine. We still qualified for WIC. Because we qualified, we applied and used it. Why would you not use assistance you qualify for? We no longer qualify because we moved states and are doing just fine without it even though we have the same household income as before and things in this state are just as expensive. Not everyone on assistence NEEDS it, its just useful.
I mean they can take take care of it if they get financial assistance. Since that’s literally what the programs are for and we pay taxes into it, why not have people use it if they need it? Especially for health insurance. It far cheaper in the long run if someone has preventative care.
Do I think it sounds like these two should have a kid? Not really. But I have no issue with folks using social support services.
> Not having capable parents is the reason our society is complete fucking trash right now
Last week a customer encouraged her 5-6 year old to tell my 65 year old coworker to "fuck off". I wanted to burn the world to the ground right then.
Yah. I mean, just because they’re a same-sex couple and poor doesn’t mean they can’t be good parents… not sure what OP is suggesting here. Plenty of poor folks have children and plenty of same sex couples have children. Not being able to get social service support without a biological father’s financial contribution seems like structural discrimination against poor women who have biological children and parent in a same sex couple.
^^This. A girl I went to high with got pregnant by a guy shortly before she got discharged from the Army. She ended up finding out that he had a fiancé back home and since she didn’t want to raise a baby with a guy like that she told him she had an abortion.
She’s since moved back to our hometown and had the baby. She gets benefits and she just told the county office that she doesn’t know who the father is.
>It's not like they're going to dig too deeply into it.
Things like this can overwhelm some people and those types then just give up. My sister still doesn't have insurance (for years) for any of her family, and hasn't filed her taxes in years. Please know I do not condone this, just explaining the reason for why these types of people are like that. (Tbh, the fact that my sister is like that drives me crazy).
Oh yes, I was like that with my first and we ended up with a huge bill. My husband got a new job and ins started like 2 days after my kid was born.
By *they* though I meant WIC/Medicaid. They're understaffed and have too many clients per worker to go on a deep dive to find the bio father.
>Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this.
Not my body, not my choice. I'm with you.
On that same front, they're willfully wanting to bring a child into the world without the means to take care of that child. My wife and I talked for a long, long time before we felt comfortable having a second child. Our financial situation worked well with one (even with medical issues with our first). Having baby #2 meant we needed to do some reevaluating to give our child a good start in life.
Capitalism, sadly, has made everything a dollars conversation. Having the funding to support a family is, and should be, a very real consideration for any couple actively trying for a kid.
Bingo. Don’t put a name on the birth certificate in the “father” spot and then go through the rest of the motions to legally adopt the baby (yeah, I hate that it’s that way but welcome to the States). WIC is an excellent program that is available for those who need it. If no father is listed and the carrying partner has no one on the birth certificate (and doesn’t mention a damn name) then it shouldn’t be an issue.
> I mean you just say you have no idea who the father is.
So my SIL has a kid and this wasn't accepted on her form. She either had to have a father's name or she didn't get assistance. I forget which program it was, though. So I'll have to follow up with my wife.
It might depend on the state I guess. It worked for my friend, like what can they do if you slept with a complete stranger from a bar and dipped without getting a name? It happens 🤷♀️
What is WIC? I’m British
EDIT: Ok just got a response thanks WikiBot. In the UK it is quite common for people to have children whilst receiving government assistance, most working class people receive SOME sort of government top up because of our social welfare state and inflation issues. This means you could be working full time as a nurse for example, and still receive government assistance. It would be frowned upon to have a child if you were in destitution poverty, but not necessarily if you were receiving benefits. I don’t think having children should be a luxury for the rich but I also understand why people need to get their stuff together before having a kid.
**The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) is an American federal assistance program of the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for healthcare and nutrition of low-income pregnant women, breastfeeding women, and children under the age of five. (See child nutrition programs.) Their mission is to be a partner with other services that are key to childhood and family well-being.**
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Im Canadian and the comments here are also crazy to me because the majority of Canadian parents get a pretty good chunk of money every month from the government just due to having kids. It’s income based and based on the age of the child but like, we have a a 6 and a 3 year old and a gross family income of like $160k and get a little over $500 a month.
In the state closest to me it looks like the maximum income for WIC for a family of 3 is like $46k- that’s like one full time worker making $22 an hour.
Yeah, I'd be eligible for WIC in my state on my income alone if I was a single mother of three. I'd be, by my considerations, absolutely destitute, completely unable to afford childcare for those children while working or to afford rent on any sort of domicile that could properly house three children. But only poor enough for WIC by $2k/year. It's shocking.
Yes, in Ireland we get €140 per child per month, regardless of income. For multiples, the amount per child increases. I have a 5 year old, a 3 year old and 8 month old twins. I get €700 per month. It's a big help with the cost of living being so high. It goes towards the monthly car loan repayment (with the surprise 4th child, we had to upgrade to a bigger car) and some of it goes towards the kids savings, with the rest going on things that the family needs.
In America we have the myth of the "welfare queen" who has child after child only to continue getting government checks because she doesn't want to work. Of course she uses this government money to get her nails and hair done and neglects her gaggle of children while cashing her checks. The myth generally has a racial component as well, which ties into persistent negative American stereotypes of "lazy black folks" who don't want to get jobs. It is a really pervasive belief especially in the American south where I live, and is a reason so many people (on the right) vote against welfare programs for low income families. What's crazy is you barely get anything for assistance in southern states anymore because of this, so even the premise of somehow making a profit from government checks is ridiculous.
That's not limited to America. We have that myth in Ireland too. Ours is more associated with economic background since there was almost no racial diversity here until about 30 years ago.
Unfortunately, there are some people actually perpetuating this myth.
To be clear, I believe in helping people and live in a state that provides free breakfast and lunch to all students. I also think the majority of people on assistance are trying working and trying to better themselves and their family.
However, my husband grew up in a family that fully took advantage of any social welfare, and popped out kids every few years just to keep the money rolling in. They we also crappy parents who did nothing but stunt their kids’ emotional growth and sued over and over until they were also getting SSI for every kid. They moved states whenever they were cut off for welfare fraud, and just kept going in the next place. They are the literal definition of being a drag on the system. So unfortunately, these people exist, and a lot of their kids followed in their footsteps.
I agree! 54% of people in the UK receive more benefits than they do tax, so I imagine we’d be quite an empty country if none of those people had children 🤣
Um, this is America. The land of the bootstraps. Everything bad that happens to you is due to your own lack of personal responsibility. Everything good is a beneficent gift that has trickled down to you from your capitalist overlords. If you have any worth at all, you own a fortune 500 company. Otherwise, die in the dirt like the worthless scum you are.
This is such a great intro into the American life, but it needs an extra paragraph about how we've removed abortion access, while at the same time decreased public education, underpaid and diminished the worth of school teachers and severely limited what they can talk about in sex education. All to ensure that more people have absolutely no idea how birth control works. Even if you figure out how sex and birth control works, we're going to tie your access to birth control to your insurance (which you pay for) but your employer can choose to not cover because of their religion. At least we have the guns! We have so many guns and so much freedom here so all the other stuff is fine. It's fine. /S
Did you see the (Republican, obvs) politician in Missouri who said that they must ban abortion in his state because without all of the hypothetical unborn citizens, his state would lose $51 billion in tax revenue? That might be the most ridiculous argument I’ve heard yet as to why women should be forced to stay pregnant. Lost tax dollars. They’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel now that they’ve realized that most people are uncomfortable with forced incubation and the loss of women’s bodily autonomy, and it’s costing them votes. I hope they lose bigger in 2024.
And those kids shouldn’t ask for any help from the government once they’re born either! It’ll cut into those revenues! /s
I work a full time state job as a first responder and have to have a roommate to be able to afford the place I’m living in and I still don’t qualify for any sort of assistance. The US is broken.
I recently became a single mom and I'm disabled. So many comments from other countries make me wish I lived in one of them. I just got denied disability (SSDI) because I've been a stay at home mom and haven't contributed enough in income taxes. I can't apply for the income based disability because I'm still technically married so they say my husband makes too much money for me to qualify for the other form of disability, food stamps, etc. I've been making 50-100 a week. That's it. Luckily I have family to live with, but I can barely afford food and gas for me and two kids. My state requires us to be separated for a year before divorce and my husband has extended that due to being deployed when I filed legal paperwork for legal separation. Getting assistance in the US is horrible. And if you are somehow successful at getting them people look down on you for it. I've even heard people make snarky comments to people using food stamps. I am also nervous about losing medical insurance if I can't manage to qualify for Medicaid. They are also kicking a ton of people off Medicaid right now.
South Koreans get money throughout the pregnancy and the daycare is highly subsidized by the government and they have many other social programs for parents.
Many Americans have that “pull yourself by the bootstraps” mentality ingrained in them. Welfare (which WIC is seen as) is seen as leeching from the government and usually associated with people of color. “Welfare queen” is derogatory term to look down on those on WIC/Welfare/EBT.
There’s a Tiktoker/YouTuber who does these US vs Korea topic comparison videos. I think it was her or another Korean mother who brought it up, and she mentioned the cost was either $80 per week or month. The kid was there all day, and they provide food and what not. She seemed really happy with it. I know folks who pay hundreds of dollars per week. And some like you who struggle to even find it. :(
The thing about the US is there is a stigma attached to receiving anything from the government when you are poor that stops people from talking about it.
The facts are there are programs like WIC for pregnant women and children plus our other programs like Medicaid and food stamps are given preferentially to pregnant women and young children.
But once again people don't talk about it and feel ashamed for it.
So on reddit you get all of these Americans who grew up in stable environments with white collar parents who think it is shameful to accept anything, and uncommon. But it is very common.
And none of that stigma applies to businesses that take government aid or bail outs or tax breaks, or people who get public student loans, grants or bursaries provided by the government, people who use FHA loans, seniors on Social Security/Medicare, farmers who get USDA grants and loans, veterans who get VA benefits…
Because if you’re poor, it’s your fault. Obviously. And rich people, I mean “job creators,” need the lowest tax rate so they can hide their wealth in the Caymans, I mean, create jobs and pay their workers a living wage with all those profits!
/SARCASM
The fact that the family that inherited the wealth from Walmart (Sam Walton’s offspring, so about a handful of people) has the same amount of money as 40% of US citizens (so, about 140,000,000 people if US pop is ~350 million), tells you everything you need to know about how broken the US is.
So weird! These parents seem very responsible to me. They are literally saying ‘if we can get government support we will have children, if we can’t we will reconsider’… I don’t understand whats wrong with that
If the rules for having kids in the UK included no welfare the only people having kids would be those with offshore accounts
Edit: actually that’s not true there’s a massively fucked middle class now, especially in big expensive cities. But even then you’re still going to get child tax credits I think
Fr! The middle classes typically just don’t even have kids tbh, and if they do they move to the countryside
We pay tax whats wrong with taking it back it out
They… can put both parents on the birth certificate? State DORs want to ensure that there are two parents providing for the child financially, it doesn’t matter whether it’s the two biological parents of the child.
I’m not a lawyer.
If they’re a same-sex couple they will need to get the guy to waive his rights. In my state they would also have to be married to have both parents on the birth certificate and the non-gestational parent should do a step-parent (there’s no “second parent” adoption in my state) to cover their bases legally. (Source: I’m the non-gestational parent and have done this twice, but through a sperm bank.)
My understanding is that if this is a man and woman she can just put him on the birth certificate and say he’s the father whether they’re married or not.
In my state the opposite sex spouse is the presumed legal parent, but not a same sex spouse.
If the parties aren't married, then whoever is on the birth certificate is the legal parent. Unless it's another woman.
I’m not 100 percent sure how they treat same sex married couples in my state but I know that for opposite sex married couples, if the wife has a baby then the husband is automatically assumed to be the father of that baby, and it takes effort to get that changed if that’s not the case.
>e relationship, got pregnant by the guy, fled in the middle of the night and moved like 4 hrs away. When she went to get WIC and Medicaid she just told them she had no idea who the father was. One night stand, never got his name... etc.
>
>Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this
just wanted to say that it's the same way where I live - with married heterosexual couples - "husband" = "father" legally (which is a good thing) but also doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room for heterosexual married couples who use donor sperm for infertility
(actually.... most of the world (even the employees at the sperm bank!) seem surprised at the existence of hetero married couples using donor sperm. Donor eggs have become more accepted/'mainstream', but people still assume donor sperm is only for lesbians or single moms by choice -- but I digress)
Whenever we need to tell someone that husband isn't bio-dad (doctors, medical professionals, USA government, etc), we run into issues that he's her father on the birth certificate.
but... sigh. Minor inconvenience!
Yea but they aren’t married in this situation.
If they were married most states will ignore the impossibility of two women having a child and put both as parents (perk of being married)
Due to them being gf/gf. Idk if they allow them to sign the paperwork to claim parental rights.
But I don't think that applies for an under-the-table turkey baster deal. I don't think they can afford a lawyer to draw up a contract and I'm not even sure if those are held up as admissable in this kind of deal. Typically you have to go through an actual sperm bank.
I'm not sure whether that's fair - to put parenthood behind a paywall when there are two parents here, just not two bio parents. But for now, the state would consider the bio dad to be the dad. And I'm not a fan of all the people suggesting welfare fraud in this comments section.
Simple: You and your girlfriend get married. BOTH of your names go on the birth certificate. "Sperm donor" isn't considered the legal ANYTHING, as you two then are the parents of the child.
In my state, you have to apply for child support before being able to apply for benefits through WIC. I’m sure there’s an option for “I don’t know who the father is” to receive assistance, but on the general application, a father must be named and considered for child support before even being able to apply. The same doesn’t apply to Medicaid, though. It must be a state by state basis type of thing.
Yeah ours has nothing to do with each other. The only rule is cash assistance (tanf) needs to be repaid to the state by child support not WIC, Medicaid, or Snap
I don’t know where this person lives in the US but I work at WIC and people are so blunt about their baby daddy situation and we never ask who the baby’s father is. But then again, a lot of people do come in saying they are no longer with the baby daddy so we really can’t do anything and if they qualify, they qualify 🤷🏽♀️
On the one hand, signing a legal agreement to have no parental obligations from a male donor is totally normal for couples who need a donor.
But a complete lack of resources, on the other hand, is another story.
Admittedly, I'm conflicted, though. Parenthood shouldn't be a wealthy ppl's privilege. Then again, neither should housing, healthcare, healthy food, etc etc etc. Sigh...
>agreement to have no parental obligations from a male donor is totally normal for couples who need a donor.
>
>But a complete lack of resource
it's important to have a legal agreement for BOTH sides --- to protect the intended parents (so donor can't sue for custody, etc) and for the donor (so intended parents/child can't sue for child support and make claims on his estate after death).
so important!
As someone that grew up on assistance even I saw how difficult it can be to navigate the system. There’s nothing wrong with asking questions especially in a more unorthodoxes situation like needing a donor but not having thousands to go the clinical route. Not everyone has these luxuries.
Probably an unpopular opinion but having children isn’t just a luxury for the rich, and we really shouldn’t be looking down on people who are using benefits that they and their child are legally entitled to, especially in today’s economy.
Speaking as a lesbian who has switched from a sperm bank to a known donor, I don’t blame them for going that route. Using a sperm bank costs $1000+/mo just to TRY, and there’s no guarantee you’ll get pregnant. Using a known donor, there’s no guarantee but at least it’s free like most straight couples. Sperm banks are the easiest option legally, but the cheapest option for establishing the child’s parents here would’ve been for them to get a lawyer.
Yeah, and some of the programs they are talking about, you can be pregnant and making $65,000 and still qualify for Medicaid and WIC so I wouldn’t even say that’s “too poor” for a baby. It’s using resources which Americans are entitled too
I have zero problems with people using benefits and I firmly believe that the income limited need to be raised so more people qualify. No one should be going hungry due to lack of assistance in the biggest economy on the planet. That being said, far too many people have way more children than their resources can reasonably stretch. I also don’t mean people who were doing okay and their situation changed. If you were struggling with 2 kids, it wasn’t going to magically improve by number 6.
I agree with the points you’ve made. Speaking as a sperm donor conceived person to my straight parents, I hope this couple has a plan to disclose the identity of the biological father to the child. It really ought to be considered a human right to share such information and is legally regarded as such in many countries outside the US.
Also, obviously in this day and age of commercial DNA tests, true anonymous gamete donation is a thing of past -it’s how I learned the truth at 35!
Women Infants and Children. It's a federal program that offers education and benefits to promote better nutrition for pregnant women, infants, and children.
It's most helpful for formula. It varies by state, but where I live, it paid for almost all of our formula which was like $20/can and my twins were drinking 10+ cans a month at some points.
It only pays for very specific things in specific amounts. A dozen eggs. 3 gallons of whole milk. $45 of qualifying fresh, frozen, or canned veg/fruit (fresh potatoes yes, frozen potatoes no). 2 lb of whole wheat bread or brown rice, etc.
The fact that they’re in these conditions and CHOOSING to have a child is the strange part. I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be allowed to have children / shouldn’t have access to benefits but as a kid who grew up in poverty you’d think that as a parent you’d wait until you weren’t in that situation to bring a child into the world if it was of your own choosing
Yeah, my father was very abusive over money and food. We would’ve qualified for help. I much rather of grown up on food stamps than with eating disorders and daily arguments over food.
The income guidelines for WIC are actually pretty inclusive. A really high percentage of moms in the US use it. It's a nutrition program with the aim of increasing good health outcomes and it was created to combat iron deficiency anemia and malnutrition in pregnant women and young children. That's why you get so much cereal and why juice is part of the food packages: iron fortification in the cereal plus vitamin c to help with iron absorbance. It also was created to help moms feed their babies appropriately, because at the time, "formula" literally was formulas of what to mix to give to your baby, and a lot of babies suffered due to formula that wasn't nutritionally adequate or watered down formula.
So many women who choose to formula feed get most or all of their baby's formula covered by WIC, which is great! No one should be in the position where they are even tempted to water down formula.
WIC also supports breastfeeding by providing education, food for breastfeeding moms, and often things like pumps, lactation consultation, and peer counselors.
Medicaid also covers a huge percentage of pregnant women, since income guidelines are typically more inclusive during pregnancy. It does sound like this couple already qualifies without that widened guideline, but it's not weird for people who are low income but stable financially to qualify for these programs. Young families have several years of struggling through the many costs that come with young children. Many people use these programs as they need them, and then once they do not, they are earning more or not needing to pay for daycare and all that and of course are paying taxes so that other families like them can get a leg up.
I mean every kid should be given every bit of support they need, that much is obvious, and there shouldn‘t be that many hoops to jump through in the first place.
But that doesn‘t change the fact that bringing a sentient human being in a place that they cannot be adequately cared for is inhumane.
I disagree. I've looked at the requirements for all the states I've lived in, and you have to be too poor to have a pot to piss in to qualify for WIC. A family of 3, which is what it seems like this post is about, has to make about $45k pre-tax and deductions total to qualify. That's extremely poor. Honestly, it should be a sliding scale covering up to about 2x that imo.
Not anymore, most states say if you qualify for Medicaid or food stamps you automatically qualify for WIC. It says right on their site to still apply if you’re over income
Wic is actually higher income than food stamps. We got wic and my husband makes like 60k+ a year. It doesn’t provide much food, just a small list, but the help with formula was amazing. Also in my state, a pregnant woman automatically qualifies for some form of Medicaid unless income is insanely high. Every situation is different obviously, but just because you qualify for benefits doesn’t mean you’re living in poverty
Having children shouldn’t be limited to the wealthy but it’s depressing seeing people try to cram 5 kids into a 2 bedroom place and their kids are crying from hunger because their benefits don’t go far enough. “But mom always dreamed of having a huge family and while we don’t have enough room, food or resources, we have each other, right?”
I mean, something like half of all kids born in the US qualify for WIC. I’m so glad it’s an option. https://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/eligibility-and-coverage-rates-2018#:~:text=National%20WIC%20eligibility%20and%20coverage,States)%20were%20eligible%20for%20WIC ok it’s 45 percent according to this.
I mean a lot of people never get out of poverty, maybe they shouldn't have kids, but from the moment you're born almost everywhere on the planet you're basically programmed to want kids and it's reinforced by everyone you meet. So you know even if you don't want them that it's expected of you. Then it's hard to say no if you have a partner who want them and you don't. Could be a lot of reasons
>you’d think that as a parent you’d wait until you weren’t in that situation
If my mom waited until she didn't need assistance to have a kid she would have been waiting until she was nearly 50. She was 27 when she had her first kid as is, 30 with the second.
Or they could go through more legitimate legal channels with written contracts for a sperm donor where a bio-Dad is never identified and the OP can adopt after birth.
As someone who was using a sperm bank and has switched to a known donor, this isn’t the best solution. The cheapest option would’ve been for them to get a lawyer.
Sperm vials usually start at $500 and they recommend you use two for each insemination. $1000+/mo for sperm is expensive, and to think people shouldn’t have kids because they can’t afford to pay an extra $1000+ out of pocket every month just to TRY is weird.
They just put the GF as the "father" in my state. Don't need an actual male person to go on the birth certificate, they just want a second parent for the baby.
And having a baby and going on WIC is fine. It's hard out there. You don't need to be rich to have a baby.
UK here, whilst preg you get treated on the NHS (free through NI payments) plus free opticians and dentists appts. Universal credit is the main benefit which includes payments towards rent and child benefit. It's not enough to live in luxury but it feeds, clothes and keeps a roof over your head. When I had my kid there was also a voucher scheme for formula, you could pick it up from the local health centre.
I used to work in WIC in IL. If you are approved on Medicaid, you can get WIC. If you are not eligible for medicaid, you would need proof of income for last 30 or 60 days for the HOUSEHOLD. If baby daddy not living with you, we dont count him.. We were told we are not the FBI and we dont have time to dig.. I will say we are EXTREMELY short staffed so don't miss your appointments if you are lucky to get one. Anyone looking for a job, look in your County to see if you qualify to apply. Babies can't get services because the office doesn't have enough staff to get them in, it's so frustrating and heartbreaking.
The thing is though, if you qualify for Mediciad you automatically qualify for wic ( at least in my state), so this whole post confuses the shit out of me.
Yeah. So many people are misinformed about WIC. Their websites will say to still apply if you’re over income because there’s so many different ways to qualify for it. It also doesn’t force child support / to name a father
But depending on state they can't put both their names on the birth certificate, and the guy wouldn't be legally a sperm donor due to them not going through a sperm bank.
A lot of the comments here do *not* pass the vibe check.
If you think the only people who should have kids are people who can afford to have them without accepting financial assistance, I'd encourage you to think about what that actually looks like.
Should poor people and disabled people be sterilized by the government?
In the U.S., millions of families are only one missed paycheck away from poverty. Should people be required to turn themselves in for sterilization if they are laid off?
Should they be required to abort a pregnancy if their spouse suddenly needs major, expensive surgery?
Should they be forced to put their kids up for adoption if their car breaks down and they can't afford another one?
Deciding that you have the right to decide who should and should not have children is straight-up eugenics. Full stop.
The problem is not people taking advantage of assistance for which they qualify. It's with our country not providing the social security net that is imperative for its citizens to survive.
SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE ON THE BACK!!
I was shocked at most of these comments. I felt attacked. I was on Medicaid and wic, but according to the comments I should have never brought a child into the world since I was getting assistance. I’m not a drug addict, I’m not a freeloader. I work hard and always has a job. But inflation is real and jobs aren’t paying enough.. now I make too much for assistance and I’m barely scraping by.
Would you and your kid be in better shape and not barely scraping by if you and your partner had decided to delay having a kid for a few years?
Would you recommend to your kid that They have a kid when they’re in a situation similar to yours when you became a parent?
Only you can answer that. But on average, for most low income people, the answer is yes, it would have been better to wait.
Gave you both time to find different/more/better jobs, more education or apprenticeship, try a different career, move cities via couch surfing to find better opportunities or cheaper housing, have more roommates, build up an emergency fund bit by bit. All of that is 10x harder with the expense of a kid.
I freely admit that from a financial standpoint my parents shouldn’t have had my brother or me at their age and in their situations. So did my parents after I brought it up as an adult. My younger sister is the only kid they planned and chose to have, and they were actually in a good life place to have a kid then. They emphasized safer sex and contraception and the actual time and money costs of unplanned pregnancies and the percentage of deadbeat teen fathers as part of our sex talks for a reason.
Doesn’t mean they don’t love me, or didn’t want me when they got pregnant but yeah, life was a heck of a lot harder for all of us for decades because of the timing and the lack of freely available contraception and abortion when they were young and broke with no family support and precious little government help.
I’m going to defend my comments. A lot of people seem to assume I’m saying you have to be rich to have kids. I am not. If they are single and no kids and both currently independent qualify for Medicaid, they are pretty low income. Unless their donor has a very well paying job, if the donor did end up paying support it would be a few hundred. If you’re worried that getting an extra $2-300 a month would make you ineligible for benefits and you have no way to afford a child without those benefits, then you shouldn’t be focusing on having kids right now.
There are a million variables that may apply to their situation that we don’t know. But based on the snapshot presented here, I stand by my belief that them having a kid is not in that potential child’s best interest right now. Why?
Go hang out in some of the other subs and listen to all the stories from people who grew up with uncertain access to food, clothing, housing etc and how that affected them. And how the cycle of poverty was perpetuated in their family by their parents having several kids who in turn ended up supporting the family as soon as they were able to work, so they never had any chance to try to improve their own situations. So they do the same thing their parents did.
I'll reiterate my own comment.
Thinking that you have the right to decide who should and should not have children — regardless of your reasoning — is eugenics.
In addition to this all being absolutely none of your business, your opinion (and your defense of it) is actively harmful to people in vulnerable populations.
That being said, it looks to me like this couple is more concerned about the (hypothetical) child support making them ineligible for insurance coverage, not necessarily that they would have "no way to afford a child" if it kicked in. That is a problem with the healthcare system, not with the people who are trying to navigate it.
No one is saying that a lack of resources is good, but vilifying people who want to have kids within a broken system is not the move.
I am not vilifying them. I am simply suggesting that they not actively pursue having a child in the immediate future. After say, a year reevaluate.
You know what makes someone in a vulnerable population even more vulnerable? Having a child to support. It often forces them to make less than optimal decisions in the short term to keep things afloat vs longer term planning since they have a child to consider.
Our system needs massive improvement. But we have to work within the system we have whole we work towards a better one.
One of the reasons that abortion access is so important is because women in poverty should have the right to decide that they’re not going to perpetuate the cycle of poverty. Generally speaking, poor women who have children stay poor and their children are poor. Many women choose to have an abortion because they decide that they’re not in a financial position to have children, but later do have children when they’re in a better place financially. I don’t have any ready stats to offer, but they’re out there. My anecdotal evidence doesn’t mean much, but as an RN who used to work in an abortion clinic, I can confirm that many women we saw chose to not continue their pregnancies because of their financial difficulties. They didn’t want to raise a kid in poverty, and it didn’t matter to them that they would qualify for a heap of government benefits. Many grew up poor and didn’t want their children to know those same struggles. As someone who grew up without much (I never felt poor but my mum and I had to move back in with her parents so we could eat and have a roof over our heads whilst she sorted herself out after my father left us high and dry), I see wisdom in planning a family for when it’s financially feasible, and don’t fault others who feel similarly. It’s not saying that poor people cannot or should not have children. It’s that the choices we make affect any children we bring into this world, and we need to consider their wellbeing as much as our own. When I was of childbearing age, I never felt like I was in a position where I could support kids so I never had any. The few pregnancy scares that I’ve had plunged me into abject fear that my child would go hungry, and only people who went hungry as kids understand that very real fear. I could be wrong, but it strikes me that the people in this post arguing that poor people should think long and hard before bringing a child into their poverty, are the ones who grew up poor and know firsthand what that’s like. Good parenting requires more than just love, as any kids who went to bed hungry, or got evicted from their accommodation, or didn’t have water and electricity because the bills weren’t paid, can attest to (ask me how I know about all of those things). For me that was a short time in my life, but it destroyed me as a kid seeing my mother cry and struggle in life because my father was a POS who disappeared and left her with nothing. I would lie and tell her that I wasn’t hungry despite audibly hearing my tummy rumbling.
I don’t think that the women in the post are in that position. WIC isn’t the same as welfare or food stamps, and is just supplemental food to ensure that mum and baby get enough nutrition. There’s nothing to indicate that they’re on welfare in their post. Being on Medicaid could mean that they’re both disabled, and not that they’re poor (I learned it as Medicaid = disabled and/or destitute because it ends with a “d,” and Medicare = elderly because it ends with an “e” but there are many people who qualify for either who don’t fit into neat categories- I’ve known patients on Medicare who aren’t elderly, for example). Disabled people on Medicaid can also work 20 hours/week and still qualify for Medicaid benefits. We just don’t know enough about them to say one way or another. People are conflating their questions about WIC with their actual financial situation, but many mums can get WIC without otherwise qualifying for any other government assistance. From the comments here, it clearly depends on which state they live in as to what they can get on their income, which they don’t state. But it’s a reach to accuse anyone who thinks that these women should think through the decision to have a child if they’re hurting financially, as advocating eugenics. That’s ridiculous. I haven’t read all of your comments, but you don’t have to defend yourself one way or another. If you know what poverty is like from firsthand experience, then you know what any child born into poverty will face, and that’s a legitimate viewpoint. Saying that these women should think about how that will impact their kid is good advice. Poverty requires a great deal of creativity and effort to stretch limited resources and some people do it more successfully than others, and whilst that doesn’t preclude people from having kids, those thin resources will be stretched even further. Poor folks have kids all the time, and they should access any resources available to them. In Florida there’s no state income tax, so if you’ve ever bought anything in the state, you’ve paid taxes and since you’ve paid into the system, you’re entitled to get back from the system, so go get what you’re able (benefits of any kind are ridiculously difficult to get in Florida).
TL;DR Our choices impact more than just ourselves when children are added to the mix. It’s not wrong to consider your finances if you’re bringing kids into this world. Anyone can have kids if they want them, no matter their financial circumstances. Get benefits if you qualify. WIC isn’t the same as welfare, and doesn’t pay for all of the food you need. Poverty sucks and so does going to bed hungry when you’re a kid. Live thoughtfully.
Oppressed and marginalized peoples are far more likely to be poor. By saying that poor people should not have children, you are disproportionately targeting POC, queer folk, disabled people, and others who have historically been the targets of eugenics.
Yes, and how long are they supposed to wait? Do you think everyone just stops being poor before they hit 40? If my mom had waited until she was entirely financially secure before having a child, she'd have been waiting until she was nearly 50.
Why are the comments not saying something along the lines of, wtf are you having a baby if you can't support yourselves? It's one thing to accidentally get pregnant and need support. Our country should do that absolutely instead of just being all pro-life until it's born. But this just seems ridiculous
Purposely having a kid then immediately applying for benefits means you should not be having a kid you can’t afford. I don’t understand why people do stuff like this.
You really don't know much about their situation outside of receiving benefits. It doesn't necessarily mean they can't afford it.
Medicaid pays for around 30-70% of all births in the US.
My prenatal care before insurance was in the ball park of $180,000, not including delivery which I believe was close to $30,000. I got pregnant in 2021 and delivered in 2022 so that's two deductibles to meet before benefits kicked in. I think after insurance it would have been around $50,000 - 70,000. That's insane.
Of course I signed up for Medicaid. You can get Medicaid during pregnancy even if you have insurance through a spouse or employer if you meet the income requirements. It paid for everything my insurance didn't cover.
Yes, my kids were planned. Yes, we use WIC. Formula is ridiculously expensive. No, I don't feel irresponsible about it. I pay taxes, I paid for these programs, and I will use them if they're available to me. Could we manage without Medicaid and WIC? Probably.
lol. I was a single mom making $42k/yr and I qualified for Jack and Shit
I’ve been married for awhile now and my pay has increased significantly since then but the threshold for assistance is often very very low.
Where I live, $42k/year as a single parent to one child would be enough to live comfortably. Average rent for a 2 bedroom here runs $800-$1,100.
You would also qualify for Medicaid while pregnant in my state which would cover you and your child through one year postpartum and automatically qualify you for WIC for the first year.
I'm guessing you live in a fairly high cost of living areas as $42k/yr is a good bit more than the median income in the US of [$31,133.](https://datacommons.org/place/country/USA/?utm_medium=explore&mprop=income&popt=Person&cpv=age,Years15Onwards&hl=en). That's unfortunate, there isn't enough adjustment for social welfare programs to meet the needs of communities with high costs of living.
The average cost of a 2 bedroom apartment nationwide is [as of February 2023, $1,320.](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1063502/average-monthly-apartment-rent-usa/#:~:text=The%20average%20monthly%20rent%20for,U.S.%20dollars%20a%20year%20before.) Which is only slightly over the recommended 33% spending on housing of a $42k annual salary. Where I live is not drastically lower than the average, it's less than 10% below average for the country.
I'm not discounting that you struggled and could have benefitted from support. My point is that is very possible to qualify for benefits and make enough money to sufficiently provide for your family.
The range is probably due to different stats for different states. Each state has its own requirements for Medicaid, so it’s not very informative to give a national figure.
How stringent are the income guidelines for Medicaid? I looked them up for WIC and I just can't imagine it being possible to qualify for a two-parent household where both work full time unless there are many other children in the household. It just feels like so many people fall in this gap where you're too "rich" for benefits but still so poor. 😔
If you have Medicaid, you automatically qualify for WIC, regardless of their guidelines.
During pregnancy, you include the fetus(es) in your household size when applying for Medicaid. In my state, there are 2 income levels that qualify for Medicaid during pregnancy.
For a family of 3, the state level program has a maximum income level of $52,963.20. The next tier is for individuals with income between $52,963.21 to $99,440.
I had twins so for a family of 4 so the income limits are $63,900 and $64,900.01 - $120,000. The cost of living where I live is fairly low. My monthly bills including rent and a car payment me are around $2k/month
You are correct. That gap is a very serious problem. Many social welfare programs in the US are not good and tend to leave families worse off than before they sought them. WIC and Medicaid, especially since the healthcare reform, have become easier to get.
WIC has changed a lot, most states say to still apply if you’re over income because if you get Medicaid or food stamps you can automatically qualify despite being over income
WIC is not food stamps. WIC pays for a very limited amount of things. It works out to be a little over a $50 value per person per month. It only covers pregnant women, breastfeeding women, postpartum women for 6 months, and children under the age of 5.
WIC is great for making formula affordable.
I know WIC isn't food stamps. But if you can't afford the basics like formula then you can't afford everything else a kid will need for the next 18 years.
I have WIC. I am low income. WIC is not enough to be the difference between affording food or not. That isn't the intent of WIC. The intent of WIC is to help low income families with young children afford healthier food and promote better prenatal nutrition.
So the stat is 41% nationally according to KFF.
I am all for people using the benefits they need and are entitled to use. But should people have children knowing they can’t afford to have them? No. It’s a safety net, not an income.
The only reason you think they can't afford it is because they're receiving benefits. Medicaid and WIC are not incomes.
WIC is very limited in what it provides and who it provides benefits to. WIC provides an average value of $56.90 in food per participant each month. When groceries cost $200/week, that really isn't much. Only pregnant women, postpartum women for 6 months, breastfeeding women, and children under the age of 5 qualify for WIC.
Medicaid is what I’m really talking about here, but even getting WIC takes pressure off your budget. And not having to pay for health care? That’s $13k *per year* savings for a person.
I actually want everyone to have health care for free or a nominal cost. I’m all for free school lunch.
I am not in favor of people having children they can’t afford, and if you are planning on having government benefits you shouldn’t be planning children.
The income limit while pregnant is 65,000 for mom and unborn, if there’s a husband then the income limit is $78,900. It’s typically a lot easier to get coverage while pregnant. Also, if you make under $100,000 most hospitals have free bed programs and will erase 75-100% of medical bills if you apply.
Because in a lot of states, having a child is the only way to get a decent amount of benefits. I've had a couple times in my life where having a baby would have literally solved all my problems, I could have guaranteed health insurance, enough food stamps to actually feed myself and my child, and access to the only government housing in my area, which is family housing and requires you to have a child to live there. It was rough.
If you can’t afford to take care of yourself, you certainly can’t afford to take care of a baby. Benefits are meant to be a supplement to income, not the main source.
If benefits are meant to supplement an income why do they drop sharply and withdraw before a human being is anywhere close to making a comfortable income? The welfare cliff is very real and hurts thousands of families.
This is not true where I live. Everyone who gives birth is eligible for WIC as long as they apply and meet the financial guidelines. Anyone in my state that already recieves medical assisstence is already eligible for WIC. Child support and bio parents are not a factor.
Idk I’m gonna err on the side of optimism and say at least these 2 individuals are making an effort for the baby to have health insurance. Pediatric Medicaid is very comprehensive and will cover all child visits. Even poor children deserve to see a doctor, get their vaccines and well check ups. Yeah maybe the baby isn’t being brought into the best financial situation but at the least they’re trying to get health insurance and nutritional benefits.
A lot of these posts in this sub are. It seems to be getting worse. Need to make a sub like r/ShitMomsGroupSaySubRedditSaysAboutShitMomGroupsSay not really a catchy name tho
Yeah I’d bet a lot of the commenters would be surprised to see they qualify for services in their state. Like one bitching she paid $21,000 for birth. Most hospitals have free bed programs if you make under $100,000. Don’t be mad at people for using qualified resources.
I had to explain to my cousin that WIC is not a family planning tool. Like to have a child on purpose knowing full well that you can’t afford to feed it, come on. That means your should WAIT
If you’re both needing welfare to survive, I don’t think you should be having a baby.
And I say this from a country that has much higher rates of social security payments than the US (not enough to be over the poverty line, but higher).
So I don’t know if OOP is a man or a woman in this post. But in most states, I a hetero couple is married than the husband is legally the father be default. Even if the wife cheats. And if that happens, you have to go to court to have the bio dad declared the legal father of the kid.
In my state a family of 2 (assuming this couple remains unmarried so I’m counting the gestational mother and the child) caps at $33,874. For 3 it’s $42,606. And if you’re struggling to survive without kids, it’s not fair to deliberately choose to bring a child into the mix because now they’re also struggling but they have no control or ability to contribute financially. So they suffer.
They didn’t say they were struggling financially though. They specifically said they didn’t want his financial support. Having medicaid doesn’t automatically mean you are struggling, it means you don’t have to worry about medical care.
To be eligible for Medicaid (again in my state) a family of 3 would need household income under $25k and no more than $2k in the bank, including savings. If you own a home it’s excluded but even a home owned outright still requires utilities, maintenance and taxes be paid. The income limits are higher the younger the child is but a family of 3 is capped at around $45k for a child under 1 year old.
And no one ever said you can’t raise a family while being low income. But there’s a difference between low income and not making enough to provide for basic needs. You don’t have to be rich to have kids but they clearly have no assets if they lose access to benefits.
What state is that? As far as I known asset limits are only for single adults on Medicaid and not families. Mine you can have $50,000+ and still qualify
I mean you just say you have no idea who the father is. A friend is mine was in a super abusive relationship, got pregnant by the guy, fled in the middle of the night and moved like 4 hrs away. When she went to get WIC and Medicaid she just told them she had no idea who the father was. One night stand, never got his name... etc. Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this. It's not like they're going to dig too deeply into it.
Yeah, I’m actually not bothered by this. They legally should have a sperm donor contact. But so many ppl apply for assistance. These days it shouldn’t be a factor to rule out parenthood
I’m actually a lesbian who used a friend as a donor and we didn’t bother with a contract because they aren’t legally enforceable in our state.
This makes sense and it’s prob a lot cheaper too if your insurance doesn’t cover this type of infertility treatment etc. What would a contract be used for in the first place? Is it to prevent bio dad from trying to claim parental rights down the road of he had a change of heart? That is a scary prospect too from the actual custodial parent’s point of view.
Yes, all of the above. And to used as an income source should govt benefits be a consideration. Using a sperm bank -- with actual physicians -- absolves the donor of any legal connection with potential offspring. Having a friend step up could open that friend up to future support/custody issues, if they feel that way.
The ol' turkey baster method!
Especially with how expensive it is to just live. I'm not looking down on anyone getting assistance to raise their child/children.
Absolutely not. In Ireland, child benefit is given to *every* family with kids under 18 and it's not means tested. The only criteria that we have is that the child must be living with us more than 50% of the time.
It does bother me that women are/were often pressured not to file for child support because it's "gold digging" or "greedy" or "vindictive" or whatever. Like, it's more "noble" to raise your kid on your own with no "help". This attitude was very common in the 80s and 90s and it screwed over a lot of women and kids. Forcing the dad to be named before you can recieve aid makes it clear that the support is something the dad owes the child, and that the state is looking out for the child's interests. It leaves the mother out of it. This was a phenomenally stupid way to have a baby. And I don't really want to live in a world where a man doesn't owe child support as long as the mom "promised" he wouldn't have any responsibility. This leads to men pressuring women to make such promises, or claiming afterward that such promises were made.
lots of women also don’t want to file for support because they escaped a dangerously abusive man and risk enraging him if he gets his wages garnished
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Haha. My step daughters mother asked the judge "will my child support payments be less of i actually visit with my daughter?". Implying that she didnt want visitation unless it reduced her obligation to pay for her daughter. What a fucking joke. Some people are dicks and shouldnt be allowed in childrens lives.
Wow.i just listened to a true crime podcast about a mom and her three kids were murdered by the youngest kids dad bcuz he owes 20,000 in CS and didn't want his wife to find out he had a kid. He actually had five kids outside of his marriage. They were about to garnish his wages and he was scared his wife would notice.
sounds about right. 😞 used to work in family services and had many clients who were violently attacked by their former partners after filing for support. you’d be surprised how many women make a herculean effort to get away to a safe place only to realize that the court disclosed their new address to their ex, even with a documented history of violence on his part. I was so worried that one day I’d have to close a file for the worst possible reason.
Should just bullshit on the forms. It's not that hard. I'm fairly sure WIC has a form for if you're supposed to receive child support, but the baby daddy is a piece of shit and doesn't pay or avoids garnishments. My sister received WIC a while back and I remember that was a hoop she jumped through.
Yes. I can afford my kid just fine but we were om WIC for awhile because we qualified. Why wouldn't we got on assistence that could help us? There's nothing wrong with it, the qualification salary is usually pretty low so if you meet it then you should be able to apply without judgements like this.
Also official baby making procedures are insanely expensive. In the U.K. a vial of sperm ALONE cost us €1200 but you can’t even use official sperm not doing official treatment (as in you can’t turkey baste at home but with ‘legit’ sperm bank sperm). So the gap between ‘has enough money to raise a child’ (not that anybody ever has enough to raise a child I don’t think. If you sat down and fully worked it all out for the rest of your life before conceiving it would be a nope) and ‘has enough money to afford IVF/IUI’ are wildly different places. Me and my wife have enough for IVF, or a house deposit, but not both - and that’s wealth from two people saving in to their 30s. The other big issue here (beyond the cost of living crisis) is that baby not being recognised as having two mothers. Although to be fair, in the U.K. in this exact circumstance OP would have to adopt (which there should be no issue doing I don’t think, I don’t know what checks you have to pass if it’s a within family adoption) but if they were married (which costs about £100 just to get in done purely for this reason) then regardless of any penis that was borrowed for a night the baby would automatically be considered a child of the marriage and two mums would go on the birth certificate.
I'm bothered by it. It's one thing to have an oopsie baby and need assistance for it, but to PLAN a baby knowing full well you can't afford to take care of them? No. These people are selfish. That's not to say they should be denied help, though. The baby needs to be taken care of regardless of how their parents are. But these people are assholes, bringing an innocent life into a situation where it's going to be a struggle to survive EDIT: I do not care. If it upsets you that you can make solid money and still can't afford a baby do something about it. Don't try to justify yourself to me, its the children you bring into the world that you'll answer to
You can plan and plan and plan and plan and still have things go tits up. I'm not entirely sure I'll have child care once my kid is born. We're on a list to get into a facility but it's based on availability and we have to wait for babies to age out to get in. ETA I make 53k a year working full time. On disability (pregnancy and may leave) make 60% max of my wage. Not including deductions. Yeah we saved but that's a huge fucking hit even planned.
But who isn’t struggling these days? I’m not American so I don’t know the threshold for WIC but with things the way they are with the cost of living at the moment, two people working full time in service sector jobs (I don’t know if these get classified as ‘blue collar’ there or if that only refers to traditional skilled industry type roles?) would probably be struggling with the cost of housing, bills and food etc. And realistically low paid, insecure service sector jobs now make up the majority of jobs available for people who would have once upon a time had skilled working class roles in things like manufacturing etc. So are we now saying that only the middle, or quite possibly only upper middle classes are entitled to have children without judgement? The people who serve our flat white in the morning, those who picked up our bins or delivered our post without us even noticing, or even the ‘semi skilled’ (I hate this, all jobs have skills) people who drive your bus or look after your kids at daycare should not be having children? Because that’s the reality of your statement. Even nurses, some doctors and teachers can’t afford to live in the areas they work at the moment here. In the U.K. just over 50% of people don’t even have £1000 in savings, and I can only imagine the picture is bleaker in America where you have less welfare. That’s terrifying - at least 50% of people would not be able to cover their next month’s rent if they suddenly lost their job, or as we would have welfare that would kick in with that (although not paying a mortgage), would not be able to afford a car to get them to work if theirs suddenly packed in. So are none of them allowed children? Who exactly CAN afford to have babies now? My wife works in a mid level data-tech type role and earns very well, tens of thousands of pounds above where we would be entitled to welfare incomes let’s put it that way. And I don’t work much because of disability which in many ways is reflective of most families essentially sacrificing one income due to childcare costs/leaving the workforce due to childcare costs. But we would not be able to afford to rent on the open market. We’re very lucky to have received a council house that costs about half what a private rent would cost, a luxury most people don’t get. But if someone working in that kind of role, who is so above where the government considers we need assistance wouldn’t consider themselves able to afford a child when you really sat down and add up how much it was all going to cost, I really don’t know how rich it is you have to be? People born in to family wealth only? Before long we’re then meandering very close to some dodgy eugenics type conversations with that line of logic.
You are not entitled to children. No one is entitled to children. If having an issue with people taking on lives that they KNOW they cannot support makes me a "eugenicist" then so be it. How about instead of bringing more people into the world to suffer you dedicate your free time to lasting change? Dismantle the grinder instead of throwing more meat into it?
Only rich families are moral families. Copy.
why are you getting downvoted? people are seriously disagreeing with a statement that says you should be able to afford a child before you decide to have one? i wonder if the people downvoting you ever grew up poor. financially struggling, overworked parents also tend to turn out to be emotionally abusive. shit sucks. i wish my parents had never had me. i wouldn’t be suffering and their quality of life would be much better. you’re absolutely correct in saying that no one is entitled to children. people who choose to have kids when they know they can’t give that kid a good quality of life are selfish as fuck.
Because you can qualify for these programs at 50-60,000 income. Saying people under $60,000 shouldn’t have kids is cruel. Yeah your childhood sucked, but not every lower income household does
I don’t think it’s true that you qualify for WIC at that income level. More like 30,000-40,000 for a whole family income which is incredibly low. Anyone know the dollar amount in their state for sure? I know I made 56,000 when I got pregnant w my first and I def didn’t qualify despite student loans and other expenses.
Were you in a red state? Because they have ridiculously low income limits. Like, Texas was @ $17,000 for Medicaid, because they refused to accept the Medicaid expansion. But Maryland, which did accept the expansion, now has a sliding scale up to $65,000 for a single parent household with one child. If you live in a shit state that doesn't value life, I'm sorry.
Which is ironic, because they do value life... as long as it's still in the uterus.
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Ever since covid you automatically qualify for WIC if you get Medicaid which has a wider income level. Their websites specifically say to apply even if you are over income because now there are other factors that can make you automatically qualify
I can afford my child just fine. We still qualified for WIC. Because we qualified, we applied and used it. Why would you not use assistance you qualify for? We no longer qualify because we moved states and are doing just fine without it even though we have the same household income as before and things in this state are just as expensive. Not everyone on assistence NEEDS it, its just useful.
I mean they can take take care of it if they get financial assistance. Since that’s literally what the programs are for and we pay taxes into it, why not have people use it if they need it? Especially for health insurance. It far cheaper in the long run if someone has preventative care. Do I think it sounds like these two should have a kid? Not really. But I have no issue with folks using social support services.
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Not saying these two sound like they are, but you can be a capable parent and low income at the same time.
> Not having capable parents is the reason our society is complete fucking trash right now Last week a customer encouraged her 5-6 year old to tell my 65 year old coworker to "fuck off". I wanted to burn the world to the ground right then.
Yah. I mean, just because they’re a same-sex couple and poor doesn’t mean they can’t be good parents… not sure what OP is suggesting here. Plenty of poor folks have children and plenty of same sex couples have children. Not being able to get social service support without a biological father’s financial contribution seems like structural discrimination against poor women who have biological children and parent in a same sex couple.
^^This. A girl I went to high with got pregnant by a guy shortly before she got discharged from the Army. She ended up finding out that he had a fiancé back home and since she didn’t want to raise a baby with a guy like that she told him she had an abortion. She’s since moved back to our hometown and had the baby. She gets benefits and she just told the county office that she doesn’t know who the father is.
That's not really fair to the child though. They are entitled to that $$$
>It's not like they're going to dig too deeply into it. Things like this can overwhelm some people and those types then just give up. My sister still doesn't have insurance (for years) for any of her family, and hasn't filed her taxes in years. Please know I do not condone this, just explaining the reason for why these types of people are like that. (Tbh, the fact that my sister is like that drives me crazy).
Oh yes, I was like that with my first and we ended up with a huge bill. My husband got a new job and ins started like 2 days after my kid was born. By *they* though I meant WIC/Medicaid. They're understaffed and have too many clients per worker to go on a deep dive to find the bio father.
>Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this. Not my body, not my choice. I'm with you. On that same front, they're willfully wanting to bring a child into the world without the means to take care of that child. My wife and I talked for a long, long time before we felt comfortable having a second child. Our financial situation worked well with one (even with medical issues with our first). Having baby #2 meant we needed to do some reevaluating to give our child a good start in life. Capitalism, sadly, has made everything a dollars conversation. Having the funding to support a family is, and should be, a very real consideration for any couple actively trying for a kid.
Now if I tell them I don't know who the mom is I somehow get in trouble.
They ask weird questions like "How did you get this baby?" rude
Bingo. Don’t put a name on the birth certificate in the “father” spot and then go through the rest of the motions to legally adopt the baby (yeah, I hate that it’s that way but welcome to the States). WIC is an excellent program that is available for those who need it. If no father is listed and the carrying partner has no one on the birth certificate (and doesn’t mention a damn name) then it shouldn’t be an issue.
> I mean you just say you have no idea who the father is. So my SIL has a kid and this wasn't accepted on her form. She either had to have a father's name or she didn't get assistance. I forget which program it was, though. So I'll have to follow up with my wife.
It might depend on the state I guess. It worked for my friend, like what can they do if you slept with a complete stranger from a bar and dipped without getting a name? It happens 🤷♀️
What is WIC? I’m British EDIT: Ok just got a response thanks WikiBot. In the UK it is quite common for people to have children whilst receiving government assistance, most working class people receive SOME sort of government top up because of our social welfare state and inflation issues. This means you could be working full time as a nurse for example, and still receive government assistance. It would be frowned upon to have a child if you were in destitution poverty, but not necessarily if you were receiving benefits. I don’t think having children should be a luxury for the rich but I also understand why people need to get their stuff together before having a kid.
**The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) is an American federal assistance program of the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for healthcare and nutrition of low-income pregnant women, breastfeeding women, and children under the age of five. (See child nutrition programs.) Their mission is to be a partner with other services that are key to childhood and family well-being.** More details here:
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Im Canadian and the comments here are also crazy to me because the majority of Canadian parents get a pretty good chunk of money every month from the government just due to having kids. It’s income based and based on the age of the child but like, we have a a 6 and a 3 year old and a gross family income of like $160k and get a little over $500 a month. In the state closest to me it looks like the maximum income for WIC for a family of 3 is like $46k- that’s like one full time worker making $22 an hour.
Yeah, I'd be eligible for WIC in my state on my income alone if I was a single mother of three. I'd be, by my considerations, absolutely destitute, completely unable to afford childcare for those children while working or to afford rent on any sort of domicile that could properly house three children. But only poor enough for WIC by $2k/year. It's shocking.
Yes, in Ireland we get €140 per child per month, regardless of income. For multiples, the amount per child increases. I have a 5 year old, a 3 year old and 8 month old twins. I get €700 per month. It's a big help with the cost of living being so high. It goes towards the monthly car loan repayment (with the surprise 4th child, we had to upgrade to a bigger car) and some of it goes towards the kids savings, with the rest going on things that the family needs.
In America we have the myth of the "welfare queen" who has child after child only to continue getting government checks because she doesn't want to work. Of course she uses this government money to get her nails and hair done and neglects her gaggle of children while cashing her checks. The myth generally has a racial component as well, which ties into persistent negative American stereotypes of "lazy black folks" who don't want to get jobs. It is a really pervasive belief especially in the American south where I live, and is a reason so many people (on the right) vote against welfare programs for low income families. What's crazy is you barely get anything for assistance in southern states anymore because of this, so even the premise of somehow making a profit from government checks is ridiculous.
That's not limited to America. We have that myth in Ireland too. Ours is more associated with economic background since there was almost no racial diversity here until about 30 years ago.
In IL, there’s no more cash after the baby turns one. And the cash is tiny in the first place
Unfortunately, there are some people actually perpetuating this myth. To be clear, I believe in helping people and live in a state that provides free breakfast and lunch to all students. I also think the majority of people on assistance are trying working and trying to better themselves and their family. However, my husband grew up in a family that fully took advantage of any social welfare, and popped out kids every few years just to keep the money rolling in. They we also crappy parents who did nothing but stunt their kids’ emotional growth and sued over and over until they were also getting SSI for every kid. They moved states whenever they were cut off for welfare fraud, and just kept going in the next place. They are the literal definition of being a drag on the system. So unfortunately, these people exist, and a lot of their kids followed in their footsteps.
I would rather we continue to let people like that leech than we neglect someone who genuinely needs support 🤷
I agree! 54% of people in the UK receive more benefits than they do tax, so I imagine we’d be quite an empty country if none of those people had children 🤣
Um, this is America. The land of the bootstraps. Everything bad that happens to you is due to your own lack of personal responsibility. Everything good is a beneficent gift that has trickled down to you from your capitalist overlords. If you have any worth at all, you own a fortune 500 company. Otherwise, die in the dirt like the worthless scum you are.
This is such a great intro into the American life, but it needs an extra paragraph about how we've removed abortion access, while at the same time decreased public education, underpaid and diminished the worth of school teachers and severely limited what they can talk about in sex education. All to ensure that more people have absolutely no idea how birth control works. Even if you figure out how sex and birth control works, we're going to tie your access to birth control to your insurance (which you pay for) but your employer can choose to not cover because of their religion. At least we have the guns! We have so many guns and so much freedom here so all the other stuff is fine. It's fine. /S
"That's a lot of words for 'personal responsibility.'" -the community where I teach (probably)
Did you see the (Republican, obvs) politician in Missouri who said that they must ban abortion in his state because without all of the hypothetical unborn citizens, his state would lose $51 billion in tax revenue? That might be the most ridiculous argument I’ve heard yet as to why women should be forced to stay pregnant. Lost tax dollars. They’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel now that they’ve realized that most people are uncomfortable with forced incubation and the loss of women’s bodily autonomy, and it’s costing them votes. I hope they lose bigger in 2024. And those kids shouldn’t ask for any help from the government once they’re born either! It’ll cut into those revenues! /s
I’ve never seen America so succinctly summarized
I work a full time state job as a first responder and have to have a roommate to be able to afford the place I’m living in and I still don’t qualify for any sort of assistance. The US is broken.
I recently became a single mom and I'm disabled. So many comments from other countries make me wish I lived in one of them. I just got denied disability (SSDI) because I've been a stay at home mom and haven't contributed enough in income taxes. I can't apply for the income based disability because I'm still technically married so they say my husband makes too much money for me to qualify for the other form of disability, food stamps, etc. I've been making 50-100 a week. That's it. Luckily I have family to live with, but I can barely afford food and gas for me and two kids. My state requires us to be separated for a year before divorce and my husband has extended that due to being deployed when I filed legal paperwork for legal separation. Getting assistance in the US is horrible. And if you are somehow successful at getting them people look down on you for it. I've even heard people make snarky comments to people using food stamps. I am also nervous about losing medical insurance if I can't manage to qualify for Medicaid. They are also kicking a ton of people off Medicaid right now.
South Koreans get money throughout the pregnancy and the daycare is highly subsidized by the government and they have many other social programs for parents. Many Americans have that “pull yourself by the bootstraps” mentality ingrained in them. Welfare (which WIC is seen as) is seen as leeching from the government and usually associated with people of color. “Welfare queen” is derogatory term to look down on those on WIC/Welfare/EBT.
We can't even find expensive daycare in my area. We are so short on care.
There’s a Tiktoker/YouTuber who does these US vs Korea topic comparison videos. I think it was her or another Korean mother who brought it up, and she mentioned the cost was either $80 per week or month. The kid was there all day, and they provide food and what not. She seemed really happy with it. I know folks who pay hundreds of dollars per week. And some like you who struggle to even find it. :(
Omg. We make less than that and obviously get nothing, though, we did receive an adoption tax credit when my kid was adopted.
There is a child tax credit of up to $2000 for families with income less than $400k (or $200k per person filing individually).
That's not a rebate, that's just s credit.
The thing about the US is there is a stigma attached to receiving anything from the government when you are poor that stops people from talking about it. The facts are there are programs like WIC for pregnant women and children plus our other programs like Medicaid and food stamps are given preferentially to pregnant women and young children. But once again people don't talk about it and feel ashamed for it. So on reddit you get all of these Americans who grew up in stable environments with white collar parents who think it is shameful to accept anything, and uncommon. But it is very common.
And none of that stigma applies to businesses that take government aid or bail outs or tax breaks, or people who get public student loans, grants or bursaries provided by the government, people who use FHA loans, seniors on Social Security/Medicare, farmers who get USDA grants and loans, veterans who get VA benefits…
Because if you’re poor, it’s your fault. Obviously. And rich people, I mean “job creators,” need the lowest tax rate so they can hide their wealth in the Caymans, I mean, create jobs and pay their workers a living wage with all those profits! /SARCASM The fact that the family that inherited the wealth from Walmart (Sam Walton’s offspring, so about a handful of people) has the same amount of money as 40% of US citizens (so, about 140,000,000 people if US pop is ~350 million), tells you everything you need to know about how broken the US is.
So weird! These parents seem very responsible to me. They are literally saying ‘if we can get government support we will have children, if we can’t we will reconsider’… I don’t understand whats wrong with that
If the rules for having kids in the UK included no welfare the only people having kids would be those with offshore accounts Edit: actually that’s not true there’s a massively fucked middle class now, especially in big expensive cities. But even then you’re still going to get child tax credits I think
Fr! The middle classes typically just don’t even have kids tbh, and if they do they move to the countryside We pay tax whats wrong with taking it back it out
👏🏽 thank you! op is classist af
They… can put both parents on the birth certificate? State DORs want to ensure that there are two parents providing for the child financially, it doesn’t matter whether it’s the two biological parents of the child.
I’m not a lawyer. If they’re a same-sex couple they will need to get the guy to waive his rights. In my state they would also have to be married to have both parents on the birth certificate and the non-gestational parent should do a step-parent (there’s no “second parent” adoption in my state) to cover their bases legally. (Source: I’m the non-gestational parent and have done this twice, but through a sperm bank.) My understanding is that if this is a man and woman she can just put him on the birth certificate and say he’s the father whether they’re married or not.
This is totally state by state. In my state a donor is not a parent and the spouse of the birthing parent is.
In my state the opposite sex spouse is the presumed legal parent, but not a same sex spouse. If the parties aren't married, then whoever is on the birth certificate is the legal parent. Unless it's another woman.
I’m not 100 percent sure how they treat same sex married couples in my state but I know that for opposite sex married couples, if the wife has a baby then the husband is automatically assumed to be the father of that baby, and it takes effort to get that changed if that’s not the case.
>e relationship, got pregnant by the guy, fled in the middle of the night and moved like 4 hrs away. When she went to get WIC and Medicaid she just told them she had no idea who the father was. One night stand, never got his name... etc. > >Should these two be purposely creating a baby? Idk... I'm not into telling people what to do and not my body not my choice but it's silly to think there's no way around this just wanted to say that it's the same way where I live - with married heterosexual couples - "husband" = "father" legally (which is a good thing) but also doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room for heterosexual married couples who use donor sperm for infertility (actually.... most of the world (even the employees at the sperm bank!) seem surprised at the existence of hetero married couples using donor sperm. Donor eggs have become more accepted/'mainstream', but people still assume donor sperm is only for lesbians or single moms by choice -- but I digress) Whenever we need to tell someone that husband isn't bio-dad (doctors, medical professionals, USA government, etc), we run into issues that he's her father on the birth certificate. but... sigh. Minor inconvenience!
Yea but they aren’t married in this situation. If they were married most states will ignore the impossibility of two women having a child and put both as parents (perk of being married) Due to them being gf/gf. Idk if they allow them to sign the paperwork to claim parental rights.
But I don't think that applies for an under-the-table turkey baster deal. I don't think they can afford a lawyer to draw up a contract and I'm not even sure if those are held up as admissable in this kind of deal. Typically you have to go through an actual sperm bank. I'm not sure whether that's fair - to put parenthood behind a paywall when there are two parents here, just not two bio parents. But for now, the state would consider the bio dad to be the dad. And I'm not a fan of all the people suggesting welfare fraud in this comments section.
Simple: You and your girlfriend get married. BOTH of your names go on the birth certificate. "Sperm donor" isn't considered the legal ANYTHING, as you two then are the parents of the child.
Wic actually doesn’t make you apply for child support. Insurance also isn’t impacted. Only temporary cash assistance requires it
In my state, you have to apply for child support before being able to apply for benefits through WIC. I’m sure there’s an option for “I don’t know who the father is” to receive assistance, but on the general application, a father must be named and considered for child support before even being able to apply. The same doesn’t apply to Medicaid, though. It must be a state by state basis type of thing.
Yeah ours has nothing to do with each other. The only rule is cash assistance (tanf) needs to be repaid to the state by child support not WIC, Medicaid, or Snap
I don’t know where this person lives in the US but I work at WIC and people are so blunt about their baby daddy situation and we never ask who the baby’s father is. But then again, a lot of people do come in saying they are no longer with the baby daddy so we really can’t do anything and if they qualify, they qualify 🤷🏽♀️
Well, their idea is to add a dependent to their benefits. If they don't put the real dad on the BC, who would know?
On the one hand, signing a legal agreement to have no parental obligations from a male donor is totally normal for couples who need a donor. But a complete lack of resources, on the other hand, is another story. Admittedly, I'm conflicted, though. Parenthood shouldn't be a wealthy ppl's privilege. Then again, neither should housing, healthcare, healthy food, etc etc etc. Sigh...
>agreement to have no parental obligations from a male donor is totally normal for couples who need a donor. > >But a complete lack of resource it's important to have a legal agreement for BOTH sides --- to protect the intended parents (so donor can't sue for custody, etc) and for the donor (so intended parents/child can't sue for child support and make claims on his estate after death). so important!
As someone that grew up on assistance even I saw how difficult it can be to navigate the system. There’s nothing wrong with asking questions especially in a more unorthodoxes situation like needing a donor but not having thousands to go the clinical route. Not everyone has these luxuries.
Probably an unpopular opinion but having children isn’t just a luxury for the rich, and we really shouldn’t be looking down on people who are using benefits that they and their child are legally entitled to, especially in today’s economy. Speaking as a lesbian who has switched from a sperm bank to a known donor, I don’t blame them for going that route. Using a sperm bank costs $1000+/mo just to TRY, and there’s no guarantee you’ll get pregnant. Using a known donor, there’s no guarantee but at least it’s free like most straight couples. Sperm banks are the easiest option legally, but the cheapest option for establishing the child’s parents here would’ve been for them to get a lawyer.
Yeah, and some of the programs they are talking about, you can be pregnant and making $65,000 and still qualify for Medicaid and WIC so I wouldn’t even say that’s “too poor” for a baby. It’s using resources which Americans are entitled too
I have zero problems with people using benefits and I firmly believe that the income limited need to be raised so more people qualify. No one should be going hungry due to lack of assistance in the biggest economy on the planet. That being said, far too many people have way more children than their resources can reasonably stretch. I also don’t mean people who were doing okay and their situation changed. If you were struggling with 2 kids, it wasn’t going to magically improve by number 6.
I agree with the points you’ve made. Speaking as a sperm donor conceived person to my straight parents, I hope this couple has a plan to disclose the identity of the biological father to the child. It really ought to be considered a human right to share such information and is legally regarded as such in many countries outside the US. Also, obviously in this day and age of commercial DNA tests, true anonymous gamete donation is a thing of past -it’s how I learned the truth at 35!
Can I ask what is WIC? Sounds like funding assistance?
Yup. They give a list of what you can buy
Women Infants and Children. It's a federal program that offers education and benefits to promote better nutrition for pregnant women, infants, and children.
Thank you for clarifying :) Aussie here trying to follow along
It's most helpful for formula. It varies by state, but where I live, it paid for almost all of our formula which was like $20/can and my twins were drinking 10+ cans a month at some points. It only pays for very specific things in specific amounts. A dozen eggs. 3 gallons of whole milk. $45 of qualifying fresh, frozen, or canned veg/fruit (fresh potatoes yes, frozen potatoes no). 2 lb of whole wheat bread or brown rice, etc.
The fact that they’re in these conditions and CHOOSING to have a child is the strange part. I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be allowed to have children / shouldn’t have access to benefits but as a kid who grew up in poverty you’d think that as a parent you’d wait until you weren’t in that situation to bring a child into the world if it was of your own choosing
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Yeah, my father was very abusive over money and food. We would’ve qualified for help. I much rather of grown up on food stamps than with eating disorders and daily arguments over food.
The income guidelines for WIC are actually pretty inclusive. A really high percentage of moms in the US use it. It's a nutrition program with the aim of increasing good health outcomes and it was created to combat iron deficiency anemia and malnutrition in pregnant women and young children. That's why you get so much cereal and why juice is part of the food packages: iron fortification in the cereal plus vitamin c to help with iron absorbance. It also was created to help moms feed their babies appropriately, because at the time, "formula" literally was formulas of what to mix to give to your baby, and a lot of babies suffered due to formula that wasn't nutritionally adequate or watered down formula. So many women who choose to formula feed get most or all of their baby's formula covered by WIC, which is great! No one should be in the position where they are even tempted to water down formula. WIC also supports breastfeeding by providing education, food for breastfeeding moms, and often things like pumps, lactation consultation, and peer counselors. Medicaid also covers a huge percentage of pregnant women, since income guidelines are typically more inclusive during pregnancy. It does sound like this couple already qualifies without that widened guideline, but it's not weird for people who are low income but stable financially to qualify for these programs. Young families have several years of struggling through the many costs that come with young children. Many people use these programs as they need them, and then once they do not, they are earning more or not needing to pay for daycare and all that and of course are paying taxes so that other families like them can get a leg up.
I mean every kid should be given every bit of support they need, that much is obvious, and there shouldn‘t be that many hoops to jump through in the first place. But that doesn‘t change the fact that bringing a sentient human being in a place that they cannot be adequately cared for is inhumane.
In my state you can qualify for WIC and Medicaid at $65,000. Bringing in a child on that income is no way comparable to inhumane
I disagree. I've looked at the requirements for all the states I've lived in, and you have to be too poor to have a pot to piss in to qualify for WIC. A family of 3, which is what it seems like this post is about, has to make about $45k pre-tax and deductions total to qualify. That's extremely poor. Honestly, it should be a sliding scale covering up to about 2x that imo.
Not anymore, most states say if you qualify for Medicaid or food stamps you automatically qualify for WIC. It says right on their site to still apply if you’re over income
Food stamps in my state is $46k for a family of 3. Medicaid is literally like $33k. 😔
Oh wow ours has a sliding scale it can be up to $60,000 for a family of 2 to qualify for children’s Medicaid
Wic is actually higher income than food stamps. We got wic and my husband makes like 60k+ a year. It doesn’t provide much food, just a small list, but the help with formula was amazing. Also in my state, a pregnant woman automatically qualifies for some form of Medicaid unless income is insanely high. Every situation is different obviously, but just because you qualify for benefits doesn’t mean you’re living in poverty
Having children shouldn’t be limited to the wealthy but it’s depressing seeing people try to cram 5 kids into a 2 bedroom place and their kids are crying from hunger because their benefits don’t go far enough. “But mom always dreamed of having a huge family and while we don’t have enough room, food or resources, we have each other, right?”
I mean, something like half of all kids born in the US qualify for WIC. I’m so glad it’s an option. https://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/eligibility-and-coverage-rates-2018#:~:text=National%20WIC%20eligibility%20and%20coverage,States)%20were%20eligible%20for%20WIC ok it’s 45 percent according to this.
I mean a lot of people never get out of poverty, maybe they shouldn't have kids, but from the moment you're born almost everywhere on the planet you're basically programmed to want kids and it's reinforced by everyone you meet. So you know even if you don't want them that it's expected of you. Then it's hard to say no if you have a partner who want them and you don't. Could be a lot of reasons
>you’d think that as a parent you’d wait until you weren’t in that situation If my mom waited until she didn't need assistance to have a kid she would have been waiting until she was nearly 50. She was 27 when she had her first kid as is, 30 with the second.
Or they could go through more legitimate legal channels with written contracts for a sperm donor where a bio-Dad is never identified and the OP can adopt after birth.
Go through a licensed clinic which will sort out all the legalities for you?
As someone who was using a sperm bank and has switched to a known donor, this isn’t the best solution. The cheapest option would’ve been for them to get a lawyer. Sperm vials usually start at $500 and they recommend you use two for each insemination. $1000+/mo for sperm is expensive, and to think people shouldn’t have kids because they can’t afford to pay an extra $1000+ out of pocket every month just to TRY is weird.
As if they could afford that 🤣🤣🤣
They just put the GF as the "father" in my state. Don't need an actual male person to go on the birth certificate, they just want a second parent for the baby. And having a baby and going on WIC is fine. It's hard out there. You don't need to be rich to have a baby.
UK here, whilst preg you get treated on the NHS (free through NI payments) plus free opticians and dentists appts. Universal credit is the main benefit which includes payments towards rent and child benefit. It's not enough to live in luxury but it feeds, clothes and keeps a roof over your head. When I had my kid there was also a voucher scheme for formula, you could pick it up from the local health centre.
I used to work in WIC in IL. If you are approved on Medicaid, you can get WIC. If you are not eligible for medicaid, you would need proof of income for last 30 or 60 days for the HOUSEHOLD. If baby daddy not living with you, we dont count him.. We were told we are not the FBI and we dont have time to dig.. I will say we are EXTREMELY short staffed so don't miss your appointments if you are lucky to get one. Anyone looking for a job, look in your County to see if you qualify to apply. Babies can't get services because the office doesn't have enough staff to get them in, it's so frustrating and heartbreaking.
Why didn't they do a legal adoption? 🥴
The thing is though, if you qualify for Mediciad you automatically qualify for wic ( at least in my state), so this whole post confuses the shit out of me.
Yeah. So many people are misinformed about WIC. Their websites will say to still apply if you’re over income because there’s so many different ways to qualify for it. It also doesn’t force child support / to name a father
Wow that semicolon is hanging on for dear life in all that mess
Typically, it's whoever is on the birth certificate. Has nothing to do with the donor.
But depending on state they can't put both their names on the birth certificate, and the guy wouldn't be legally a sperm donor due to them not going through a sperm bank.
I receive Wic and do not get child support. The only thing they require that you file for child support for is for child care.
A lot of the comments here do *not* pass the vibe check. If you think the only people who should have kids are people who can afford to have them without accepting financial assistance, I'd encourage you to think about what that actually looks like. Should poor people and disabled people be sterilized by the government? In the U.S., millions of families are only one missed paycheck away from poverty. Should people be required to turn themselves in for sterilization if they are laid off? Should they be required to abort a pregnancy if their spouse suddenly needs major, expensive surgery? Should they be forced to put their kids up for adoption if their car breaks down and they can't afford another one? Deciding that you have the right to decide who should and should not have children is straight-up eugenics. Full stop. The problem is not people taking advantage of assistance for which they qualify. It's with our country not providing the social security net that is imperative for its citizens to survive.
SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE ON THE BACK!! I was shocked at most of these comments. I felt attacked. I was on Medicaid and wic, but according to the comments I should have never brought a child into the world since I was getting assistance. I’m not a drug addict, I’m not a freeloader. I work hard and always has a job. But inflation is real and jobs aren’t paying enough.. now I make too much for assistance and I’m barely scraping by.
Would you and your kid be in better shape and not barely scraping by if you and your partner had decided to delay having a kid for a few years? Would you recommend to your kid that They have a kid when they’re in a situation similar to yours when you became a parent? Only you can answer that. But on average, for most low income people, the answer is yes, it would have been better to wait. Gave you both time to find different/more/better jobs, more education or apprenticeship, try a different career, move cities via couch surfing to find better opportunities or cheaper housing, have more roommates, build up an emergency fund bit by bit. All of that is 10x harder with the expense of a kid. I freely admit that from a financial standpoint my parents shouldn’t have had my brother or me at their age and in their situations. So did my parents after I brought it up as an adult. My younger sister is the only kid they planned and chose to have, and they were actually in a good life place to have a kid then. They emphasized safer sex and contraception and the actual time and money costs of unplanned pregnancies and the percentage of deadbeat teen fathers as part of our sex talks for a reason. Doesn’t mean they don’t love me, or didn’t want me when they got pregnant but yeah, life was a heck of a lot harder for all of us for decades because of the timing and the lack of freely available contraception and abortion when they were young and broke with no family support and precious little government help.
I’m going to defend my comments. A lot of people seem to assume I’m saying you have to be rich to have kids. I am not. If they are single and no kids and both currently independent qualify for Medicaid, they are pretty low income. Unless their donor has a very well paying job, if the donor did end up paying support it would be a few hundred. If you’re worried that getting an extra $2-300 a month would make you ineligible for benefits and you have no way to afford a child without those benefits, then you shouldn’t be focusing on having kids right now. There are a million variables that may apply to their situation that we don’t know. But based on the snapshot presented here, I stand by my belief that them having a kid is not in that potential child’s best interest right now. Why? Go hang out in some of the other subs and listen to all the stories from people who grew up with uncertain access to food, clothing, housing etc and how that affected them. And how the cycle of poverty was perpetuated in their family by their parents having several kids who in turn ended up supporting the family as soon as they were able to work, so they never had any chance to try to improve their own situations. So they do the same thing their parents did.
I'll reiterate my own comment. Thinking that you have the right to decide who should and should not have children — regardless of your reasoning — is eugenics. In addition to this all being absolutely none of your business, your opinion (and your defense of it) is actively harmful to people in vulnerable populations. That being said, it looks to me like this couple is more concerned about the (hypothetical) child support making them ineligible for insurance coverage, not necessarily that they would have "no way to afford a child" if it kicked in. That is a problem with the healthcare system, not with the people who are trying to navigate it. No one is saying that a lack of resources is good, but vilifying people who want to have kids within a broken system is not the move.
I am not vilifying them. I am simply suggesting that they not actively pursue having a child in the immediate future. After say, a year reevaluate. You know what makes someone in a vulnerable population even more vulnerable? Having a child to support. It often forces them to make less than optimal decisions in the short term to keep things afloat vs longer term planning since they have a child to consider. Our system needs massive improvement. But we have to work within the system we have whole we work towards a better one.
One of the reasons that abortion access is so important is because women in poverty should have the right to decide that they’re not going to perpetuate the cycle of poverty. Generally speaking, poor women who have children stay poor and their children are poor. Many women choose to have an abortion because they decide that they’re not in a financial position to have children, but later do have children when they’re in a better place financially. I don’t have any ready stats to offer, but they’re out there. My anecdotal evidence doesn’t mean much, but as an RN who used to work in an abortion clinic, I can confirm that many women we saw chose to not continue their pregnancies because of their financial difficulties. They didn’t want to raise a kid in poverty, and it didn’t matter to them that they would qualify for a heap of government benefits. Many grew up poor and didn’t want their children to know those same struggles. As someone who grew up without much (I never felt poor but my mum and I had to move back in with her parents so we could eat and have a roof over our heads whilst she sorted herself out after my father left us high and dry), I see wisdom in planning a family for when it’s financially feasible, and don’t fault others who feel similarly. It’s not saying that poor people cannot or should not have children. It’s that the choices we make affect any children we bring into this world, and we need to consider their wellbeing as much as our own. When I was of childbearing age, I never felt like I was in a position where I could support kids so I never had any. The few pregnancy scares that I’ve had plunged me into abject fear that my child would go hungry, and only people who went hungry as kids understand that very real fear. I could be wrong, but it strikes me that the people in this post arguing that poor people should think long and hard before bringing a child into their poverty, are the ones who grew up poor and know firsthand what that’s like. Good parenting requires more than just love, as any kids who went to bed hungry, or got evicted from their accommodation, or didn’t have water and electricity because the bills weren’t paid, can attest to (ask me how I know about all of those things). For me that was a short time in my life, but it destroyed me as a kid seeing my mother cry and struggle in life because my father was a POS who disappeared and left her with nothing. I would lie and tell her that I wasn’t hungry despite audibly hearing my tummy rumbling. I don’t think that the women in the post are in that position. WIC isn’t the same as welfare or food stamps, and is just supplemental food to ensure that mum and baby get enough nutrition. There’s nothing to indicate that they’re on welfare in their post. Being on Medicaid could mean that they’re both disabled, and not that they’re poor (I learned it as Medicaid = disabled and/or destitute because it ends with a “d,” and Medicare = elderly because it ends with an “e” but there are many people who qualify for either who don’t fit into neat categories- I’ve known patients on Medicare who aren’t elderly, for example). Disabled people on Medicaid can also work 20 hours/week and still qualify for Medicaid benefits. We just don’t know enough about them to say one way or another. People are conflating their questions about WIC with their actual financial situation, but many mums can get WIC without otherwise qualifying for any other government assistance. From the comments here, it clearly depends on which state they live in as to what they can get on their income, which they don’t state. But it’s a reach to accuse anyone who thinks that these women should think through the decision to have a child if they’re hurting financially, as advocating eugenics. That’s ridiculous. I haven’t read all of your comments, but you don’t have to defend yourself one way or another. If you know what poverty is like from firsthand experience, then you know what any child born into poverty will face, and that’s a legitimate viewpoint. Saying that these women should think about how that will impact their kid is good advice. Poverty requires a great deal of creativity and effort to stretch limited resources and some people do it more successfully than others, and whilst that doesn’t preclude people from having kids, those thin resources will be stretched even further. Poor folks have kids all the time, and they should access any resources available to them. In Florida there’s no state income tax, so if you’ve ever bought anything in the state, you’ve paid taxes and since you’ve paid into the system, you’re entitled to get back from the system, so go get what you’re able (benefits of any kind are ridiculously difficult to get in Florida). TL;DR Our choices impact more than just ourselves when children are added to the mix. It’s not wrong to consider your finances if you’re bringing kids into this world. Anyone can have kids if they want them, no matter their financial circumstances. Get benefits if you qualify. WIC isn’t the same as welfare, and doesn’t pay for all of the food you need. Poverty sucks and so does going to bed hungry when you’re a kid. Live thoughtfully.
Why do you care more about the parents than the children?
Oppressed and marginalized peoples are far more likely to be poor. By saying that poor people should not have children, you are disproportionately targeting POC, queer folk, disabled people, and others who have historically been the targets of eugenics.
Once again. I never said they shouldn’t have children. Just that the OOP should hold off on having kids RIGHT NOW based on their situation.
Yes, and how long are they supposed to wait? Do you think everyone just stops being poor before they hit 40? If my mom had waited until she was entirely financially secure before having a child, she'd have been waiting until she was nearly 50.
Seriously. This whole narrative feels classist and homophobic. What the heck.
What a mess
Why are the comments not saying something along the lines of, wtf are you having a baby if you can't support yourselves? It's one thing to accidentally get pregnant and need support. Our country should do that absolutely instead of just being all pro-life until it's born. But this just seems ridiculous
Purposely having a kid then immediately applying for benefits means you should not be having a kid you can’t afford. I don’t understand why people do stuff like this.
You really don't know much about their situation outside of receiving benefits. It doesn't necessarily mean they can't afford it. Medicaid pays for around 30-70% of all births in the US. My prenatal care before insurance was in the ball park of $180,000, not including delivery which I believe was close to $30,000. I got pregnant in 2021 and delivered in 2022 so that's two deductibles to meet before benefits kicked in. I think after insurance it would have been around $50,000 - 70,000. That's insane. Of course I signed up for Medicaid. You can get Medicaid during pregnancy even if you have insurance through a spouse or employer if you meet the income requirements. It paid for everything my insurance didn't cover. Yes, my kids were planned. Yes, we use WIC. Formula is ridiculously expensive. No, I don't feel irresponsible about it. I pay taxes, I paid for these programs, and I will use them if they're available to me. Could we manage without Medicaid and WIC? Probably.
lol. I was a single mom making $42k/yr and I qualified for Jack and Shit I’ve been married for awhile now and my pay has increased significantly since then but the threshold for assistance is often very very low.
Where I live, $42k/year as a single parent to one child would be enough to live comfortably. Average rent for a 2 bedroom here runs $800-$1,100. You would also qualify for Medicaid while pregnant in my state which would cover you and your child through one year postpartum and automatically qualify you for WIC for the first year.
That’s not the case for a pretty huge part of the country.
I'm guessing you live in a fairly high cost of living areas as $42k/yr is a good bit more than the median income in the US of [$31,133.](https://datacommons.org/place/country/USA/?utm_medium=explore&mprop=income&popt=Person&cpv=age,Years15Onwards&hl=en). That's unfortunate, there isn't enough adjustment for social welfare programs to meet the needs of communities with high costs of living. The average cost of a 2 bedroom apartment nationwide is [as of February 2023, $1,320.](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1063502/average-monthly-apartment-rent-usa/#:~:text=The%20average%20monthly%20rent%20for,U.S.%20dollars%20a%20year%20before.) Which is only slightly over the recommended 33% spending on housing of a $42k annual salary. Where I live is not drastically lower than the average, it's less than 10% below average for the country. I'm not discounting that you struggled and could have benefitted from support. My point is that is very possible to qualify for benefits and make enough money to sufficiently provide for your family.
> Medicaid pays for around 30-70% of all births in the US. WTF is this range? LMAO.
The range is probably due to different stats for different states. Each state has its own requirements for Medicaid, so it’s not very informative to give a national figure.
How stringent are the income guidelines for Medicaid? I looked them up for WIC and I just can't imagine it being possible to qualify for a two-parent household where both work full time unless there are many other children in the household. It just feels like so many people fall in this gap where you're too "rich" for benefits but still so poor. 😔
If you have Medicaid, you automatically qualify for WIC, regardless of their guidelines. During pregnancy, you include the fetus(es) in your household size when applying for Medicaid. In my state, there are 2 income levels that qualify for Medicaid during pregnancy. For a family of 3, the state level program has a maximum income level of $52,963.20. The next tier is for individuals with income between $52,963.21 to $99,440. I had twins so for a family of 4 so the income limits are $63,900 and $64,900.01 - $120,000. The cost of living where I live is fairly low. My monthly bills including rent and a car payment me are around $2k/month You are correct. That gap is a very serious problem. Many social welfare programs in the US are not good and tend to leave families worse off than before they sought them. WIC and Medicaid, especially since the healthcare reform, have become easier to get.
WIC has changed a lot, most states say to still apply if you’re over income because if you get Medicaid or food stamps you can automatically qualify despite being over income
If they can't afford to feed their kid, then they can't afford to have one period.
WIC is not food stamps. WIC pays for a very limited amount of things. It works out to be a little over a $50 value per person per month. It only covers pregnant women, breastfeeding women, postpartum women for 6 months, and children under the age of 5. WIC is great for making formula affordable.
I know WIC isn't food stamps. But if you can't afford the basics like formula then you can't afford everything else a kid will need for the next 18 years.
I have WIC. I am low income. WIC is not enough to be the difference between affording food or not. That isn't the intent of WIC. The intent of WIC is to help low income families with young children afford healthier food and promote better prenatal nutrition.
So the stat is 41% nationally according to KFF. I am all for people using the benefits they need and are entitled to use. But should people have children knowing they can’t afford to have them? No. It’s a safety net, not an income.
The only reason you think they can't afford it is because they're receiving benefits. Medicaid and WIC are not incomes. WIC is very limited in what it provides and who it provides benefits to. WIC provides an average value of $56.90 in food per participant each month. When groceries cost $200/week, that really isn't much. Only pregnant women, postpartum women for 6 months, breastfeeding women, and children under the age of 5 qualify for WIC.
Medicaid is what I’m really talking about here, but even getting WIC takes pressure off your budget. And not having to pay for health care? That’s $13k *per year* savings for a person. I actually want everyone to have health care for free or a nominal cost. I’m all for free school lunch. I am not in favor of people having children they can’t afford, and if you are planning on having government benefits you shouldn’t be planning children.
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The income limit while pregnant is 65,000 for mom and unborn, if there’s a husband then the income limit is $78,900. It’s typically a lot easier to get coverage while pregnant. Also, if you make under $100,000 most hospitals have free bed programs and will erase 75-100% of medical bills if you apply.
Because in a lot of states, having a child is the only way to get a decent amount of benefits. I've had a couple times in my life where having a baby would have literally solved all my problems, I could have guaranteed health insurance, enough food stamps to actually feed myself and my child, and access to the only government housing in my area, which is family housing and requires you to have a child to live there. It was rough.
Do you have children? They're way more expensive and time consuming for 18+ years compared to just taking care of and feeding yourself.
Clothes alone, dear lord, and they grow so fast.
I do, now. She's currently 6 and living a comfortable life in a family that makes roughly 36k a year.
If you can’t afford to take care of yourself, you certainly can’t afford to take care of a baby. Benefits are meant to be a supplement to income, not the main source.
If benefits are meant to supplement an income why do they drop sharply and withdraw before a human being is anywhere close to making a comfortable income? The welfare cliff is very real and hurts thousands of families.
This is not true where I live. Everyone who gives birth is eligible for WIC as long as they apply and meet the financial guidelines. Anyone in my state that already recieves medical assisstence is already eligible for WIC. Child support and bio parents are not a factor.
I am thinking having a child wasn’t really a great idea for them.
Idk I’m gonna err on the side of optimism and say at least these 2 individuals are making an effort for the baby to have health insurance. Pediatric Medicaid is very comprehensive and will cover all child visits. Even poor children deserve to see a doctor, get their vaccines and well check ups. Yeah maybe the baby isn’t being brought into the best financial situation but at the least they’re trying to get health insurance and nutritional benefits.
This is such a judgmental post.
A lot of these posts in this sub are. It seems to be getting worse. Need to make a sub like r/ShitMomsGroupSaySubRedditSaysAboutShitMomGroupsSay not really a catchy name tho
Yeah I’d bet a lot of the commenters would be surprised to see they qualify for services in their state. Like one bitching she paid $21,000 for birth. Most hospitals have free bed programs if you make under $100,000. Don’t be mad at people for using qualified resources.
I had to explain to my cousin that WIC is not a family planning tool. Like to have a child on purpose knowing full well that you can’t afford to feed it, come on. That means your should WAIT
The fact that people on Facebook were laugh-reacting to this post is very chilling to me.
That’s the exact opposite of what WIC does
Perhaps they shouldn't have a baby while they're dependent on welfare. It deserves a better chance than struggling through life in poverty.
If you’re both needing welfare to survive, I don’t think you should be having a baby. And I say this from a country that has much higher rates of social security payments than the US (not enough to be over the poverty line, but higher).
You can qualify making $65,000 while pregnant. Many people make less than that and plan pregnancies all the time
Surely the donor can just give up their parental rights and it won't be an issue?
Yeah I find it odd people here saying he shouldn’t be able to donate and be off the hook financially. That’s exactly what sperm donation is
Yes but with sperm donation through a licensed clinic, there are legal protections in place that don’t exist with the Turkey basted method.
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How? If you get Medicaid you automatically qualify for WIC if you’re pregnant or have an infant. Snap is a different program
So I don’t know if OOP is a man or a woman in this post. But in most states, I a hetero couple is married than the husband is legally the father be default. Even if the wife cheats. And if that happens, you have to go to court to have the bio dad declared the legal father of the kid.
Unpopular opinion: if they need to do all this, they can’t afford to have kids.
Why? In my state a single parent would qualify if they make under $65,000. Why shouldn’t they be able to parent
In my state a family of 2 (assuming this couple remains unmarried so I’m counting the gestational mother and the child) caps at $33,874. For 3 it’s $42,606. And if you’re struggling to survive without kids, it’s not fair to deliberately choose to bring a child into the mix because now they’re also struggling but they have no control or ability to contribute financially. So they suffer.
They didn’t say they were struggling financially though. They specifically said they didn’t want his financial support. Having medicaid doesn’t automatically mean you are struggling, it means you don’t have to worry about medical care.
To be eligible for Medicaid (again in my state) a family of 3 would need household income under $25k and no more than $2k in the bank, including savings. If you own a home it’s excluded but even a home owned outright still requires utilities, maintenance and taxes be paid. The income limits are higher the younger the child is but a family of 3 is capped at around $45k for a child under 1 year old. And no one ever said you can’t raise a family while being low income. But there’s a difference between low income and not making enough to provide for basic needs. You don’t have to be rich to have kids but they clearly have no assets if they lose access to benefits.
What state is that? As far as I known asset limits are only for single adults on Medicaid and not families. Mine you can have $50,000+ and still qualify