Father-of-11 Elon Musk says having children should be 'incentivized'

Father-of-11 Elon Musk says parents should be ‘incentivized’ to have children to ‘create the next generation of humans or spiral into oblivion’

  • Tesla mogul Elon Musk has argued that there should be greater financial incentives to encourage people to have more children
  • The billionaire stated on his social media platform X that procreating is a ‘financial penalty’ in most countries around the world 
  • The cost of raising three children now sets sets the average American family back $54,000 a year 

Elon Musk says people should be incentivized to have children to drive population growth across the world. 

The billionaire father-of-11 warned humanity will be doomed to ‘oblivion’ if birth rates drop.

‘Having children should be incentivized, not be a financial penalty like it is in most countries!’ Musk wrote on X, formerly Twitter, which he owns. 

‘We must create the next generation of humans or spiral into oblivion’ he added. 

The statement came in response to Katalin Novak, the President of Hungary, posting a poll on the site asking ‘should people with children be at a financial disadvantage compared to those without?’

Tesla tycoon Elon Musk has eleven children and has advocated for pro-natal policies 

Musk wrote on the social media platform X, which he owns, that more should be done to incentivize people to have children 

‘In Hungary, we would like people with children to have a financial advantage’ Novak added. 

It comes as Hungary recently announced a set of pro-natalist policies including tax exemptions for women with more than four children, loans that get written off after couples have three or more children, help for first-time buyers with kids and access to government-owned fertility clinics. 

Musk himself 11 children: Techno Mechanicus, Griffin, Vivian, Kai, Saxon, Damian, X, Nevada, Exa and a set of twins whose names are not yet publicly known.

The Tesla mogul has made pro-natalist comments before, proclaiming ‘if people don’t have more children, civilization is going to crumble,’ during a factory visit in 2021, Wired reported.

Later at a Wall Street Journal event in 2022 he reiterated ‘The fundamental constraint is labor, there are not enough people. 

‘I can’t emphasize this enough. One of the biggest risks to civilization is the low birth rate.’ 

The US is grappling with a downturn in birthrates and the cost of raising three children now sets sets the average American family back $54,000 a year – with costs rising upwards of $90,000 in the most expensive places in the country.

Typically, the price of childcare, housing, food, medical costs and transportation are the highest for the first born, with an annual average of $20,814 nationwide. 

Musk’s post was in response to the the President of Hungary , posting a poll on the site asking about child policies 

This drops to $17,413 a year for the second child before falling even further to $16,513 for the third.

SmartAsset examined the costs of food, childcare, healthcare, additional housing and other necessities across 381 metro areas when a family with two working adults adds one, two or three children into their budget.

Ann Arbor, Michigan, is the most expensive place to raise kids in the US, according to the study, mainly due to its exceptionally high childcare prices.

Bringing up three children under four in the city will set the average family back approximately $91,063 – with childcare costs hitting a whopping $22,000 a year per infant.

Raising the first child costs $31,670, according to SmartAsset, but drops to $28,924 for the third – a percentage decrease of almost 9 percent.

The San Francisco area is notoriously expensive – especially when it comes to real estate.

Typically, the price of childcare, housing, food, medical costs and transportation are the highest for the first born

The third child costs parents about 20 percent less than the first, a new study from financial technology company SmartAsset has found

Ann Arbor, Michigan, is the most expensive place to raise kids in the US, according to the study, mainly due to its exceptionally high childcare prices

The San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley metro area is the most expensive place to raise a single child, according to the study, at $35,647.

It comes after a landmark study earlier this year revealed childcare costs across the country have shot up by 220 percent in three decades – far outstripping the general rate of inflation.

The rocketing cost has forced many parents out of the workforce, educational charity the Annie E. Casey Foundation found, with families facing an effective geographical ‘lottery’ with childcare costs varying by thousands of dollars between states.

Soaring childcare costs are in part due to more parents working – pushing up demand – and the fact centers themselves are underfunded and under-resourced. 

Childcare businesses survive on margins typically less than 1 percent, the report noted.

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