There are other (many) lines in this article that I also consider appalling, such as this: "Yet a 2007 Pew Research Center survey found people insisted that their relationships with their children are of the greatest importance to their happiness. Gilbert believes the reason people say this is because they’re expected to. He puts it in clinical economic terms: the more people pay for an item, the more highly they tend to value it, and children are expensive: the latest data suggests it costs upward of $250,000 to raise one to age 18." So now children are "items" and we're comparing their cost like to that of a car or house? This is disgusting. I know children are expensive, but most of the time it's because people think they have to be. People decide to buy the highest-priced stuff for their kids and don't have the backbone to say no when their kids ask for brand-name stuff. How many of my college-age students have said to me that they don't want kids because they think they won't be able to afford them, I've lost count. One of the other commentors said exactly what I feel: kids just want our love and time, and that's priceless to me.