Plants are the new pets, dogs are the new kids…
…And kids are the new exotic zoo animals.
When our parents’ generation was in their 30s, they were debt-free after college, they owned a house, awaited a promotion at their stable job, and thus decided to take the next step in their white-picket journey: Parenthood. These days, your average 30-something-year-old is likely living with roommates to afford their rent, getting excited about a full fridge of food, and rejoicing over a new TV show. Although it’s still fairly common for young people to want children, it seems like these days, there’s a far more compelling argument to avoid becoming a parent.
Heidi Gollub, a lifestyle journalist, “surveyed 1,000 dog owners nationwide and found that 38% of them made the choice to become pet owners instead of having a child. The reasons: children are expensive, dogs are easier.” Financially, raising a human child is an insane commitment. According to statistics from the Brookings Institution, a socioeconomic research organization, the average American household will spend $284,600 to raise a child from infancy to 18 years old. That’s a lot of cheddar that most of us would rather spend on paying off mountains of student loans, owning a home, or traveling the world.
However, it’s not just about the money.
Having a child is far more complicated than caring for a dog—simply because humans aren’t as simple as a canines—yet most dog owners would agree that a dog adds comparable value to one’s life. When you have a kid, you lose a lot of your freedom and your time, planning your weekends around soccer tournaments and last minute birthday parties at Chuck E. Cheese. If you have a dog, all he really needs are a few potty breaks and a full food and water dish at the end of each day and he’ll happily greet you when you decide to return home. Dogs are there whenever you need them and they’re conveniently cozied away at home when you don’t have the bandwidth.
Like a house-tiger or a rare hyacinth macaw, kids are a luxury that most modern couples can’t afford, both financially and with their time. So when we can’t afford to have an exotic creature as a pet, whether with money, time, or our housing situation, we’re considering the alternative—dedicating 100% of our nurturing energy to a darling dog instead.
Nurturing Nature
Kids are cool sometimes, but there’s a lot that can go wrong when raising a child—humans are complicated. Family psychologist Mark Travers claims, “family structures are rapidly changing and pets are often considered equivalent to, and, in some cases, better than having children.”
Dogs are excellent companions: They love you, they’re unconditionally loyal, and they are far less-complex emotionally and mentally than humans. On top of that, they can be left at home alone, they’re cuddle-bugs, and they’re always happy to see you. What could be better than that?
Canine companions offer all the delights of parenthood without as much mess. Travers continues, “if nurturing rather than parenting is a fundamental need, it can be fulfilled by pets without the full-time demands of biological offspring.
Dog-ownership proves to be a more attractive alternative to younger generations today because it’s a more attainable and sustainable family structure. When you’re struggling to pay your bills with a dead-end job and no health insurance, the last thing a responsible adult would do is introduce a human child into the mix—but having a dog is far more forgiving. According to Shelly Volsche, an Anthropology professor at the University of Boise, “a growing number of societies are also experiencing the emergence of people who remain voluntarily childless (‘childfree’), as well as an increase in investment in companion animals.” Dogs are a lower-risk addition to the modern family in which many young people have found parental fulfillment.
We don’t have to repeat the same overdone family model of the past and we’ve decidedly changed the way we think about ‘family’—it’s more than just DNA, your tight-knit circle can be as simple as you, your partner, and a gaggle of loving dogs curled up at the foot of your bed.
Via u/brittatheiggy
Primitive urges, changing priorities
Humans are biologically hardwired to want to procreate and raise an army of children, but in 2025 even if you wanted a huge family of kiddos running around, there are a lot of growing concerns in our everchanging society. “In evolutionary terms,” Volsche continues, “life history trade-offs become increasingly complicated when an individual's personal preference, rather than basic needs, becomes part of the decision-making process.”
On top of the socioeconomic concerns, younger generations are also considering a childfree lifestyle because of environmental reasons. With the threat of the oceans turning saline and wildfires consuming every inch of habitable land within the next decade, the thought of bringing a new human into the mix seems reckless. From a pragmatist’s perspective, in the midst of global turmoil, it’s hardly rational to complicate your life by having a baby.
And as we’ve always heard, it takes a village to raise a child. However, nowadays with reurbanization, moving away from suburbia, and as young folks migrate into new cities, people rarely live in the same time zone as their parents, removing a key component in childcare facilitation. When your child’s babysitter lives three hours away, that seriously limits your ability to continue living a fulfilling, adult life. Is it worth sacrificing your current life to take on so many struggles? Contrarily, if you’re a dog parent, asking a random friend to help watch your dog for a few nights when you’re in a pinch isn’t going to cause lasting abandonment issues and psychological damage like it would if you had a child. With dogs, there are far more options.
Granting us companionship with the added benefit of flexibility, dogs provide a perfect solution to aspiring parents who are living moderately unstable lifestyles and have uncertain futures. Volsche notes, “humans are known to be nurturing, even to persons outside their immediate, biological kin, and it could be argued this need to nurture is crucial to our emotional and social wellbeing.” So to fulfill that innate desire, many responsible overthinkers are choosing instead to pour their heart and soul into their dogs.
With a precarious future on the line, young people are simply being mindful and realistic about their parental bandwidth, reassessing what it means to be a caregiver in a world where repopulation isn’t the primary goal.
yOuR DoG iS nOt YoUr BaBy
While they’re certainly not as complex as human children, dogs can certainly check that box on the Bingo card of life. On top of that, there has also been a substantial fertility decline since the ‘60s. Travers reports there has been nearly a 50% drop in the global fertility rate since 1963 and “Couples who are unable to conceive often experience a void, which leads them to explore alternatives to raising a child.” Even people who would prefer having a human child find that dogs provide a “pawsitive” alternative to traditional parenthood.
Humanity’s desire to nurture is met through dog ownership. Without overflowing into overstimulation, fatigue, or a dismal life spiral, dogs provide their human companions with the same love and fulfillment that a child would—with far less risk. We train our dogs, we share in their successes, we feed them, love them, care for them, and invite them into our beds when they have a nightmare. Fundamentally, dogs are not all that dissimilar from a child, provided you care for them with the same fervor as you would a kid.
We’re cooking special meals for our dog, we buy them new toys every time we’re at the store, and we spend more money on veterinary care than we do for our own health. With that level of love and dedication, who’s to say that our pets aren’t our little fur children, living lavishly like a furry blanketed royal with a customized collar and prescription allergy meds?
Via u/dogmemejunkie
Straight From the Mouth of Dominic Toretto
Family is what you make of it. Your chosen family is more than just biology, it’s a deep-seeded connection that cannot be contended. Younger generations are realizing that they have the choice to build the family they want, and don’t have to just replicate the tried-and-failed model from the past. Adapting to the pressures of the modern world, many people have leaned into wholehearted dog-ownership as an alternative to raising a child. Childfree families have actualized the same fulfillment, the feedback, and the constant love on loop that they enjoy with their pooch, redefining what it means to be a family unit, one boop at a time.
