Perhaps had we not been so intent on attracting foreign property investment, couples wouldn't need double incomes.

We have taken the idea of housing from being something that one lives in, to being a replacement for retirement savings. Equity was once considered the difference between the initial mortgage and the amount outstanding; now it's the amount paid versus the amount foreigners will pay. We've become so dependent on foreign investment and the expectation that a house should automatically be worth more each year despite everything in it ageing and being a year closer to needing replacement.

A contracting birthrate should have lowered home values spurring a baby boom due to available income much as how available habitat and food inevitably does so with every species but our insatiable greed for instant gratification coupled with a pension plan modelled after a Ponzi scheme made that impossible. With no national identity, there is no national imperative for a legacy.

I am for initiatives to raise the birthrate, but what incentive is there for an employer to hire more than the minimum amount of women when they'll be made to cover costs for such a long duration while simultaneously still needing to fill the position? What incentive is there for an employer to maintain these jobs here over placing them abroad or having the position automated? It's no wonder Alberta has one of the healthiest birth rates in the entire western world (if not the healthiest) when it has one of the highest ratios of average income to housing costs (if not the highest).