<story><title>Child-safety laws may reduce the birth rate</title><url>https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2020/11/28/child-safety-laws-may-reduce-the-birth-rate</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>irateswami</author><text>This is an actual conversation I had to have with my wife, having a third kid definitely requires a larger vehicle as the vast majority of cars today simply don&amp;#x27;t work for a family of five. Child car seats are too wide and the backseats of most cars are too narrow, and the price jump to a vehicle that would be able to handle three child car seats at once is enormous. Throw in some dogs, a couple pieces of luggage that any nuclear family would have to tote around, plus a stroller and it becomes prohibitively tight.&lt;p&gt;It took me MONTHS of shopping and playing child-seat-jenga in various car dealership lots before I finally found a sedan that was actually able to hold everything (thank you, Volkswagen, for making an actual family sedan that could fit a family!).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ynniv</author><text>I replaced my 3-series BMW with a Honda Odyssey, and I&amp;#x27;ve spent two years singing its praises. Part of the problem is that we have created a culture that uses cars as a form of self expression, and many early parents aren&amp;#x27;t ready to &amp;quot;be&amp;quot; a minivan. But the minivan is what you actually want as a parent: room for six people of any size, or four people and at least twice as much cargo as an SUV, with safe, remote control doors that can be operated by kids. It&amp;#x27;s a living room on wheels, including the TV.&lt;p&gt;Honda is trying to bridge the identify gap a little with paddle shifting, ventilated seats, and almost 300hp, but really we should try to step back from seeing the car as an expression of who we are, and try to optimize for the functionality that we use every day. As much fun as it was to drive the BMW, finding a way to fit my growing family into it was a stressful mess and I&amp;#x27;m happy to have found, perhaps unintentionally, a much better situation.&lt;p&gt;Some of this insight came to me from Steve Kaufer of TripAdvisor, who at the time I was there was running a $4B company and driving an old minivan, because that&amp;#x27;s what his family fit in. He never cared for a fancy new car because fancy meant small and he wasn&amp;#x27;t out to impress anyone on the road anyway.&lt;p&gt;But I also can&amp;#x27;t pretend that Honda&amp;#x27;s naturally aspirated 6-cylinder and perfectly matched 10-speed (domestic!) paddle shifter didn&amp;#x27;t help seal the deal in my garage.</text></comment>
<story><title>Child-safety laws may reduce the birth rate</title><url>https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2020/11/28/child-safety-laws-may-reduce-the-birth-rate</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>irateswami</author><text>This is an actual conversation I had to have with my wife, having a third kid definitely requires a larger vehicle as the vast majority of cars today simply don&amp;#x27;t work for a family of five. Child car seats are too wide and the backseats of most cars are too narrow, and the price jump to a vehicle that would be able to handle three child car seats at once is enormous. Throw in some dogs, a couple pieces of luggage that any nuclear family would have to tote around, plus a stroller and it becomes prohibitively tight.&lt;p&gt;It took me MONTHS of shopping and playing child-seat-jenga in various car dealership lots before I finally found a sedan that was actually able to hold everything (thank you, Volkswagen, for making an actual family sedan that could fit a family!).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>PopeDotNinja</author><text>&amp;gt; the vast majority of cars today simply don&amp;#x27;t work for a family of five&lt;p&gt;I recently visited Pakistan for the first time, and was amazed to see a family of five riding around on a small Honda motorbike.  The father was driving, a small child sat in front of the father, the was mother hanging on behind the father, and the oldest daughter sitting on the far back with both legs hanging off to the left while holding an infant.  None of them were wearing helmets.  It was both terrifying &amp;amp; impressive.</text></comment>