I never had kids. I never wanted them and one of the many, many reasons was not being able to afford to bring them up how I'd want. I'm lucky that I found someone who also has never wanted kids and is actually pretty much in the same situation except that he has more savings than me. I feel like the only thing we have going for us is no debt, but really I don't know what good that is doing for us. I will still never go into debt but I just watch all those around me 'buy' houses and cars and it's just mind blowing. They just don't see that they don't own any of it and with houses they can tax you what they feel like and still do whatever they want.