Sparr, there's something you didn't consider in the numbers. Okay, let's say $60k for surrogate motherhood. But past the point of birth, go on the assumption that the father is spending no time with the child (as if it didn't exist), and paying child support to offset that. How much would it cost him to get a nanny that performed all of those services, to where parenthood would be a completely hands-off matter for him? So you could think of it like this: he's paying the mother child support to do that for him, and at most child support rates versus live-in nanny rates, he's getting a very good deal.
That said: thespian, the statistics you give are questionable (as statistics tend to be), and also seem to be correlational from what I see. One of my nitpicks with statistics in general is that correlation does not prove causation*. In other words, "Fathers have a higher average income than non-fathers" is absolutely not equivalent to "if a non-father becomes a father, he will get more income." Also, according to the Wikipedia article, there have been other studies that have shown fatherhood to have no effect on wages one way or the other.
* The classic example here: body weight is extremely highly correlated with intelligence (the more someone weighs, the more intelligent they are likely to be). This is a for-real, true fact. That does not mean that if you were to over-eat and gain weight that you would become more intelligent though. It's obvious why all of this is, if you think about it for a moment. Babies aren't that smart, and don't weigh that much. Toddlers have a bit more reasoning ability, and weigh more. Teenagers, all the way to adults.
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Date: 2010-08-31 01:37 pm (UTC)That said: thespian, the statistics you give are questionable (as statistics tend to be), and also seem to be correlational from what I see. One of my nitpicks with statistics in general is that correlation does not prove causation*. In other words, "Fathers have a higher average income than non-fathers" is absolutely not equivalent to "if a non-father becomes a father, he will get more income." Also, according to the Wikipedia article, there have been other studies that have shown fatherhood to have no effect on wages one way or the other.
* The classic example here: body weight is extremely highly correlated with intelligence (the more someone weighs, the more intelligent they are likely to be). This is a for-real, true fact. That does not mean that if you were to over-eat and gain weight that you would become more intelligent though. It's obvious why all of this is, if you think about it for a moment. Babies aren't that smart, and don't weigh that much. Toddlers have a bit more reasoning ability, and weigh more. Teenagers, all the way to adults.