So, what else are men to blame for?

[BlaqueKatt]

As an addendum, there is an article on Wikipedia that shows the effects of advanced maternal age on rates of birth defects. In the five years it takes a woman (or her eggs, rather) to go from 35 to 40, the chances of the child having birth defects increase four-fold (from 1:400 to 1:100). And from 30 to 35, it more than doubles (from 1:1000 to 1:400).

It is being called into question, as until recently it's always been assumed sperm doesn't degrade, however the cells that manufacture them do, and older women tend to have partners of similar ages, so it may not just be the eggs.

Older males have more offspring with mental health issues

[Andara Bledin]

It is being called into question, as until recently it's always been assumed sperm doesn't degrade, however the cells that manufacture them do, and older women tend to have partners of similar ages, so it may not just be the eggs.

Except that it's not actually being called into question. When the mother is older, the defects are physical in nature, while when the father is older, they are psychological. While both carry risks, those risks are of notably different natures as well as differing magnitudes.

It's also worth noting that the study specifically used men who were over a decade older than their mates versus men who were under 20, and the article does not mention the ages of those men. For all we know, some of those men were still under 30. I do wonder as well why the study focused on older men with significantly younger wives but did not include older men with wives who were of an age.

Also, even the study suggests that there is a possibility that the effects are also due to epigenetic and environmental factors. It notes, particularly, that late-life children who were planned were threefold less likely to develop schizophrenia than those who were 'accidents.'

Not to mention that since the participants necessarily self-select which group they are part of, there is also a slight possibility that it has nothing at all to do with any of that and is, instead, based on completely unrelated genetic, epigentic, and environmental factors.

It would be interesting to see a study that included men that had children both earlier and later in life across a wide spectrum and if, within that consistent sample, there is any statistically significant data as regards the age of the father at conception and the children's mental function.

However, as it relates to the "saving" of genetic material, you can freeze sperm far more easily than you can eggs.

[HYHYBT]

I don't know about the rest, but have to agree that suing the eggs won't help anything

[Nyoibo]

Anakhouri beat me to it. "Men are attracted to younger females"? Sure, in a sense... but what 'younger' means is relative. 600 years ago, a nice age for a woman to marry and start having kids was 12. That age has increased over time due to a cross between changing societal norms and longer lifespans, with each playing off/feeding off the other.

Not really, life span wasn't that much lower than today back then and unless you were part of the nobility you wouldn't be getting married until you were around 16-18.

[Andara Bledin]

Not really, life span wasn't that much lower than today back then and unless you were part of the nobility you wouldn't be getting married until you were around 16-18.

We don't know that about lifespan. We can make educated guesses, but with the records we have and our current technological level, there's just no way to know one way or the other.

Although, one thing to consider is that "life expectency" is often a figure that includes all lives, from the time of birth, and with high infant mortality rates, the number is much lower than the actual median age of death.

Supposedly, the merchant elite of London several centuries ago had a medial death age of about 50. Without knowing the methodology used to reach this number, however, it is of limited value.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Just a random aside, that was brought up in a child development class I took one time. Both men and women play with fire by waiting until they're older to have kids. Financially it looks like a win-win since you're having your kids at the height of your money making years. But biologically speaking you can get lucky or not. And really since what you're playing games with is the child's lifetime, it's probably not the best idea.

[Andara Bledin]

Thus the reason why freezing and storing the genetic material for later is a necessary option, and the price needs to be brought down into the realm of achievable by more people.

Because while the health of the child later in life is a crapshoot, the stability of the home is absolutely improved. And if it turns out not to be, then the couple can choose ot not have children at all. having children when you're not ready because of some biological ticking time bomb is a very poor reason to make that decision.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Yes and no though. That also means a parent that stays home or takes unpaid time off leaving the most money on the table in their 40's. So the opportunity cost is actually much higher so it makes the most sense only if you've always been saving with that in mind. Ideally you would still have kids in your late 20's which puts college age around the same time the parents are at the apex of their earning power. That means the opportunity cost is low in your late 20's and the earning power is high for the balloon expenses that occur in your 40's.

One doesn't have to do things that way, but if you think where people make the most money, losing years in your 40's and early to mid 50's is a bad idea.

[Panacea]

Personally, I think that it's just another data point that proves that gender-studies should be removed from the 'science' faculties and shoehorned next to the astrologists and homeopaths.

This isn't a gender study. The authors are biologists.

We had a hypothesis, and we ourselves programmed a way to test it, and shockingly, it turned out we were right.

...Yay?

Yes, this is the problem I have with the study. While computer models are valuable tools in many fields (climate change, or meteorology, for example) they are less useful in the biological sciences. They reflect what might happen as opposed to what does.

Do you think a women should freeze her eggs when young, in case she does decide to have kids in her thirties-forties but is not ready yet?

It depends. If she has risk factors for certain diseases, it might be worthwhile. Otherwise its an ethical situation; some religions forbid in vitro fertilizaiton.

So much bad and missing information here.

First, all other factors being equal, it is no more dangerous for a woman post-menopause to have a baby than it is for a woman under 32.

I respectfully disagree. The older you get, the more the risks go up. After menopause, the risk of osteoporosis gets very high, especially in certain groups such as short women and Caucasian women. Also, genetic damage to the egg (assuming the fertilization is not IVF) may create risks. Yes, it happens, and yes some babies do just fine. But it is very rare for a reason.

It is being called into question, as until recently it's always been assumed sperm doesn't degrade, however the cells that manufacture them do, and older women tend to have partners of similar ages, so it may not just be the eggs.

Sperm is constantly produced by the man; by itself it has a life span of about 72 hours. There are a lot of factors that affect sperm production including the tightness of the man's underwear. Certainly some conditions could damage sperm; such as an enlarged prostate. But there are plenty of examples of older men fathering perfectly healthy children, and it's not considered much of a risk factor for the father.

Not really, life span wasn't that much lower than today back then and unless you were part of the nobility you wouldn't be getting married until you were around 16-18.

Actually, commoner men generally didn't marry until they were older either because they often could not support a wife at a young age, especially if they were in the merchant or craftsman classes because they were apprentices and journeymen until their mid 20's at least, if not longer.

Life spans did not start increasing until the mid 20th century. Until around WWII the average life span was about 45. Now it is around 80.

[Ginger Tea]

A recent rerun of QI listed the Vatican's AOC as low as 12, this was taken on board when they made it a principality of sorts in the early 20th century and they were using Italian laws of the time, those laws have changed outside of the Vatican, but not all if any within.

So 100 years ago 12 was legal, but I just assumed 12 was for middle ages to 1700's tops not 1900 pre WWI and yes Alter boy jokes were made on the show.

But with the 90 year old and sperm, the 90 year old is not the one bringing the baby to term, also the study a few posts up that I forgot to comment about at the time.
If they used one 90 year old and multiple mixed aged partners, you could use him as a base line.