As a 20-something living in New York City, I’ve had a lot of opportunities to think about (or try to ignore) my finances. But it turns out that for every $4 latte I’ve avoided or brown-bag lunch I’ve packed, the best financial decision is one I didn’t actually make: growing up an only child.

I write this knowing I risk playing into many of the stereotypes surrounding those of us raised without siblings. “The one-child family is not thought to be ideal,” said Toni Falbo, a professor at the University of Texas, who studies only children. “There’s still this deep-seated prejudice to only children. The assumption is that only children are overindulged and spoiled, and it’s unclear if that’s true.”

I don’t like to think of myself as a part of some spoiled class of humans. Friends’ and acquaintances’ surprise at finding out I’m an only child indicates, I hope, that I didn’t wind up a selfish person, a loner or a brat.

Still, I’ve always suspected that I received a big financial advantage from growing up without siblings, and it wasn’t in the form of getting every toy, clothing item or piece of jewelry that I demanded. I’ve also worried that as my parents age, my only-child status, which thus far has been a boon, may turn into a burden.

Right now, this tension is something felt by a relatively small share of the American population — in 2014, 18% of American women ages 40 to 44 had only one child, according to the Pew Research Center. But there are signs the demographic is growing; in 1976 just 10% of women ages 40 to 44 had only one child. The share of women ages 40 to 44 with three and four children dropped during the same period.

Terrence Horan

The data on the financial benefits of being an only child are somewhat limited, but conversations with psychologists, financial planners, fellow only children and even my own parents back up this feeling that so far my financial life has just simply been easier and my relationship to money less strained in large part because I’m an only child.

“One of the great privileges of my life, which has defined in many ways what I’ve gotten to do as an adult, is being able to graduate college without student loans, and that is not something that would have happened otherwise,” said Lauren Sandler, the author of “One and Only: The Freedom of Having an Only Child and the Joy of Being One.” Without loans, Sandler was able to pursue a job in public radio — not the most lucrative field — straight out of college, which ultimately led her to a career as a journalist and author.

My family’s finances are such that if my parents had other kids, I certainly would not have grown up destitute. Still, I received a lot of perks that gave me a leg up in life.

For one, I never had to have the tough conversation about college financing that I now so frequently advise for other families. Of course, there are only-children families for whom paying for college is still a struggle. But many of the other only children I spoke with agreed that the relative ease of higher-education financing was one of the biggest benefits of not having siblings. Some even received financial help from their parents all the way through graduate school — something they know likely wouldn’t have been possible if they’d had a brother or sister.

Though help paying for college is perhaps the biggest financial benefit of growing up without siblings, only children often receive all sorts of financial perks their whole lives, such as private-school tuition, that could be harder to swing in families multiple children, said Carl Pickhardt, the author of “The Future of Your Only Child.”

“Parents of only children, they want to do it right, they want to give their child every advantage they can, and those advantages come with a financial cost,” he said. “They’re willing to pay the freight on that.” The data appear to back him up. Parents of only children spend 25% more on their only child than parents of two kids spend per sibling, according to the United States Department of Agriculture. By comparison, parents with three children or more spend 22% less per child on average.

The experts I spoke with said much of what they knew about the relationship between only children and money is anecdotal because there isn’t much hard data out there on how only children approach their finances. Instead, most of the literature focuses on our sociability and personalities.

But it’s easy to imagine how growing up without siblings can be a financial positive in the way I described. That elusive work-life balance can be easier when there is only one kid. Some parents of only children plan for a small family so both partners can more easily pursue their careers, which often leads to more money. Professional interests were a factor in Sandler’s decision; she noted that it would have been a challenge for her and her husband to afford to live in New York City as a writer and photographer, respectively, with more than a single child.

No matter the reason that only children end up that way, their status means their parents will likely have more resources to devote to their child. A child born to a middle-income family in 2013 costs $245,340 to raise to age 17. And as my mom noted, there are no great economies of scale for this stuff. Sure, siblings share clothes, some possessions, and occasionally a bedroom, but there’s not much of a bulk discount on some of the biggest costs. The yearly cost of raising three young children in the Northeast is $34,616 for a couple earning between $61,680 and $106,800, compared with $18,525 for one young child, according to the USDA. Extrapolated over 18 years, “the difference is huge,” as my dad put it.

In some cases, a one-child family even develops out of financial circumstances — a tacit acknowledgment by the couple that the best route to ensuring their children get the best they can offer is to have only one. During the Great Depression, rates of only children or childless families were relatively high, said Falbo. “That’s the main evidence we have that there would be more only children in bad economic times,” she said.

Even so, only children often benefit from their parents’ outsize investment in them in ways that can wind up influencing their career, Pickhardt said. Only children are typically motivated, have relatively high self-esteem and relate well to adults — all qualities that have the potential to take them farther in the workplace. “When your parents invested in you, you want to give them a return on that investment, you want to do well for them, but you also want to do well for you because you have this sense that you’re somebody who can do well,” he said. This internal drive could even extend to a strive for financial perfection, said Falbo.

Still, it’s possible that constant access to attention and resources could backfire, said Matt Becker, a financial planner who focuses on families. “There may just be this expectation that there’s always money available for everything you want as opposed to understanding that there are limited resources.”

A childhood friend speculated the opposite — that being raised as an only child made her more aware of the true cost of things. She wasn’t sharing clothes or a car with siblings and so she learned early on to evaluate the price of gas and T-shirts in ways friends with siblings rarely considered.

But the perks of childhood don’t come without strings. Perhaps the major financial drawback to growing up without siblings is that you’re solely responsible for the care of your parents as they age. Of course, in some families, sibling fights over money or other topics can make caring for aging parents difficult. But most of the only children I spoke with agreed that being solely responsible for mom and dad in their golden years is a tough assignment. One noted that he plans to support his parents financially as they enter retirement. Another said she expects her parents to be financially able to care for themselves in their old age, but she imagines the emotional toll will be huge. Sandler said she sees the responsibility to help her parents in retirement as the flip side to the financial advantages she received growing up without siblings.

Despite that pressure, Sandler said that overall she’s happy she grew up as an only child and, at least for now, plans to have her daughter grow up that way, too. As a kid, I always liked the idea of having a sibling. But after doing an honest accounting of all the advantages conferred on me as an only child, I can’t deny that, at least financially, I’m better off without a brother or sister.