9 votes

Against child hostages

3 comments

  1. NaraVara
    Link
    Provocative title, but also pretty evocative. It's full of some really stark lines excoriating contemporary thinking in political circles around welfare spending.

    Provocative title, but also pretty evocative. It's full of some really stark lines excoriating contemporary thinking in political circles around welfare spending.

    The fact of the matter is that the United States does not actually have a durable social compact. It’s been unspooling for decades. But it’s not because we let takers free-ride off makers by soaking up TANF benefits without putting in a solid shift at Dollar General. It’s because we’ve insisted on a market economy that makes it easy for already relatively well-off people to get even better-off while exposing the rest of us to the dislocations of globalized trade and the “disruptions” of innovation, but without a functioning system of social insurance that puts a floor on the miseries of poverty.

    8 votes
  2. streblo
    (edited )
    Link
    The author quotes the NYT op-ed: I'm actually shocked someone would agree to publish this with their name attached to it. The idea that a child is somehow beholden to their parents life choices...

    The author quotes the NYT op-ed:

    [The universal child benefit] goes too far. While universality may appeal in its simplicity, it violates the principle of reciprocity at the heart of a durable social compact...

    I'm actually shocked someone would agree to publish this with their name attached to it. The idea that a child is somehow beholden to their parents life choices is, quite frankly, disgusting. Equality of opportunity should be the ultimate goal of any liberal society and the cost of its creation/maintenance is a public burden that strengthens the social compact, not dilutes it.

    Personally, I’d prefer real universality — it should be a benefit for kids no matter how lucky or unlucky they happened to get in the parent lottery. And then, separately, tax rates at higher brackets should go up by an amount that would wipe out the value of the benefit and then some.

    This is how it works here. If you have zero income I think between provincial and federal programs you're looking at around ~$9,000 CAD a year for your first child and slightly less for each additional child. The amount you are eligible for is determined by your earned income so that the benefit does stack with unemployment as well.

    Edit: The bulk of that is in cash benefits but some does come from tax credits which does incentivize working to a degree. Depending on your province it looks like $7-8k a year for a single child in cash benefits.

    Thus far I don't think our social compact is at risk vis à vis the United States.

    6 votes
  3. skybrian
    Link
    This is a UBI argument combined with a "for the children" argument, for extra political potency. It seems like it should be a political winner to me, but maybe I'm biased.

    This is a UBI argument combined with a "for the children" argument, for extra political potency. It seems like it should be a political winner to me, but maybe I'm biased.

    5 votes