As is stands, parents are able to claim their children as dependents on their tax returns, which lowers their overall tax liability and in effect means that the parents either pay less in taxes or receive a higher return at the end of each year.
Until they reach the age at which they can work, children are a drain on society. They receive public schooling and receive the same benefit from public services that adults do, yet they contribute nothing in return. At the point that they reach maturity and are gainfully employed and paying taxes, they become a functioning member of society.
If a parent decides to have a child, they are making a conscious decision to produce another human being. They could choose to get a sterilization surgery, use birth control, or abort the pregnancy (assuming they don’t live in a backwards state that’s banned it). Yet even if they decide to have 15 children, the rest of society has to foot the bill for their poor decisions until the child reaches adulthood.
By increasing taxes on parents instead of reducing them, you not only incentivize safe sex and abortion, but you shift the burden of raising a child solely to the individuals who are responsible for the fact that that child exists.
I am a strong advocate for social programs: Single-payer healthcare, welfare programs, low-income housing, etc, but for adults who in turn contribute what they can. A child should only be supported by the individuals who created it.
Children are not a drain on society, they are society. You cannot have a society for longer than a single generation without children. They are critically important to continuing any society and penalizing people for deciding to have children is backwards thinking.
The idea that a single family body should be the sole people responsible for the development of a child is also a foolish and somewhat modern misconception. The adage of “it takes a village…” comes to mind. As a society, it is our collective duties to ensure that all members of the society are healthy and cared for. We are communal, social creatures who have long relied on community to be successful and raise our children. This individualist perspective is myopic and counterproductive.
Additionally, the value of a human being simply cannot be reduced to what they contribute to the GDP. Children or adults.
Children are not a drain on society, they are society. You cannot have a society for longer than a single generation without children.
Nowhere did I suggest that people should just completely stop having children. The fact is that children are extremely expensive, and having more than one per adult is quite frankly unnecessary. At least until the unchecked population growth is under control, reproduction should be disincentivized as much as possible, and society should not be forced to bear the brunt of parents’ poor reproductive decisions.
This is so wrong it’s not even funny. Look at CO2 emissions and climate change. Do you really think we’d be destroying the environment the same way we do now if industry wasn’t producing products for billions of people?
Unpopular as advertised, sure. But man, what an absolute weapons-grade bad take, with beginning to end poor reasoning.
Parents pay less in taxes because they’ve contributed a human to the system which will inevitably be taxed.
It’s an incentive for procreation.
Frankly the incentive isn’t good enough.
Unless you’re in a country/state with no VAT/sale taxe, the child will inevitably pay taxes.
I’m in a country with no VAT. 40% of US citizens pay no income tax.
Say what you will about humans on earth, annoying kids, etc.
But the state needs bodies. Kids are future workers, and they state wants healthy, capable workers. As such, tax credits are offered not as a prize to the parents, but an investment by the state. The state is hoping parents will have a bit more money for healthy food, housing and education for their kids, thus creating workers who are a bit healthier and more capable.
Human capital is a real thing, at a state level. Lose your input, and you’ll grow weak.
You may not have had a perfect, or even good upbringing, but any tax credit your parent/guardian received didn’t make it worse. If you did have a good upbringing, think of all the variables that went into that. Tax credits are a small part of that.
Upvote for using the sub correctly
Who’s going to provide care for you when you’re retired and ill? Another pensioner?
I would change the wording so it makes sense. Society needs children. Humanity needs children. A state is just some construct, but any human society needs children in order to survive.
This isn’t unpopular, this is plain wrong. You seem to be so blinded by your hate of kids that you forget they’re critically essential for the society to function
Parents already pay higher taxes on everything they buy for their kids.
You need one jacket. My fam needs 4. I’m paying 4x the sales tax you are. I drive my kids to school …I pay more gas tax.
The only place parents get a break is on income and the only reason is because we have to pay for at least 2x the stuff.
As someone with no kids, never wanted the crotch goblins, I have no issues with parents getting a break on taxes raising their kids (where I am there is no tax on kids clothes and I am 100% behind this) and my subsidising their education. Besides I, OP, and basically everyone else will need these new adults in the making to take care of us when we are once again, and I am sure will shock OP, will be in the position to need to be looked after again (unless OP came to the world a fully formed adult, I know I wasn’t). Who do they think is going to look after all of us?
If I go to the store for a jacket, you’re right, I only need to buy one. You may need to buy 4, but do you really think that the sales tax you spend on supplies for your children is equivalent to what they cost the taxpayers in public education? Does it offset the increased demand that your children place on the supply chain for food? Does it offset the carbon emissions that 4 more human beings produce for 18 years?
Maybe your children will grow up to cure cancer one day. Maybe they’ll spend their entire adulthood working a minimum-wage service job. As long as they don’t grow up to become drug addicts or serial killers, they’re still contributing to society in whatever way they can. Until they become adults, though, they’re not a contributing member of society. Nobody forced you to produce 4 children, and the taxpayers should not be forced to support your life choices based on the possibility that they may benefit from them in the future.
I don’t hate children. They’re brought into the world whether they like it or not, and they should have every chance to succeed as long as they put forth some sort of effort. What I do hate are parents who have a child without any consideration to what they’re doing. No couple should ever have more than 2 children, at least until the population declines. Children should not be punished because of their parents poor reproductive choices. Parents should be punished, not rewarded.
