General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Fellow childfree folks, how much did you love writing the check out to the IRS after hearing all the [View all]Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)Look, it is the lifestyle choice of some people to eat a lot of cheeseburgers, develop heart disease, become disabled and get supported by disability plus free medical care, sleep around and get HIV, likewise, drink themselves blotto or do drugs and get a liver transplant, likewise.
(Note, this is to make a point and I know perfectly well that a diet that will make one person sick will be fine for another, that you can get HIV without ever being reckless or irresponsible in any way, and that many people who need liver transplants do so for causes that are utterly unrelated to lifestyle.)
Now think about that. The families raising children are doing something for all of us - when we are older, we will all need the next generation.
The whole point about society is the people - we seek to make a world in which people can live not necessarily richly, but with human dignity and some basic security. Your implicit argument is even more powerful against the sick, the elderly and the poor for any reason, and quite frankly, it fails the test of rationality.
Do you want to tell the firefighter who fell off a ladder in a fire rescue attempt broke his back and now is on disability retirement, "It was your lifestyle choice"? What the hell, he wasn't climbing the ladder to save you or anyone you know, so why does he have a claim on your money?
Come on now. The numbers in the OP are wrong, but it does cost a lot to raise kids. The purpose of a progressive tax system is to leave people enough money to live on, and those with kids usually need the money to live on.
A society without children is a dead society. Of all the things people do, being parents probably entails the most average sacrifice and the most average good for society.
I support disability for all those who are disabled. I support publicly funded medical care for all those who can't pay for it. I support retirement programs and food stamps and medical care for the imprisoned and public education and yes! The Dreaded Welfare, and I'd rather give tax credits to working single parents so I don't have to support them on welfare, and I don't feel bad about any of it. As far as I am concerned a drunken bum still deserves medical care and help. The other kind of society is one I just don't want to live in - it's one that doesn't respect people as people.
What a single person gets out of all this is not having to drive through intersections where kids are begging and paraplegics are begging, and if you really can't understand the benefit, it's time to sit down and think hard about it.