Posted on 03/06/2006 7:12:09 AM PST by FreedomSurge
Economically, every society needs children.
Children are the producers of the future This means that children are in a sense a necessary economic good. A society that does not produce enough children, or that cannot produce enough children who grow into economically productive adults, is doomed to poverty.
Every long-term investment we make, whether in the private or public sector, is predicated on the idea that there will be a future generation which will actually produce a return. It doesn't matter what economic or political system rules the present, it will need children to secure its future. Even the most self-centered individual would eventual realize that if the next generation cannot produce, his own welfare will suffer.
So, collectively we all need children and benefit when they grow into productive adults, but the cost of raising children is increasingly being borne by fewer and fewer in the general population.
Childless adults are rapidly becoming economic free riders on the backs of parents.
In the pre-industrial era, children almost always contributed to the economic success of the family directly. Agriculture depended heavily on the labor of children, and children brought further benefits by extending support networks via marriages. In the industrial era, however, children began to contribute less and less while consuming more and more. Nowadays, children usually return very little if any economic benefit to the parents.
Being a parent costs one economically. Although we socialize some cost, such as education, parents pay most of the cost of raising a child. Parents also lose out in non-monetary ways such as in a loss of flexibility in when and where they work. If an individual sets out to maximize his lifetime income, avoiding having children would be step one.
In our atomized society, children do not provide a boost in status, networking or security that offsets their very real cost. I think this economic loss may explain why many people shy away from having children. Many people simply do not want the loss of status that will come from having their disposable income consumed by rug rats.
Like all free-rider situations, this one will eventually cause a collapse that hurts everyone. As the percentage of parents in the population shrinks, the cost of being a parent will rise. More and more people will be tempted to conserve their own resources and let someone else shoulder the burden of creating the next generation. Eventually, the society will either produce too few children or, probably more likely, will not produce enough children with the skills and habits needed to carry on the economy
There is already grousing in some blue zones by the childless that they shouldn't have to subsidize the "breeders'" children. How long before child-hostile places like San Francisco become the norm?
I'm not sure how to address this problem from a public-policy perspective, but the next time you run into someone bragging because he chose not to have children, call him a parasite and see how it works out.
Look at the life cycle costs. Initially your statement may be true, but for the last 25 years of your life the costs will dramatically reverse. Do you propose to voluntarily euthanize yourself once you become a burden to the younger generation?
"Someone should place a pacifier up the anal cavity of this author to prevent any further episodes of this verbal diarrhea."
This comment identifies you as a fascist.
Yes, we've considered it and have a meeting this Thursday to begin state required MAPPS (parenting classes basically) classes.
The problem with adoption through a state is that most available children are much older, have from severe to mild physical and/or mental conditions. People, as selfish as it may sound, do not want to deal with serious conditions.
What about people who experience a miscarriage...do they get to vote?
Fine, I'll just go knock up some tramp and let your tax dollars support the offspring via HUD and WIC so I have your blessing to vote. Gee, silly me thinking I was being responsible by remaining childless unless I find Mrs. Right. I didn't realize that I wasn't even worthy of being a citizen. Well, thanks, I needed the excuse to go tomcatting around and impregnating women so that I can go vote in the next election.
Most people are probably more tactful than me, so I'll say what they cannot. This has got to be one of the more idiotic statements I have ever read on FR.
Childless people pay WAY more in taxes than parents.
The kind you see around FR disturbingly often.
Yes. But the important point is whether childlessness is freely chosen.
Nobody in the church asks them why they are childless. The priest doesn't ask why they are childless and refuse communion if they don't give the right answer.
The priest doesn't interrogate anyone prior to Communion, nor does he refuse Communion to anyone unless they are notorious public sinners.
You're missing the point of this entire discussion, which is about whether childless people should be allowed to vote or whether they are a drain on society.
If people understood ABC and deliberate childlessness as intrinsically evil, this discussion would be moot.
By the standards of the person who started this thread, every priest and nun should be refused the vote.
Well, I don't see this happening in the forseable future. So I'm ignoring this aspect of the argument for this practical reason. More importantly, there's no point in denying the vote to sinners of one particular kind, since we're all sinners.
Your church's attitude is irrelevant to anyone not a member of your church.
Not if the arguments are based in the natural law, which is knowable by everyone, nor if non-Catholics are interested in Catholic teaching.
And the church's attitude is irrelevant to how the government of the USA treats childless people.
Again, not if the Church's arguments are based on the natural law, which they almost always are with regard to public policy. You'll find that Catholic social and moral teaching borrows heavily from Aristotle.
Reporting you for abuse. What are you, twelve?
Until they get old.
Yea, but a childless couple doesn't get to keep more of their money, there is no refund. So in fact, who is really paying more?
"My parents paid school taxes because they HAD a child."
Sorry if I offended you, but you are wrong. We ALL pay school taxes since a failure to do so will result in our property being sold on the courthouse steps. One may wish to think that is somehow confiscatory, but once, before we lost a sense of community, we knew there would always be more of us either too young to work, or too old. It fell to all of us in the middle to care for the old, and educate the young. Nothing in that equation has changed, save a generation that wishes to "go it alone," for whatever purpose. Even Rouseau eventually gave up his idea of a social contract toward the end of his life.
LOL!!!
I think it all comes out in the wash as far as taxation goes. The children have to pay your retirement and eldery care and you have to pay for their education.
The complaining goes both ways. I often hear childless folks complain about the requirement of funding schools and hear parents complain about having to fund the social security and medicare of childless folks. I have heard childless people complain about having to put up with kids in public places... Selfish cranks, all.
Well, your post identifies you as an idiot, so I guess we're square . . .
For this reason, the deliberate choice to exclude children from marriage is one of the grounds for declaring a marriage null in the Catholic Church.
Of the big categories that have moved civilization which two caused the most bloodshed and which two created the most prosperity and least bloodshed .
Politics and religion cause the most blood shed.
Business and science created the most prosperity and least blood shed.
It is beyond reason why people chose to have government and religion recognize a man and a woman's devoted love for each other. Talk about upside down!
"Look at the life cycle costs. Initially your statement may be true, but for the last 25 years of your life the costs will dramatically reverse. Do you propose to voluntarily euthanize yourself once you become a burden to the younger generation?
"
Silly boy (or girl)! Like many childless folks, I have already arranged to have plenty of funds and insurance to take care of those needs. Indeed, my wife and I are less likely to be sucking off the public nipple in our old age than most folks with kids.
I don't know who you are, how old you are, or what the heck you're thinking, but your logic is way, way off.
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