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Citizens are not some helpless victims. They make their life choices and they should by exercising personal responsibility. The same benefits also applies to n

by yanilkr 11y ago

Citizens are not some helpless victims. They make their life choices and they should by exercising personal responsibility. The same benefits also applies to non-value creators who want to avoid tedium of work and the incentivizes to not do anything and takes risks goes away. There is a natural Darwinism involved in influencing who wants to have kids. If someone is already struggling in their life, why should they get the incentive to have kids?

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
1: Some people are helpless victims, especially poor and minorities. Much bigger chances of arrest and fewer starting opportunities significantly limits where they can go and what debts they are chained to for how long. 2: Lazy people have and will always exist. Better in general for them to collect their check and not bother anybody. Otherwise you end up with more criminals, homeless, bad employees who can tarnish your brand, and so on. 3: Great point about children! I do believe that maintaining the replacement rate is of paramount importance (if you don't believe me, look at China by 2050), but excessive offspring should be discouraged, and even taxed at certain rates.
trgn 11y ago
People have kids outside of financial consideration. The desire for having children is an enormous natural force for many (not all). That's not even including all the children as result of youthful mistakes or just plain happenstance. Technocrats are quick to frame having children as some sort of result of rational decision making, like buying a car. Since it's obviously not, this viewpoint readily becomes a normative prescription. What not is, instead should. Hence, poor people shouldn't have children because they can't afford them. But humans aren't robots. It's like saying teenagers shouldn't wreck their dad's car (they will), adults shouldn't fall in love with abusive a-holes (happens all the time), or old Johnny over there should just give up smoking already (he won't). A just community absorbs this messiness with patience, forgiveness, and empathy. Families generally do. Friends often as well. Tight-knit towns have that capacity. Perhaps even the polis as well. But the higher up we go, the more abstract a human becomes. Right now, humans are widgets, no more than appliances in the cybernetic feedback loop. Not too long ago, we were divinely chosen caretakers with responsibilities to God first&foremost; at some point we were hapless pieces on the game board of disinterest cosmic chess players. Not sure which abstraction to prefer honestly.
- yanilkr 11y ago
  People also don't want to let go of their hard earned money. It is also an enormous natural force. Our society is doing that to productive people forcibly and for your just theory you are picking and choosing which force of nature we should tolerate and which one we shouldn't. Your patience, forgiveness and empathy has any worthiness if it is voluntary and forcing it on certain set of people is no longer a just community.
  - aninhumer 11y ago
    >Our society is doing that to productive people forcibly If they don't like it, they can stop producing. But I'm guessing they're not quite so willing to give up all the other freedoms their money grants them.
    - yanilkr 11y ago
      They are productive people, they do other things like move to places where there are less taxes mostly out of USA. They hire people outside USA where payroll taxes are less. Or they stash in cyprus and panama. Or buy politicians. Why do you think Steve jobs and other CEOs give them selves 1$ salary because they want to avoid paying income tax and want to pay less capital gains tax.?
      - aninhumer 11y ago
        >They are productive people, they do other things like move to places where there are less taxes mostly out of USA. They still need to sell their goods in the US, so we can tax them then. And as these countries develop, they'll start to implement similar social programs. Eventually there'll be nowhere left to hide. >Or they stash in cyprus and panama. Or buy politicians. These are separate problems, with their own solutions.
        yanilkr 11y ago
        If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail. If the only thing you can imagine is taxation then you try to solve every problem with taxation.
ambicapter 11y ago
Basically you want to punish people's kids if their parents aren't up to your standard. True meritocracy, that.
- yanilkr 11y ago
  just like you want to reward stupid people having kids. true idiocracy.

by yanilkr 11y ago

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago

1: Some people are helpless victims, especially poor and minorities. Much bigger chances of arrest and fewer starting opportunities significantly limits where they can go and what debts they are chained to for how long. 2: Lazy people have and will always exist. Better in general for them to collect their check and not bother anybody. Otherwise you end up with more criminals, homeless, bad employees who can tarnish your brand, and so on. 3: Great point about children! I do believe that maintaining the replacement rate is of paramount importance (if you don't believe me, look at China by 2050), but excessive offspring should be discouraged, and even taxed at certain rates.

trgn 11y ago

People have kids outside of financial consideration. The desire for having children is an enormous natural force for many (not all). That's not even including all the children as result of youthful mistakes or just plain happenstance. Technocrats are quick to frame having children as some sort of result of rational decision making, like buying a car. Since it's obviously not, this viewpoint readily becomes a normative prescription. What not is, instead should. Hence, poor people shouldn't have children because they can't afford them. But humans aren't robots. It's like saying teenagers shouldn't wreck their dad's car (they will), adults shouldn't fall in love with abusive a-holes (happens all the time), or old Johnny over there should just give up smoking already (he won't). A just community absorbs this messiness with patience, forgiveness, and empathy. Families generally do. Friends often as well. Tight-knit towns have that capacity. Perhaps even the polis as well. But the higher up we go, the more abstract a human becomes. Right now, humans are widgets, no more than appliances in the cybernetic feedback loop. Not too long ago, we were divinely chosen caretakers with responsibilities to God first&foremost; at some point we were hapless pieces on the game board of disinterest cosmic chess players. Not sure which abstraction to prefer honestly.

yanilkr 11y ago
People also don't want to let go of their hard earned money. It is also an enormous natural force. Our society is doing that to productive people forcibly and for your just theory you are picking and choosing which force of nature we should tolerate and which one we shouldn't. Your patience, forgiveness and empathy has any worthiness if it is voluntary and forcing it on certain set of people is no longer a just community.
- aninhumer 11y ago
  >Our society is doing that to productive people forcibly If they don't like it, they can stop producing. But I'm guessing they're not quite so willing to give up all the other freedoms their money grants them.
  - yanilkr 11y ago
    They are productive people, they do other things like move to places where there are less taxes mostly out of USA. They hire people outside USA where payroll taxes are less. Or they stash in cyprus and panama. Or buy politicians. Why do you think Steve jobs and other CEOs give them selves 1$ salary because they want to avoid paying income tax and want to pay less capital gains tax.?
    - aninhumer 11y ago
      >They are productive people, they do other things like move to places where there are less taxes mostly out of USA. They still need to sell their goods in the US, so we can tax them then. And as these countries develop, they'll start to implement similar social programs. Eventually there'll be nowhere left to hide. >Or they stash in cyprus and panama. Or buy politicians. These are separate problems, with their own solutions.
      - yanilkr 11y ago
        If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail. If the only thing you can imagine is taxation then you try to solve every problem with taxation.

ambicapter 11y ago

Basically you want to punish people's kids if their parents aren't up to your standard. True meritocracy, that.

yanilkr 11y ago
just like you want to reward stupid people having kids. true idiocracy.