4 ms·

I don't know about Austria, but in the Netherlands there's a similar monetary compensation you get for each child; however, AFAIK it's not meant to "encourage"

I don't know about Austria, but in the Netherlands there's a similar monetary compensation you get for each child; however, AFAIK it's not meant to "encourage" people to have more children. Rather, it's meant to make up for the increased cost of living once your family expands. (There's a Dutch politician quoted in the article as saying that Dutch women should have more babies... it seemed awfully odd to me. Upon closer investigation, he was talking about cranking up the birth rate from 1.7 to 2.1.)

randallsquared 16y ago
it's not meant to "encourage" people to have more children. Rather, it's meant to make up for the increased cost of living once your family expands. Removing discouragement is the same overall as adding encouragement.
- Someone 16y ago
  "Removing discouragement is the same overall as adding encouragement." It may have the same effect, but it something entirely different. For example, would you argue that legalizing the sale of tobacco or alcohol is the same as encouraging people to smoke or drink?
  - pmjordan 16y ago
    I think it's pretty safe to say that paying cash for every child falls squarely in the category of "rewarding behaviour you wish to encourage", let alone subsidised housing, tax breaks and paid maternity leave. There are obviously degrees of encouragement or discouragement, but that's beside the point. Which, in case it wasn't clear, was that these measures only have a hope of working with low-income households as the advantage of fixed-size benefits (cash child benefits, paid maternity leave) diminishes proportionately, and the rest (tax breaks, housing) are inversely dependent on income.
  - randallsquared 16y ago
    It's not clear to me that legalization of those drugs would have the same effect as doing something else with the intent to encourage use of them. However, in the case of money, it's a little clearer: the only difference between giving someone extra money when they have another child and replacing money they spend on an extra child is what you say about it. Now, it's true that what you say about it can have a real effect on choices and outcomes, but we don't really know enough to reliably predict what that effect is in the general case, so for practical purposes, I think we're better off assuming that the effects are negligible.

randallsquared 16y ago

it's not meant to "encourage" people to have more children. Rather, it's meant to make up for the increased cost of living once your family expands. Removing discouragement is the same overall as adding encouragement.

Someone 16y ago
"Removing discouragement is the same overall as adding encouragement." It may have the same effect, but it something entirely different. For example, would you argue that legalizing the sale of tobacco or alcohol is the same as encouraging people to smoke or drink?
- pmjordan 16y ago
  I think it's pretty safe to say that paying cash for every child falls squarely in the category of "rewarding behaviour you wish to encourage", let alone subsidised housing, tax breaks and paid maternity leave. There are obviously degrees of encouragement or discouragement, but that's beside the point. Which, in case it wasn't clear, was that these measures only have a hope of working with low-income households as the advantage of fixed-size benefits (cash child benefits, paid maternity leave) diminishes proportionately, and the rest (tax breaks, housing) are inversely dependent on income.
- randallsquared 16y ago
  It's not clear to me that legalization of those drugs would have the same effect as doing something else with the intent to encourage use of them. However, in the case of money, it's a little clearer: the only difference between giving someone extra money when they have another child and replacing money they spend on an extra child is what you say about it. Now, it's true that what you say about it can have a real effect on choices and outcomes, but we don't really know enough to reliably predict what that effect is in the general case, so for practical purposes, I think we're better off assuming that the effects are negligible.