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More directly, yours is a wealth redistribution scheme from parents to elderly non-parents to produce healthy young people at the bottom of the pyramid mostly a
by beaeglebeached 3y ago
More directly, yours is a wealth redistribution scheme from parents to elderly non-parents to produce healthy young people at the bottom of the pyramid mostly at their own cost so they can turn around and subsidize people who never raised up this distribution mechanism. An interesting system that is collapsing in much of Europe due to the free rider effect. Why have kids when some other schmuck will foot the bill and the output will lower my insurance premium in what becomes effectively a regressive tax.
- imtringued 3y ago[flagged]
- beaeglebeached 3y agoWouldn't it be the kids taking advantage? They fall into non-parents bucket, so yes they are free riders but since they are children I'll forgive them. I don't blame children for not paying their premiums, and since society is about to farm hard on them it's almost a half hearted quid pro quo. Or do my adult premiums go down when I have kids?
- oktoberpaard 3y agoKids don't pay premiums until they're 18, or to be more precise: they're already covered by the base package of their parents.
- thriftwy 3y ago> I doubt anyone in Europe is deciding to not have children based on this factor. Why so few children in most of Europe then? Of course they don't. They just know that they can have fleeting fun until 60 and then "somebody" will foot their old age bills. So why have children? At the same time, people who have children has to pay for themselves, for their children, for their parents but also for "grasshoppers" who only use their country's coffers when in need, while barely contributing anything.
- oktoberpaard 3y agoI'm confused by this statement, as the fertility rate in the European Union (1.5 in 2021) is similar to the fertility rate in the US (1.66 in 2021). But yes, countries in Europe do have issues with aging populations, especially when the net immigration is low. It depends on the system how big of an issue it is. For example, in my country the pension system is designed with this in mind, and for a big part people pay for their own pensions instead of for the pensions of the current pensioners. Of course population aging is also a hazard for the economy as a whole, but that's a bit of scope for this discussion, I'd say.
- beaeglebeached 3y agoThe problem exists in shades in the USA and pretty much everywhere with nation state robust social security that relies in tragedy of the commons of privatizing the lions share of cost of children while socializing the gains ( your health insurance scheme is perfect in scope example I think). The effect is so predictable it's stunning that it's rarely seen as an obvious focus of study.
- oktoberpaard 3y agoHow does this scheme socialize the gains of children if children don't pay premiums? In my country it's actually free to have children (as there are no hospital and healthcare costs involved for the parents) and having children gets subsidized in various forms (allowances, education, etc). Sure, it's still expensive to have children, but it's expensive to have children in any country. And mind you, there is no country in the world where the per capita healthcare expenditure (private and public combined) is higher than in the US. Edit: per capita.
- thriftwy 3y agoThis scheme seems to squeeze young adults for cash so they can only afford children shortly before they are no longer able to produce them.