BilikFamily.com

Two is enough - I came across an article yesterday entitled "Two is Enough: Why large families don't deserve tax breaks" at Slate magazine. The author's point was that once families go beyond two, the children suffer on the educational front. The parents only have a fixed amount of resources and every child beyond two takes away resources from the first two. He suggests that we should change the tax code so that there are diminishing exemptions and credits beyond two children to discourage couples from having large families.

His mindset seems to be focused solely on improving the quality of the children in the family. It implies that a child is better off with better schooling than more siblings. It reminded me a bit of eugenics-lite. When Margaret Sanger pushed for unlimited contraceptive access and oversaw the development of the modern birth control pill, she couched her arguments in terms of helping the poor but much has been written about her associations with the eugenics movement of her time. She wanted that only the best breeds would propagate. Inferior classes and races should be encouraged to use the pill.

Anyway back to the article, using the author's style of reasoning, one could likewise argue that governments should put in place policies that encourage having children based on your income. Picture a policy that encourages, say, one child for every $50k/year you earn. That way the state is assured that you will have the resources to give that child the education he/she needs. If you earn $100k/year, then yes, two children are encouraged, but not three. Creepy, no?

I also thought of our modern social security crisis. It has two main factors. One, we're living longer healthier lives so the average retiree draws from the fund for more years before their eventual death. This is why there has been so much talk of increasing the age of retirement benefits for SSI. But second, there are fewer younger people paying into the system because family size has shrunk so much relative to when the program was introduced in 1935. While people may find it unusual for our family (or the Tarpey family) to have five children, it was much more common, almost typical, in 1935. I've often wondered what would happen to the American "but how will you pay for their college education" mindset if the social security payout at retirement had a bonus based on the children you added to the active workforce.

Lastly, I think that the tax break was only a very minor factor in our decision to be open to more children. The tax break helps, certainly, but it's not as if we would have stopped at two children for lack of an exemption claim and child tax credit.

I'd write more, but the kids are up and need changing. After that I have to head to work.