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Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

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Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#141

Post by soco »

qurren wrote: post #136
pibaker wrote: post #117

I am increasingly of the opinion that you can either be eligible to vote, or collect pension, but not both at the same time. By the time you start collecting pension, you have effectively ousted yourself from economic production. And unlike a 20yo still in college and not contributing to the economy yet, you don't have 50 more years of your life to worry about. This effectively means it is safe for you to support any…

> By the time you start collecting pension, you have effectively ousted yourself I disagree. The vast majority of jobs are difficult to work at old age and with medical conditions that typically come with old age. As long as we value keeping people alive for their natural lifespan (I hope we do), then our base assumption needs to be that we every time we pay someone we need to pay them $1 for now and $1 for their ret…

And before that difficulty to perform the work, it's also that willing elderly won't even be considered for a job. I mean even if the job is pure intellectual job, you hear reasons like "oh 10 years only until retirement they won't invest in our culture" - while at the same time the company attrition is 20%. Pure prejudice. Also not allowing for part time jobs, another prejudice "oh they aren't fully focused on us" and mandatory office presence "oh they will do nothing if I don't watch them". We have a doomed system if we can't work on those solutions which would definitely solve, or at least push back a serious while, the current demographic imbalance. But prejudices are probably more difficult to address than passing a law... try to force any of the above and you'll immediately have the right-wing all over you for "removing muh freedoms" and such.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#142

Post by Jamesbeam »

myrmidon wrote: post #6

There's a bunch of criticism, but this is in my view the only general approach that makes sense (globally) and should have been done 50 years ago already. IMO a big factor for the whole sub-replacement fertility in developed nations (and resulting demographic problems) is that the state has invalidated/replaced all the economical gain that families got from children (cheap "workers" and elder care), but the chld-rela…

I think that someone gets an overall tax rebate when they have children is a reasonable decision for a society to make.

But the real problem here is that there are a ton of adults who would love to have kids but are medically not able to for a bunch of reasons, from autoimmune disease to genetic differences to the simple fact that young people get cancer too and infertility because of treatment or the illness is a thing too.

Is it really wise for a society to treat them as if they willingly deny the society additional benefactors and valuable younger members?

It feels wrong for me that you get treated unequally by the law because of circumstances that are not choice-based and your decision to make in the first place.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#143

Post by thefz »

myrmidon wrote: post #6

There's a bunch of criticism, but this is in my view the only general approach that makes sense (globally) and should have been done 50 years ago already. IMO a big factor for the whole sub-replacement fertility in developed nations (and resulting demographic problems) is that the state has invalidated/replaced all the economical gain that families got from children (cheap "workers" and elder care), but the chld-rela…

What about taxing the rich instead of putting yet another burden on the young.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#144

Post by myrmidon »

lokar wrote: post #112
myrmidon wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but not commensurately. A child might cost its parents somewhere beyond $200k, the parents only get a tiny fraction of this from the state. And the public paying for education is not a subsidy for parents in my view, but an investment into the children , i.e. future taxpayers (=> the parents don't really gain from that).

I think you are arguing inconsistently here. You can't claim at the same time that we should recognize all of the benefits of children (in their adulthood) and at the same time not recognize the cost to society to educate them. It's a subsidy, a wise subsidy and money well spent, but it's still a cost.

My point is: Society itself recoups the investment into education very easily (from competent taxpaying workers some years later), but the main cost of raising children is paid by parents, and they don't get back anything (economically).

All the benefits that used to be there (adolescents helping with farm/work, children taking care of aging parents) became more and more irrelevant, but general costs of raising children (to parents) have not decreased at all (and "reputational" cost of just skipping parenthood is at rock bottom, too, so that is no longer pushing prospective parents towards economically irrational decisions, either).

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#145

Post by spwa4 »

soco wrote: post #139
spwa4 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forget the problem that's being solved here. It's not how to incentivize having kids. It's how to increase taxes while reducing pensions. Increasing the obligations of everyone currently working while decreasing what the state provides at the same time. The full details are: this is an additional 2.5% non-progressive income tax, two thirds paid by employers, one third by employees. Other "currently proposed" chan…

And why wouldn't the elderly need to keep working longer? They did benefit from all the new medical stuff extending their active lives, so how about giving back by working a few years more? It's also their own decision to have less children, thus less workers, and also they generally don't want more immigrants, so there - it's either more work, or magic. And we don't know how to do magic.

They voted and paid taxes based on a deal that was presented to them, in writing. Now the deal is being changed.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#146

Post by thefz »

myrmidon wrote: post #45
lokar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Society pays a lot for children as well. Including members without children.

Yes, but not commensurately. A child might cost its parents somewhere beyond $200k, the parents only get a tiny fraction of this from the state. And the public paying for education is not a subsidy for parents in my view, but an investment into the children , i.e. future taxpayers (=> the parents don't really gain from that).

> A child might cost its parents somewhere beyond $200k, the parents only get a tiny fraction of this from the state.

Yet another reason for others not to chip in your bad ROI decisions then

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#147

Post by thefz »

matchbok3 wrote: post #39

This is a challenging topic to discuss because (rightly) it's very personal. Sadly the fact of the matter is this: we need more children and young people to keep society functioning (and continually improve our quality of life). There is no other known way. So unfortunately the "free rider" problem needs to be addressed somehow. Of course, the "cruel" part is how it affects those who either can't have children, are g…

> So unfortunately the "free rider" problem needs to be addressed somehow.

Free rider? I am already paying close to 30% of my income for the state to distribute to ALL.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#148

Post by skeledrew »

hobofan wrote: post #8
mc32 wrote: post #2

Makes sense since they don’t produce future taxpayers. They should also adjust retirement age based on life expectancy -of course people won’t like this but you can’t overcome the math. Separately, I also think airfare should be in part based on weight.

Childless people have a shorter life expectancy by ~2 years. So if we unsocalize the cost and base it on that factor, people with children should be paying more as they are a strain on the system for longer.

That would be counterproductive, as then there would be less incentive to have children, and the fertility rate is already in the tank as is.

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#149

Post by thefz »

bigballsbjorn wrote: post #64
ahtihn wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many people can't afford to have kids Wrong. Poor people have 0 problems having kids. People can afford kids, they don't want to compromise on lifestyle.

children will massively compromise your lifestyle, not just financially but they require a lot of "labor" from you. this is probably the most important piece of the social contract and if you are breaking it you should be penalized.

So you want others to be miserable like you, to feel better?

Re: Germany news: Childfree adults to pay more for elder care

#150

Post by saalweachter »

qurren wrote: post #72
saalweachter wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want to incentivize people to have kids, hand out $500K-1M to anyone who wants to have kids. Don't penalize those who don't. Where does the money come from?

I really don't fucking know. That's not my problem. Either increase my salary by $500K for a couple years, or stop taxing me to death (state taxes, federal taxes, sales taxes, indirectly paying property taxes via rent, taxes disguised as car registrations, tariffs, so many goddamn taxes I don't have any money left to save), stop starting wars elsewhere, stop squandering money, anything. It's not my problem, really. I…

It's just that in the US, there are 3.6 million babies born each year; even taking the low-end of a $500k one-time payment to one parent, you're already talking a $1.8 trillion / year program, slightly larger than Social Security's $1.6 trillion program.

Social Security is funded by a 12.4% income tax, with half nominally paid by the employee and half nominally paid by the employer.

You'd need a similar tax to fund such a benefit, which would amount to a 15% income tax, assuming the program isn't too successful in raising birth rates.

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