Comment by jperras | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jperras | Hacker News Reader

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> It's a "nit pick" for sure, but in my understanding, something that "pays for itself" is not dependent on government subsidies. Quebec has some of the highest income taxes in the country - you pay for such services one way or another.

The subsidies that are required are offset by the increased labour force participation that occurs as a direct result of said subsidies. Conversely, if the subsidies disappeared, then there's a good chance that many of those currently employed parents would have to make a choice – do I remain in the workforce and pay $1-2k/month for childcare, or do I quit my job and raise my child/children?

I've had relatives that live in Ontario that had to make this choice. Daycare in Toronto is $1600/month, and can be around $2500/month if you have two children. If one of the parents is pulling in $50,000/year (net pay of $38,979), and you have to drop close to $30,000 for childcare, for 2-4 years, is it even worth staying at your job?

> do I remain in the workforce and pay $1-2k/month for childcare, or do I quit my job and raise my child/children?

That the program "pays for itself" in increased taxes implies that the additional tax burden is at least the $1-2k/month required to pay for the childcare.

So if you just cancelled the childcare and reduced the taxes you'd end up at the same place on average, except you wouldn't have non-parents subsidising childcare for parents.

I understood it as it would "pay for itself" in increased tax revenue in the future as the children who had access to better child care become more productive citizens. That sounds like how any other investment works, you pay now for a better situation in the future.

If you argue that you don't want to pay now because you won't benefit in the future because you'll be dead, I assume you're not willing to support any other investments either. That sounds like you're just freeloading on the investments that our ancestors made.

>children who had access to better child care become more productive citizens.

From the article:

But young Canadians who were eligible for the program experienced, as teenagers, “a significant worsening in self-reported health and in life satisfaction” relative to Canadians from other provinces. So, did the Quebec child-care experiment “work”? Yes, for parents and public financing. Perhaps not for the kids.

No, the argument is that the program increases GDP because more women with children are participating in the labor force. A portion of that increase is collected in taxes, and if that amount happens to be the same or larger than what the government spends on childcare, the program "pays for itself".

Non-parents are not subsidizing parents in this scheme. And if the additional amount collected in taxes is greater than the cost of the program, then parents are subsidizing non-parents.

If you cancelled the childcare, the GDP increase would disappear, so the increase in tax revenue would disappear, and you wouldn't be able to reduce the tax rate.

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