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Comment by wonderwonder | Hacker News Reader

Different but related topic, Hungary has recently moved forward with a program reducing the tax burden of mothers up to I believe exemption from income taxes for life for those that have 3 or more kids. This seems to be a pretty solid idea with so many people putting off having children due to the associated costs.

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That's performative policy. Hungarian mothers of 3 weren't paying much or any taxes at all in the first place. Because on average they have a small or no income.

I think a better policy would be to reduce the tax burden of a couple with 3 children. This makes working quite lucrative whilst at the same time it creates the flexibility for the couple to distribute work how they see fit, whether this is a breadwinner model or more hybrid.

Pinning this to the mother doesn't work. The policy incentive is to work as much as possible whilst at the same time carrying the burden of 3 children. Not an attractive combination.

On the face of it that sounds like childless taxpayers of all varieties subsidizing people who have many children. That's a "solid idea"?

If you want a country in the future, yes.

The actual existential threat to my own country has little to do with how many children people have or what their personal tax burden is.

Well, I guess a lot of the threat is to do with the children and tax burden of one specific man...

This has no relevance to whether fertility rates below replacement can end a country.

God forbid we relax immigration laws

Seems like a temporary fix: outsourcing the externalities of having children.

I would prefer this than having my country die or resorting to importing millions of people with completely different cultures. Those same 3 kids then go on to become tax payers, ensuring that there is a tax base in the future. So its a long term investment if you actually still want a country.

Your view is going to change depending if you look at the short or long term.

You might not like the culture of the kids raised by moms specifically incentivized by money to have kids, who may or may not be interested or able to raise the kids well.

It has always been trivial to pay a woman to give birth. Incentivizing the creation of productive families with well raised children is the difficult part.

Sure, there are positives and negatives to every single situation. But the absolute erasure of the population of a country is my concern. I'm not in the business of telling people how to raise their kids but I support incentivizing people to have kids.

You are of course welcome to disagree.

In the US, the majority of federal government spend is on old people (between social security, Medicare, health services, and VA benefits).

https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/feder...

It’s always been interesting to me that healthcare for kids is not as popular as healthcare for old people, such that there is no Medicare for kids. There is Medicaid, but it pays healthcare providers less…why?

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