‘Why should I pay for you to have a child?’

[Cuppasoupmonster]

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/18/pay-child-uk-childcare?CMP=fb_gu&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR2yWUzAXpWYbFCLjFDcKiQU5fwjZ-vd1FyGHsnWwcCfTDeSy57AX014AnI#Echobox=1666093596

Great article!

And if only the rich have children who exactly is going to pay the taxes that will fund your pension and care as you age???

I don't think that's a good analogy. No one's denying health care to children and infants. And you've drawn attention to the high costs of maternity and obstetric care which those who don't have children don't run up.

Heavily subsidising parents so that they can both work and enrich themselves while the state picks up childcare costs is something else.

I don't disagree with subsidising childcare costs but if I wanted to I could argue why, say, a single person struggling to pay rent or a mortgage should be taxed extra to pay for your child to be looked after so you and your partner can both go out to work and afford the kind of property and cars and holidays the single person never could.

Well said @HighlandPony

@pattihews

Because it’s better for the economy for as many people as possible to be in employment?

It’s not really about enrichment it’s about earning a salary and housing and feeding your family.

And who exactly do you think is going to do all those low income jobs (supermarkets, caring jobs, nursery workers, the list goes on) if they have to quit because they can’t afford care for their children? Unless of course you think only wealthy people should have children.

How do you think those women are going to live when they’re elderly and they’ve got no pension to speak of because of the years out of work raising children?

What happens to all that government revenue from taxes and NI that will just disappear when those women can’t work anymore?

All of us pay taxes towards public services that we may never use, you’re not unique in that respect.

Hold your horses: I said I was going to play devil's advocate and you're at me with your axe and making assumptions about my own circumstances.

So, devils' advocate hat on. Why should a single low-income person working in a care home or as a cleaner in a hospital pay 2% more in tax so that someone with children can go out to work and afford a second car or a second foreign holiday for her family? Of course in many cases it's about personal enrichment. People with two children in childcare may be paying £1500 a month for their care. If they don't have to pay it they'll have £1500 extra to spend on themselves. Or save it towards private school fees.

Imagine that one of your children was in the position of the care worker or the NHS cleaner. Would you really think that was fair?

Childcare is expensive, difficult to find, unavailable for shift workers (who are likely to really need it), and gets dumped on grandparents (who may not want or be able to do it easily). But if someone becomes a sahm, they are called a sponger on society, bad example for their kids, not feminist etc. Society can't have it both ways - either it wants women to be back in the workplace, paying tax, or it doesn't!

Heavily subsidised, good childcare would, as said by a pp, protect those children with shitty parents and help produce adults who in turn make positive contributions to society and maybe not turn into shitty parents themselves. It would be an investment in our future society.

The truth is that as much as some posters resent any accommodation for children, we need them - every time you see a doctor, go to a shop, call a plumber, it's someone else's choice to have children which means those services are available!
It's really short sighted to say only the rich can procreate and the rich would soon change their minds on this when they realise there's no one to wipe their arse in the old people's home, or worse, Waitrose has run out of courgettes because there's no one to grow them!

@pattihews

Well assuming we had a fair and just tax system, I think I’d be happy with the concept that childcare was affordable for all and that some of all our taxes went towards this.

Ditto healthcare. Many people can afford private healthcare, but I believe healthcare is something that should be provided to all systems by the state as part of a properly functioning society.

@pattihews

Argh, all citizens not systems

Then I don’t see why other people’s children should pay for your pension and healthcare in retirement.

When mine were tiny I stayed at home but found work I could do around them, we had one old car, no mobile phones (yes they had been invented!) no pay tv, no gym and I only went to free child activities at the library and church. Bought cheap or second hand etc. Kids need their parent more than stuff. We lived in one bed flat until we had 2 children then a 2 bed which I got a job doing the end of tenancy cleans and communal areas.

If both parents work, I'm not sure why I should help pay the bill, cut back to a lifestyle you can afford (low income get help with costs already)

@gogohmm what year was this?

And you can’t ‘personal finance’ your way out of £1,500p/m nursery bills. Double that for two children.

I don't disagree with you.

I'm reeling from reading threads on here where people taking home £90K pa (£7.5k a month) and with £40k in savings are complaining that with interest rates and inflation they won't be able to cope. I don't want to be subsidising people who can't cope on £90k pa, I want my taxes to go to the poorest.

@pattihews £90k pa isn't 7.5k pm, it's more like £4.5k after tax and NI. Assume you have student loans too so that's another £600 per month for plan 1. Personally I earn slightly less than that and after mortgage on an ex council house, full time childcare of over £2k, and all the other bills of food, fuel to get to work, car inc MOT and insurance, council tax, gas+electricity, I am worse off right now than I would be if I didn't work and lived in a council house claiming benefits. I know this because one of my neighbours talks extremely loudly outside about how much they get for housing benefit, etc., for claiming as a single parent and how they have their live in partner's (who is parent to their kids) entire wage to put towards the deposit on help to buy on the house so that's another load of tax subsidising their lifestyle choices. I couldn't afford three kids under school age because of childcare costs - someone on universal credit can because someone else pays for it. I reckon they're costing the state about the same amount I pay in tax each year and they've got a shipload more money at the end of each month than I have. Are you happier subsidising them instead?

Don't pretend the worst off at any one time are always those earning the least when they get help with the biggest costs. Quite frankly I don't know how people who are being honest and those just above benefits are surviving right now.

And when your children are in school and when you've paid off your student loan and when your career has progressed a bit you will be absolutely rolling in it and moving off to live somewhere bigger and nicer and offering your children an interesting and varied life — and they won't.

I may be misremembering, but I seem to recall that the thread about struggling to survive on £90k was after tax and deductions.

@pattihews yes but that's bigger all help with the bills right now. I've not seen the other thread anyway to comment on exact numbers, just trying to make it clear that there are an awful lot of people who you'd think are doing great who aren't and a lot of people you'd think wouldn't be doing great who are. Personally I'm hugely conflicted on where the help should go because it's clear we can't help everyone.

I don't want to seem glib, but I think one's mid 20s into late 30s, which is when we're most likely to be raising young children, is a crunch period in many women's lives, when family and work and mortgage and so on come together. I think very few people don't go through a pinch point which at the time feels as if it'll last for ever. It won't. You will get through this. But yes, bloody tough as a single parent.

As you say, we can't help everyone.

Oh, and I forgot to say that when you're in a household earning £90k, whether that's gross or net, you are doing okay by any standard.

I was definitely not paying $8 per day in Toronto! It was $1500 per month for a full time place in nursery, for a two year old. Not radically different to London.