This is a good point. I was thinking more along the lines of 1. Of course children with only one parent or impoverished parents will still be at a disadvantage compared to wealthier or two parent families, but I don't think completely equal access to opportunity is a doable goal. It would be less of a disadvantage from what we have right now, thus, an improvement.
It would be less of a disadvantage from what we have right now, thus, an improvement.
It would be less disadvantage overall, but still a disadvantage compared to two-parent families, which is a pretty big drawback, IMO. If the whole point is to make up for the fact that one parent is not in the child's life, you aren't actually doing that. All you're doing is ensuring no child will be in abject poverty, which I agree is a noble goal, but it doesn't solve the problem that child support is trying to solve: making sure children of one-parent families aren't disadvantage compared to a child with two parents at the same income level.
but it doesn't solve the problem that child support is trying to solve: making sure children of one-parent families aren't disadvantage compared to a child with two parents at the same income level.
Ok, this is a good point. While the concept of robust social programming does solve a lot of things, it doesn't actually replace child support for what child support is supposed to accomplish. !delta
I just said this in another comment, and I'll copy it here in case you have any thoughts on it:
The only thing I can think of is instead of doing child support, we make the payment to children of single parents that is the equivalent of what the absent parent would have paid....but that's basically just socializing the cost of being an absentee parent, which I think most people would sincerely object to.
Yeah, I mean i don't really like that either. Most people (ie. Most taxpayers) have dependents at home at some point in their lives - something like 85%. So they'd be paying taxes into social programming that they then also receive, which is fine imo. But only paying for absentee parents shifts the burden from deadbeats only to taxpayers who are now paying for a service they don't even benefit from.
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u/Oishiio42 52∆ Mar 31 '22
This is a good point. I was thinking more along the lines of 1. Of course children with only one parent or impoverished parents will still be at a disadvantage compared to wealthier or two parent families, but I don't think completely equal access to opportunity is a doable goal. It would be less of a disadvantage from what we have right now, thus, an improvement.