by Vince?Daliessio
i.e., that giving more welfare to incentivize people?to reproduce will incentivize the poorest people far?more than the well-off, and young, single females most of all;
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/05/20/1085028466009.html
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Look at our experience with welfare. When welfare agencies give single women on welfare more money if they have children, more single women give birth. When you stop subsidizing additional children, the birthrate among single welfare mothers with children drops precipitously. Requires no moral or economic analysis beyond that. This was considered "cruel and inhuman" when New Jersey implemented this in the late 1980's, but it worked like a charm.
Before anyone argues that the small amount rewarded for having a baby wouldn't justify having one, I submit the concept of margins. Sure, $3000 won't make anyone rethink having a baby as opposed to a career but some women live closer to the margins. Some are already on welfare and don't work. Although a new baby may not be the intended outcome of a relationship, the extra incentive would make it more likely that she would become less careful about preventing unwanted pregnancy. And any entitlement scheme would push those further from that margin closer to it even if it wouldn't necessarily push them over. And the article hit it on the head when it said that the media, so casual about parental responsibility already, takes away the stigma that used to be associated with teen motherhood.
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