Even putting aside the fact that many families who collect tax-funded benefits have failed to carry out the basic duties of families, family as a conservative value does not equal family as entitled beneficiary of other people’s wealth. People who do society the service of raising good and honest citizens might be gratified to receive the thanks of their neighbors. But only under socialism does it follow that a person who has reproduced has a right to her neighbors’ money.
Nearly all parents have voluntarily taken up the task of having children and derive many benefits from parenting, including material ones like reciprocal caregiving. The idea that people earning up to $250,000 need help with child care could only be believed by people who have never lived on an annual income of, say, $20,320.
Most marvelous is that not even two breadwinners are enough anymore. So many two-earner families are struggling that fellow citizens must underwrite their living expenses. It’s almost like costs are somehow being artificially driven up. In “Christianity and Culture,” T. S. Eliot observes, “What is miserable is a system that makes the dual wage necessary.” Old Possum’s head might explode to hear that now we have a system in which it is normal for a family to require two paychecks plus a check from the neighbors.
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