While it has not yet arrived, a plan is underway by the Republican Utah senator Mitt Romney together with Democratic Colorado senator Michael Bennett, the latter of which announced he would run for president in 2020 on May 2, 2019, to enact a bill in Congress that would allow children to receive a basic income, or more literally the parents and guardians of children to receive subsidies for raising their children, that would phase out for high income recipients, but would generally target the vast majority of lower income and middle class parents across America.
This system is similar to what other Western, developed countries such as Canada and various European countries already have in place for their citizens. As of right now, the US only provides tax credits for working parents of children, meaning that a large portion of disabled parents do not get any child benefits for their children.
There are many benefits to this type of child benefit, aside from a moral and human responsibility to provide one’s fellow man with the ability to provide for his children, in the 21st century when we are living in an abundant, prosperous era, particularly in the United States of America, currently undergoing the largest economic expansion in it’s history so far.
For one, it would raise the birth rates and encourage more parents wishing to have children to do so, who have no done yet out of fears of their financial stability and future, and government interventionism and bureaucratic obstacles with negative consequences that are imposed by child social services organizations when a parent is either temporarily or permanently in a position where they cannot provide by their children.
This scary, yet arbitrarily unnecessary reality creates an atmosphere in which having children is not a natural product of love and affection but one of financial forecasting, and one that brings stress and uncertainty upon the parents considering it, instead of a feeling of happiness and excitement.
While it is not for certain so far, the fact that it is being pitched as part of an increasing amount of socialist platforms in a country that has traditionally had a very conservative and staunchly hostile attitude towards “perceived to be” anti-Capitalist and democratic ideas, due to mostly Cold War hysteria and propaganda, and little understanding of economics and social psychology.
Eventually, it will arrive not only as a serious consideration, but also as an actual reform, either in this form or in a more refined form packaged with other welfare reforms.