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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34437 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 13, 2023

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I've also heard an argument that Social Security and nursing homes are to blame. It used to be that having kids was how people saved up for retirement. You spend 18 years paying for a child, and even if they earned you some money that just reduced the economic burden without removing it, but then they love you and are loyal to you and when you're old they take care of you and pay for you. Which, especially if you have an agrarian society where most of your wealth and income is physical goods not just cash, makes it hard to invest in a retirement account the same way we do now.

I don't think there's way to even possibly actually move the clock back on that though. Even if you ruthlessly cut social security and all financial assistance for elderly people, they could still take the money that would be spend on children (and the resulting decrease in taxes) and invest it in a retirement account.

But if you combine it with the reduced labor laws, together they might add up to being worth it.

I mean, the issue is there were a lot of families who didn't or couldn't do that, and it led to insane levels of endemic deep elderly poverty.

Social Security was a win-win. For lefties like me, it basically ended endemic deep poverty among elderly people. For more conservative people, it created a whole new class of consumers, who bought RV's, homes in Florida, et al. Plus, ya' know, actual retired people seem to like the freedom, instead of being free labor for their kids.

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