I don't know what we're talking about any more - you proposed that those that have children have a lower threshold to save for their retirement and this be part of a state programme. This is driven on the basis that these children will be taxpayers of the future and will fund the state coffers, including funds for pensions/care of the elderly. I was saying that continuing to rely on the next generation to meet our retirement needs is a ponzi scheme that multiplies the issue up until it is not possible to continue this approach through resource limitations - whether than be on a national or global scale. Trying to keep the low/middle segments of a population pyramid wider than older ages is unsustainable. I don't see any need for incentivising people to have children but instead that the resources of the taxpayers today are put towards their retirement.
No doubt there would be criticism of this in the future where the older generations are seen to be 'hogging all the wealth' but the alternative is they have no wealth and the young provide for their older generations in their working lives, which is what we have now and will continue to have until we make some fairly significant changes.
I wasn't speaking of an apocalypse but a continuing constraining of resource availability as human population and materials demand continues. We're there already and yet we're adding to the problem by denying its existence ('climate change is a myth') or preparing half-arsed ideas ('the population of the planet could live in Australia with enough land to feed them').
The pronatalist Government incentives are working - is anyone claiming that we don't have a high enough birth rate here or in (say) Britain? We can all pick out countries that meet our argument but we have to get away from the mindset that we need more children/future taxpayers in order to have state provision for pensioners.
The only alternative then in the longterm is to abolish the state pension pension completely - and everyone is saving then. It is now a ponzi scheme as a promise of money later in life is made - though there won't be enough people to finance that promise.
As said - the aim is to stabilise a population (2.1). Thats the reasoning also behind reducing mandatory savings for private pension (and increasing access to already made savings) by a third after each child with that proposal.
Hungary is exact in that situation - large emigration - non existing immigration. Fertility rate is 1.34.How would the "fertility" theory work in a country that had large emigration and insignificant immigration?
So Hungary is here really "desperate" - after the third child you receive 32k in Euro (10 million Forinth - the average detached house price in Hungary is HUF 9.3 million) and you can get a cheap loan for additional 32k from the government.
With very large emigration the state pension is even faster doomed.
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