You might pay more, but are you actually worse off.StuartPlymouth wrote: Agreed that it would be a nightmare situation to administer. Rather than proposing a tax on having children why not simply remove what is essentially the tax on not having them (ie remove Child Tax Credits). I pay more income tax than a single parent with a child on an equivalent income.
Lets look at the situation without Tax Credits:
Those low income parents currently on tax credits are currently paying some income tax (although less than the equivalent person without children). Remove the tax credits and they may decide that it isn't worth it any more; sit at home and claim benefits. You lose their income tax and have to pay them benefits. You are unoquivically worse off.
The only way you would be better off is if it deterred those on low incomes from having children in the first place (it could make you significantly better off, for a whole myriad of reasons*); however it isn't realistic to say that this would happen. If the would be parents is purely financial they would be better off not having the children anyway; the effect at the margin would be minimal.
* For example, your (well, not your, but just go with me on this) children would be better off (studies have shown that the greatest impact upon educational achievement is the parents income, closely followed by the peer group effect). Crime may be lower (based on Steven Levitt's findings that an increase in abortion rates was responsible for a large drop in crime levels in the early 90's in the US).
