Talk Elections

[MORE] (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070928/ap_po/clinton_baby_bonds;_ylt=AtWaLIsNh.2LMrBtpXqKLX6yFz4D)

Dis-f**king-asterous.  There is no way in hell I will ever vote for Hillary unless she takes this proposal off the table.

She clearly has no concept of inflation, little grasp on how people actually behave—a gigantic, government-funded savings account would be a DISincentive to save on your own, and little respect for the voters if she really thinks we're dumb enough to swallow this garbage as a legit proposal.

What a bizarre idea.  At least it's... uh... unique, I suppose.

Hmmm... I think she stole this proposal from Soult-onomics... well, my proposal was only for people who need the money.

This equals about $2 billion a year. Seems like a lot, but the US is blowing a lot more on dumber things (the Iraq War comes to mind...)

Great idea!

^^^^^^^

But still won't make me support Hillary.

Now what could get me to support Hillary would be something like her publicly telling Ralph Nader to f**k off. In those exact words.

Maybe it's just me after a week of not sleeping, but this was totally not what I was expecting when I saw "Clinton: $5,000 for every U.S. baby".

You're missing a power of ten.  It's $20 billion.


"I think it's a wonderful idea," said Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, an Ohio Democrat who attended the event and has already endorsed Clinton. "Every child born in the United States today owes $27,000 on the national debt, why not ^make it $32,000 so they can buy a car when they turn 18? let them come get $5,000 to grow until they're 18?"

The only problem with this plan is that it doesn't include babies born overseas to at least one U.S. resident.

Epic fail.

Not quite - Howard pulled that one out of his hat during the 2004 election. I thought it was a bad idea then... I think it's a REALLY bad idea now. Clinton should never have done this - it sounds good, but there are some negatives to it.

On one hand, panderbear is back.

On the other, realistically it'll probably mean weakening social security so everything will even out. Maybe if the bond is given, they'll need less in Pell grants, so again evening things out.

And the massive spike in inflation that will occur 18 years following the plan's implementation.  That could be a problem too.

Very strange idea to say the least.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Amen.

Hillary's plan: Worst. Pander. Ever.

This makes sense in Europe, where they have a negative growth rate. But it's kind of bizarre here...

Looks like Hillary Clinton is pulling a Bruno Kreisky (note: most powerful Social Democratic Austrian chancellor in the 1970s) who introduced "birth allowance" valued at then 8.000 Schilling for every child born. Inflation-adjusted this would mean about 1.000-1.500€ (=1.500-2.000 $) nowadays per child. This was substituted in 1997 with "maternity allowance" and additional forms of child and family benefits. Basically, if you are a 7-month pregnant woman in Austria, you are banned from working about 8 weeks before your calculated birth date and you´ll get your whole net income until 8 weeks after the birth of your child. By then you normally applied for additionally family and child benefits, so that you are getting between 500-1000€ a month in benefits - 3 years long.

Back to Socialist Kreisky: Did the "child allowance" he introduced in the mid 70s bring any good for the number of births ? Well, it was so-so. The Austrian birth rate hit a record 1.9% in the early 60s and steadily declined afterwards to 1.2% in the mid 70s. Between 1975 (implementation) and 1997 (substitution) the birth rate just declined to 1.1%, with a slight upward trend in the early 80s and early 90s, just to reach record lows from 2000-2006. Kreisky was blamed by conservatives for skyrocketing the national debt during his time in power, but was seen as a huge freedom fighter for Social Rights in Austria. One of his most famous slogans was: "I would prefer the state to run up high debts rather than see people become unemployed." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruno_Kreisky#Kreisky.27s_legacy)

Where does Austria stand now ?

The national debt is declining for years now, from 70% of GDP to less than 60% now (mainly achieved by skilled conservative finance minister Karl-Heinz-Grasser), the unemployment rate is rather low (4% -> OECD calculated rate) and the budget will be balanced in a few years. Yet 1 problem remains: The birth rate remains low. But is it bad ? Hell, no. There are plenty people on this planet for selective skilled immigration. ;)

Give $10,000 for every abortion instead and make birth control and condoms free.

Yes it is.

We shouldn't be promoting population growth. We need to make promotion of birth controls, contraception and legal abortion a condition of recieving any food/medical/other humanitarian aid.

It's an interesting idea. Obviously there are a lot of details to work out about it, but it sounds promising in concept at least.

I wonder about the reasoning power of someone who would say that this idea is "crazy," yet not bat an eye as the government spends billions on weapons systems we don't need.

Interesting idea.

Agreed. It's not as though we couldn't afford this plan easily if we wanted to; the argument that it would be too expensive doesn't really hold water.

Now as to whether or not it's actually a good idea, I would agree with Supersoulty that there should be an income cap, although that of course would decrease its popularity as it would then become a welfare program. It's a good idea, though it could use some refinement.

I think it would be more helpful to use that money to pay for Universal Healthcare and making college cheaper/investing in pre-college education.

Agreed.

The birthrate in Australia is up since the introduction of the baby bonus (a similar payment we have here in Australia). That said, the increase was being seen pre-baby bonus, although it is larger now.

This is Hillary's first good idea in the campaign.

I'm not sure there would be inflation.  If one presumes that everyone will spend every dime of their money on consumer goods when they turn 18, then it would, yes (Even then, the consumption would remain a very small share of GDP and therefore any inflation would be minimal).

More likely people won't spend it all at once, they will keep some of it invested.  Much of the money that does get spent will be spent on college costs, which means less borrowing for student loans, which actually means less inflation.

Also pay people to get abortions and voluntarily sterilize themselves. Apply the reverse for IQ/creative people to boost the nation's IQ. Pay people with high IQs/noted authors/educated peiople to have kids but put special taxes on income for people with IQs below 120 who reproduce(adoption wouldn't incure taxes).

Such a blatant money handout?

Yes. We need to reduce global population and I figure that promoting womans rights/abortion/contraceptives/vuluntary sterilization both at home and abroad is much more humane then... other methods which could be done to achieve that goal.

will just incourage more illigitimate children, which is the primary cause of poverty.

For once in your life you post something I agree with.

The future of Social Security is up in the air, and she's proposing this garbage? She'll say and do anything. No heart and soul.

Actually, this was part of a series of good ideas released by the DLC a couple years back.  Gradually Clinton has been integrating them into her campaign.  The idea of simplification of all of the confusing college tax credits and aid programs into a single annual tax deducation, which she has recently proposed, came from this policy release.  The "American Dream Initiatives," I believe they were called.

Pure pandering.  She was speaking to some sort of urban minority group, which is good, but she said this to make them happy because they like to hear these sorts of things.  There is no way such a thing would get through congress.  It is a mute point.  I'm sure it will show up in ads next fall by whoever is the republican nominee.  In 2002 in MI, Jennifer Granholm said in passing in front of a black audience something to the effect that she understood their interest in reparations.  Dick Postumas campaigned saying that she would tax us and give handouts to minorities.  We all know that the right likes the race card.  I works with their crowd since racists almost always republican.  The goal here is to get them to the poles.  Once again, the MI legislature would have never approved such a measure anyway so her right wing opponent was simply trying to use hatred of blacks as a way to get racists out to vote.   He lost the election.

Better than Iraq.

I agree....a lot of people should not be allowed to reproduce.

Why are so many people here supporting Eugenics and Population control? Seriously. What you are suggesting is a form of class warfare and you should be ashamed. The Nazis were for something almost exactly the same except more radical. They wanted the poor to be sterilized , as the were untermenshen.
My parents are the brightest on Earth and I perform great in school, and am one of the smartest kids, in a difficult Charter school. I am proof that it doesn't matter how stupid people are, they can still have smart or really smart kids. Even your twisted theories on life were true, it would still be so cruel and unjust to make people not reproduce, just because they had the bad luck to be born without smarts
And I thought the Eugenics was gone in America. You suck Abraham and LadyJane and you probably should join a Fascist or Neo-Nazi party as that is where you belong.

Whilst I think the idea is an excellent one, I can't imagine it going down well in America, which is more to the 'right' than Europe (where I live).

How is paying people to not have kids the same as forcible sterilization? Also I don't see any parallels between allowing voluntary sterilization, abortion, contraception and the nazi's extermination of undermenschen so I'm lost here. Also reported for calling me a nazi.

Never mind. I am just saying that even though there is a huge line between paying people to be sterilized, and by killing off the untermenshen, you still seem to want all stupid people to be essentially wiped out, for money.
Oh yeah and I never called you a Nazi, I said that you believed in a form of Eugenics, which the Nazis supported.
I am sorry if this came off as harsh but I really, really hate anything relating to the government interfering in family life, even if it just an incentive.

What I want is a better functioning America with a higher average IQ and less problems than now. Also how is encouraging stupid people not to breed the same as wiping them out(also untermenshen? wtf? I'm not racist I just don't like stupid people). Yes I am pro-eugenics but that doesn't mean I support the same kind the nazis do(they support authoritarian eugenics while I support liberal eugenics). Keep in mind that societies function better with a higher average IQ(also lower IQ people are more likely to fall for religious/political demagogues, be easily swayed and tend to be more reactionary in their reactions to things in general(this translates into favoring reactionary politics)) of the population. It's in the interests of moderates/liberals/libertarians to support programs like my proposed ones since it'd reduce the parts of the population most prone to being reactionary minded and easily swayed(AKA conservative/populist voters).

Sorry, that's impossible. 100 will always be the average IQ by definition.

Not true. If there's less people on the lower ends of the IQ, the US average IQ would go up because of sheer numbers.

The average is curved to 100.

What he said.

Anybody with a high enough IQ would have known that. ;)

"I like the idea of giving every baby born in America a $5,000 account that will grow over time, so that when that young person turns 18 if they have finished high school they will be able to access it to go to college or maybe they will be able to make that downpayment on their first home," she said."

A bit ironic, this is  a personnel account for each citizen, just what Bush proposed to do for social security, but Democrats vilified as a scheme.

This is the norm in European countries, this isn't weird.

Good.  You pay for it, then.

Better to give them money now than have them wind up on welfare and medicaid and have me paying for it their whole lives.