ARE childless Australians community-spirited enough to pay more taxes to enable people with kids to be taxed less, to help support them as they raise the next generation of taxpayers to keep the country going? It is a controversial proposal, floated today in the US by one childless columnist who was raised by two extremely hardworking middle class parents who battled—as many Australian families do—to cover family costs.
To foster a fairer society and give those who are producing kids a little less excruciating financial pressure, he suggests that child-free people earning more than the median household income (in Australia $57,400 in 2011) should be taxed more heavily, and families should pay around $5000 a year less.
“As a childless professional in my mid-30s, I often reflect on the sacrifices working parents make to better the lives of their children. And I have come to the reluctant conclusion that I ought to pay much higher taxes so that working parents can pay much lower taxes,” writes conservative columnist and political commentator Reihan Salam in the journal Slate.
