Bill for the Unborn

A propósito de todo o escândalo provocado pela notícia Governo adia cheque-bebé, é interessante verificar que ninguém de facto se preocupa com as próximas gerações — Bill for the Unborn: $20,000 (FY 2011),

Here we come to the grand irony of the Keynesian worldview: Keynes saw the Great Depression and declared that there is no contract between generations. Spend the next generation’s money! Live for today because “in the long run we are all dead” (J.M. Keynes). But once the really big spending is locked in as an entitlement, the Left dreams up a “contract between generations” on the spending side.

Bastiat would remind us of “what is not seen”: The Keynesians pooh-pooh the “contract between generations” on the tax side: In the long run we all die, but we leave children behind. If the Left believes in its “contract,” then what about the unborn?

The fallout of this fiscal disaster, if it persists, will mean fewer children as taxes rise higher and higher. Another alternative is the hidden tax of inflation (rather than direct taxation) but that would have the same effect: couples could no longer afford two or more children. Welcome to Eastern European demographics.