zlacker

There are many things that may be better overall, but because they're not financialized, they don't show up on GDP and so are deemed "worthless."

Breastfeeding doesn't move money around, but formula does; things like that.

Cooking your own meal doesn't raise GDP beyond the cost of supplies, but door-dashing from a restaurant does.

>>bombca+(OP)
More realistically here, there’s a limit to the funding any individual state can come up with to fund benefits. Tradeoffs have to be considered and increased workforce participation increases the tax receipts that fund these programs. It’s not much more complicated than that.

>>bombca+(OP)
In the book 'Double Entry' the author explains that the guy who created GDP was actually in favor of having family caregiving and household activities accounted for in GDP. If that had happened, different world

>>ch4s3+35
It's sometimes surprising to read a comment like this, which applies just common sense, basic math, and logic, instead of the typical online comment mixture of hysteria, panic, and portraying one's non-favorite "team" as a bunch of mustachio-twirling cartoon villains.

>>ch4s3+35
I find it dubious that adding the people who don't find it financially feasible to use childcare to cover working hours will generate tax revenue to cover this due to the low income and low tax nature. Not to mention the addition of the cost from all the current paying families.

>>giantg+gd
> generate tax revenue to cover this due

That's not the claim I'm making. Someone entering the workforce has tax implications for a local government far beyond their individual tax receipts and will increase their future earning potential.

>>xp84+2c
You read a lot of books about economics, history, and political science and suddenly everything starts to look like it's complicated. The recent trend of commentators shouting "it's actually not complicated" is troubling. I try to present commentary with some nuance and humility. I have a perspective, but I endeavor to leave room for the possibility that I don't have a full understanding or that my model of the world doesn't fit every set of circumstances.

>>ch4s3+Ld
You imply an overall net netral to net positive. I find it hard to believe that would total $12k per year. If there are complicated n-order effects, then perhaps you should call them out instead of saying it's not complicated.

>>bombca+(OP)
> There are many things that may be better overall, but because they're not financialized, they don't show up on GDP and so are deemed "worthless."

I think you're confusing GDP with a measure of worth or quality. It is not. Just because you can earn money doing double-shifts in a coal mine that doesn't make it better than spending the same time at a beach doing nothing.

>>giantg+gd
> I find it dubious that adding the people who don't find it financially feasible to use childcare to cover working hours will generate tax revenue to cover this due to the low income and low tax nature.

You can actually think through your belief. The announcement provides a concrete number: $12,000 per child. Do you generate $12k in tax revenue? Note that this means direct and indirect tax revenue, not only from your job and what your employer earns from your work but also with your own expenses that you can cover by having a job.

>>rml+xb
Thanks for mentioning this book. I just bought it, looking forward to reading it.

>>motore+9j
Yes, I understand that and still don't think that adds up. Things like SNAP for a family of 4 would be less than $12k per year. And that increased tax revenue would have to offset the currently working and paying families that will now use the program. We would have to wait for the experiment to conclude to see what the increased earnings for participants will be.

>>giantg+Te
> I find it hard to believe that would total $12k per year.

Again I didn't claim that. The tradeoff is generating some percentage of X benefit in economic activity vs some much lower percentage of X while X is also much larger.

>>ch4s3+Ut
I fail to understand what value your initial comment holds. The grandparents of that comment was talking about financial feasibility of the program in the context of a proposed waiver. This necessarily implies that on-topic responses to that should be weighing financial feasibility of the program with and without the waiver. Your most recent comment seems to just be clarifying that your initial comment is just the same generalized explanation for the current expansion - expanding the benefit to the currently working higher earning parents where the return is unclear and logically dubious, thus providing some much lower percentage of X while X is much larger. The only way to claim what your comment is trying to is to also display some evidence that this current expansion will provide economic activity benefit beyond the previous program that had 4x poverty level means testing. Otherwise, it's simply "some much lower percentage of X while X is also much larger" vs the same thing with X being even larger.

>>rml+xb
This actually DOES occur at the margins, in some cases.

If you have a severely disabled child (who is on SSA), you often can get certified by the state and get paid as the caretaker. Then the action appears on the GDP.

>>ch4s3+ue
The key I realized is that there is always complexity, but the "simple" understanding is still "mostly" right.

No complexity can make a $1 billion expense able to be paid with $1m of revenue.

>>motore+eh
It's a confusion the whole world seems to have, even if you ask everyone and they'd deny it.

GDP of a country is flat for 10 years, but everyone is happier and healthier and feels better? Bad country!

GDP is soaring for ten years, but everyone is depressed, suicidal, deep in debt, overweight, and dying early? Good country!

>>giantg+Hy
The idea of extending the program to pay people who aren't using the benefit directly sounds nice in theory but would cost way more and incentivizes people to not work. This necessarily makes the broader version of the program even more expensive than it appears at first. A working parent using a daycare voucher necessarily pays taxes back into the system and so does the day care. This offsets the cost a little. Giving essentially cash payments to people who stay at home has no such offset. So it is much more expensive and disincentivizes people working which might slightly offset the cost.

> Would make sense IMO to provide an equal value waiver to those who take care of their kid rather than send them to childcare

There is no way this is affordable to New Mexico. They're estimating the cost at $600 million a year, of about 6% of their total budget next year.

>>ch4s3+3h1
"A working parent using a daycare voucher necessarily pays taxes back into the system and so does the day care."

This assumes the value of the parent working is greater than the value generated by the alternative consumer spending.

"and incentivizes people to not work"

This would only incentivize low income individuals to not work, which could actually be beneficial as it could drive a living wage increase in that labor segment if employers had to compete against the benefit.

>>giantg+Xp1
>This assumes the value of the parent working is greater than the value generated by the alternative consumer spending.

I don't think the benefit is even contingent on the parent working, and it definitely isn't contingent on the value of their current and discounted future earnings appreciation being greater than the cost of sending the kids to daycare. From what I can tell you can put the kid in daycare then lay on a beach if there is anything of that sort in the New Mexican desert.

I'm open to the argument that by certain measures "free" childcare leads to increased economic output, but they've certainly not crafted the program in a way I would expect someone with that aim to do it.

>>bombca+zE
> but the "simple" understanding is still "mostly" right.

I rarely find this to be the case for anything big or important.