By Stacy Shores

Raising kids is the single most important thing anyone can do.

Personally, it perpetuates your genetics (admittedly diluted somewhat with someone else’s but that’s practically unavoidable right now) and your values. It expands the pool of people who will probably love you (as long as you don’t screw it up too badly).

And that’s about it. We no longer live in a world where we have multiple generations of family living together and pooling resources and effort. We don’t care for our aged, impoverished parents and grandparents the way that we once did, favouring a life of fulfilment of personal whims. When you look at the benefits of child-rearing to an individual, biological imperative is really the only thing it has going for it these days.

From society’s point of view, however, raising the next generation of labourers and consumers is absolutely crucial. Without this continuous influx of new blood to carry on the cultural traditions of overwork and overindulgence (or, even – in a slightly less dystopian world – necessary labour and modest consumption to drive it) our way of life would simply collapse.

As much as we try to believe all the “personal gain for personal effort” rhetoric, and as much as we try to convince ourselves that everyone can lift themselves up by their proverbial bootstraps, no one ever does anything meaningful on their own. We are incredibly intertwined with other humans despite some people trying to convince us otherwise to justify themselves taking a larger slice of the pie. We rely on the effort and patronage of the community around us to thrive in today’s world.

We should stop pretending otherwise.

If our civilisation relies so heavily on the creation and nurturing of children into adults, to the point where even (especially) people who don’t have children require it to happen, I have one simple question:

Why wouldn’t we pay people to do it right?

And while we’re at it, let’s consider paying people for all the other (currently under- or un-remunerated) ways in which they contribute to our society through volunteer work, aged care, coaching local sports, generating cultural content (music, art, stories), etc.

Society has been getting a free ride for as long as I can remember off the backs of our inherent desire to improve the world that we live in. It is now wealthy enough to pay for the privilege. So why shouldn’t it?

The time has come for us to start talking seriously about a Universal Basic Income.

#basicincome

Also by Stacy: Hippocrates of Canberra

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