Re-examining the Child Tax Credit in the Context of Education

For parents, the child tax credit is little more than a Band-Aid on a gaping wound when considered against the cost of raising a child. Still, its a welcome dressing that, during tax time or from paycheck to paycheck, eases some of the burden associated with childcare expenses. Still, with the child tax credit comes a level of unspoken responsibility to those taxpaying members of society who dont have children.

No one forces men and women in our society to have children, or at least that should be the case. As a result, having children should be no different than buying a car or a boat in terms of tax. If someone decided to buy an automobile tomorrow, they wouldnt expect the rest of society to contribute to keeping it clean and with a full tank because it was their decision to purchase it and therefore their responsibility. Still, parents do get a tax break for making this decision, and while most would agree that they certainly dont want to see the child tax credit amended or removed, they also dont want to incur any additional expenses as a result of a decision they have no say in.

How do we know this to be true Local or municipal tax increases proposed in relation to educational funding are notoriously almost always shot down. While taxpayers with children cant imagine how someone could possibly vote against additional funding for local schools, its only because they fail to see things from a non-parents point of view. If all things were equal and there were no child tax credit, the burden of education should fall on society as a whole just as so many other burdens do, such as the cost of defense, road maintenance, bureaucracy and many others. Because parents pay less tax as a result of their own decisions, many people feel that they should at least then shoulder that much more of the burden. After all, its one thing to benefit from a decision and another to expect others to suffer for it.

While its true that in most cases, the few dollars per taxpayer that would constitute an increase in educational funding is by no means something to cause widespread suffering, the principle is still sound. Shouldnt the responsibility of a childs education be born by those who made the decision to have the child, and not society as a whole If not, why stop at the 12th grade What distinguishes K-12 as societys responsibility while anything after that the student or parents responsibility Perhaps the rational is that once a child is past the twelfth grade, he or she is now an adult and free to make their own decisions. As taxpayers, shouldnt we also be free to decide for ourselves whether we want someone elses decision to affect our bottom line In the case of additional educational funding propositions, we are freeand we so often do decide that while we understand the need for resources to be pooled for the greater good, there is a limit to how much we are willing to give for an individuals decision. The child tax credit is that limit.