Rowling writes:
Rowling goes on to detail the trials of single-motherhood, and portray Cameron as out of touch with the lower-class and ignorant of nontraditional family dynamics.Yesterday’s Conservative manifesto makes it clear that the Tories aim for less governmental support for the needy, and more input from the “third sector”: charity. It also reiterates the flagship policy so proudly defended by David Cameron last weekend, that of “sticking up for marriage”. To this end, they promise a half-a-billion pound tax break for lower-income married couples, working out at £150 per annum.
I accept that my friends and I might be atypical. Maybe you know people who would legally bind themselves to another human being, for life, for an extra £150 a year? Perhaps you were contemplating leaving a loveless or abusive marriage, but underwent a change of heart on hearing about a possible £150 tax break? Anything is possible; but somehow, I doubt it.
But what is Cameron really saying that’s so controversial?
There are a number of things that bother me about Rowling’s piece. While it’s true that some children suffer because of acrimonious marriages, the overwhelming amount of research suggests that – all other things being equal – kids are substantially better off in stable two-parent households. Asserting that two-parent households are better for children in the aggregate isn’t the same as demonizing single parents. It's simply acknowledging what seems to be the empirical reality. Rowling is wrong to misconstrue Cameron's statements as some sort of crusade to smear single moms.
The central complaint of Cameron's “sticking up for marriage” campaign is that the British welfare system provides a fiscal motive for single-parenthood, while the tax system fails to encourage matrimony in any meaningful way. Since we know that kids from two-parent households perform better – even when controlling for a range of other demographic factors – this makes little sense. Conservatives argue that we need to provide parents with more of an incentive to stay together for their children.
The real question, then, is whether you believe that people actually respond to economic incentives – even if those incentives seem relatively meager. Rowling is very skeptical, primarily because she doesn’t believe couples will stay together for such a trivial amount of money. Afterall, why would any woman base her decision to get married on the how much she would receive in tax breaks?
Of course, this is a pretty silly oversimplification. And whether she knows it or not, Rowling is actually challenging decades of microeconomic research (with broad theoretical underpinnings) that shows people do respond to these kinds of incentives, at least on the margin. Certainly, no one is expecting – or hoping – that an abused wife will remain with her husband so that she can take advantage of a small tax break. But what about a young couple that recently had a child out of wedlock and is wavering on the marriage issue? Or a couple that has lived together for years and never thought it was “worth it” to get married?
What bothers me most about Rowling’s piece is her ignorance of microeconomic theory – an ignorance that I believe is widespread. Microeconomic analysis rests on two primary assumptions: people respond to incentives, and those responses can be measured on the margin. This is the central thesis of books like Freakonomics.
To argue that people won’t respond to a tax incentive because you can’t picture them responding to it strikes me as a pretty weak and ineffectual argument, particularly when you're railing against such a widely-held and widely-supported proposition.
But, then again, Rowling has never been very good at economics.
3 comments:
Asserting that two-parent households are better for children in the aggregate isn’t the same as demonizing single parents. It's simply acknowledging what seems to be the empirical reality.
My reading of the Rowling piece was quite different from the get-go. I don't think she was saying that the marital tax break is demonizing single parents (and more often than not, single mothers); but that the British society in the aggregate looks down upon single mothers on welfare, portrays them as lazy or feckless or worthless, and that the Tories, even though they are trying to soften their image, are offering more of the same.
Her take on the marital tax is, I think, a somewhat separate matter.
And on that, I don't doubt that offering a tax break does influence a couple's decision to get married or to part. I do acknowledge Rowling's point, though, being that if the sum is paltry, it does little to actually help a family and uses a lot of money that could have been better utilized in helping those families to instead prioritize the traditional values the Tories find more attractive.
I also think your examples of the type of couple the tax break isn't supposed to encourage versus the couples the tax break is supposed to encourage actually demonstrate why this may not be the soundest plan.
My parents may not be legally married. It is something that has been up in the air for the entire 31 years of their "marriage". And yet, they are still a fairly competent two-parent household. So, that couple who is waffling on getting married, and that couple who has just never thought about it, those are couples who could be fairly competent two-parent households without a tax break. And then there are the couples on the margins, the ones who are influenced to stay with their abusive partner because they are so poor that little bit of money is a bit of a cushion.
There's a reason I personally don't like tax incentives for the economically disadvantaged when it comes to encouraging marriage, and that's because it seems like a paltry and ineffective way of actually helping people make marriage work for them. Which is also what I thought Rowling was getting at. Her first marriage wasn't working for her. Her current marriage is. A tax break wouldn't help the first be stronger, and doesn't effect her feelings about the second.
I don't think she was saying that the marital tax break is demonizing single parents (and more often than not, single mothers); but that the British society in the aggregate looks down upon single mothers on welfare, portrays them as lazy or feckless or worthless, and that the Tories, even though they are trying to soften their image, are offering more of the same.
Her take on the marital tax is, I think, a somewhat separate matter.
I may be missing something (more than possible), but it seems to me that the primary evidence Rowling uses to support her claim that Cameron is offering 'more of the same' is that he's proposed a tax break for married couples.
I also think your examples of the type of couple the tax break isn't supposed to encourage versus the couples the tax break is supposed to encourage actually demonstrate why this may not be the soundest plan.
. . .
So, that couple who is waffling on getting married, and that couple who has just never thought about it, those are couples who could be fairly competent two-parent households without a tax break.
I think that's a totally fair point. But Rowling doesn't seem to be arguing that the tax breaks incentivize the wrong kinds of couples to get married; she saying that she can't think of any couple that would choose to stay together (and live together) simply because of a small tax incentive.
But I tend to think there are a lot of couples who may not be sure whether they want to stay together (and raise their kids together), and who may be more inclined to do so if they're given a small tax incentive.
Relatively minor tax breaks tend to mean a lot to people -- especially when it comes to stuff like this. Proponents of gay marriage, for example, have argued that tax breaks are an extremely important aspect of marriage equality that gay couples are missing out on.
it seems to me that the primary evidence Rowling uses to support her claim that Cameron is offering 'more of the same' is that he's proposed a tax break for married couples.
Which is more of the same, if you take into account that he is doing nothing to counteract the low opinion of single women. The way I read it is not "Encouraging marriage is demonizing single parents", but "encouraging marriage in these cases may help in certain individual situations, but may not really help the general situation, and does not address the status poor single parents occupy in society. It is the wrong solution to the problem". Which, I think, is a valid case to make.
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