Parents on government subsidy

[sunnydays]

This is a good debate to have, so I hope everyone understands that I am not attacking Judy (I respect and agree with much of what she posts about daycare and her considerable experience), but simply want to bring this discussion up so we can all have our say. So, to respond, if you believe that we should get rid of publicly funded health care, then I guess that if one of your children is diagnosed with cancer for example, you would not mind paying the thousands or perhaps hundreds of thousands to pay for treatment and then if you ended up losing everything (your home, savings, etc) because of these massive bills, you would also not mind that there is no social assistance available to help you out because we have scrapped that as well. I do know that people abuse the system...some people will abuse any system. However, there are many more people who genuinely need help so that they don't end up on the streets raising there kids in a way that will almost certainly lead to crime...which you will no dount later complain about. Then we will need lareger prisons to lock them all up...and you won't mind paying for that because it's better than paying for welfare, health care...or heaven forbid, daycare! I don't agree that most people work because they want more things....I believe most parents work because they have to in order to support their families as the cost of living is high and the cost of raising children is high...much higher than in our grandparents' generation. Yes, we are a society of consumers and it has gotten out of hand, but in order to put a roof over your kids' heads and provide food and post-secondary education etc, most families need to have two parents working and not all moms are cut-out for being daycare providers nor have the set-up for it as we on this forum do. And it's a good thing they don't because we'd all be out of work as well! Also, if, as you suggest, one parent stays home to raise the kids (I do think this is good for the kids if a family can manage it, don't get me wrong) that cuts out almost half of our labour force. We are already facing a labour shortage...so if half of parents stay home and furthermore, many people do not have children at all because of a lack of government support, we are going to be in serious trouble!