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Many Republicans want to change programs like the earned income tax credit to provide benefits to married couples. However, as Jared Bernstein noted when Marco Rubio proposed eliminating the “marriage penalty” in EITC, the primary impact is to harm non-married people, by
shifting current EITC spending away from single parents with kids to married couples with kids (along with childless adults, who get little–too little–from the EITC).Plans that create economic benefits for marriage (beyond the already-extant social benefits) will end up providing an economic disincentive for divorce and penalize the unmarried. A better solution would be to “socialize patriarchy” — that is, have the public sector bear the burdens of childcare, pre-K education and other labor that is expected to be performed by women without pay. (As Ben Bernanke has noted, such a program would likely pay for itself because it would increase America’s human capital.) At the same time, the public sector should reduce the financial burdens that strain marriages (numerous surveys suggest that financial troubles are the leading cause of divorce) through a stronger safety net. Workplace policies that harm women, such as just-in-time scheduling, should be curtailed. Very few other developed countries actively promote marriage through the tax code, but instead provide a strong safety net and parental leave. In a recent report for the Center for American Progress, Shawn Fremstad and Melissa Boteach have laid out changes to the tax code that could improve family stability.
The problem is that these policies cost money, and would mean transferring wealth from the top to the bottom. In a political system run by and for the rich, such proposals are unlikely to catch on. Thus the disingenuous attacks on single-family households: It’s easier to blame the victims of inequality for their plight than ameliorate the problem.
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