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Distortions that might work

by Whaleoil on September 2, 2010

So Peter Dunne wants to change the Child Support System because more than $2 billion remains unpaid by deadbeat parents. I know of one dead beat dad who doesn’t even so much as call his daughter let alone pay anything towards her upkeep. There are plenty of others out there. At the same time we have an issue with our welfare system providing the wrong incentives. This creates distortions in the environment leasing to outcomes that are ass-backwards.

I can save Peter Dunne a whole heap of consultants fees and fix the problem over night. Build a Deadbeat Parents Website and provide a searchable database outlining how much they owe. Create a top ten Dead-beat Parents list…kind of like a Most Wanted. That would see almost all that $2 billion recovered even before the website goes live.

Since we know that poorly draft systems incentive people int he wrong way for the taxpayer, like student loans, like the DPB, like Deporits Guarantee Schemes…..it is high time to look at the changing the focus of such systems so that the system works to account for human behaviour.

Essentially if there are risk free benefits then people fill their boots with as much free taxpayer loot as possible. Since Peter Dunne is looking at ways to improve welfare then let’s look at the system surrounding the Domestic Purposes Benefit.

Step 1: Cancel DPB – Of course when I say cancel, I mean phase out in order to be fair to existing users.

Step 2: Pay DPB equivalent to all females aged 12 to 25 provided they don’t get pregnant

Step 3: This could be funded from Corrections/Police budget because crime, particularly crimes against children, will plummet with only planned births

This post should be considered a discussion document, so please add your comments to help develop this policy further.

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  • http://angryvictim.gotcha.co.nz/ Lauren Order

    Hmmm.. Interesting idea. So if the system isn’t working as it is, turn it totally upside down rather than tweak and tune it. Radical approach, don’t you think?

  • jman

    I see where you’re going with this and most people will probably not even take you seriouly here but I will. There are some glaring problems.
    1) Far too expensive, even if the police budget reduce as a result. Maybe if you just paid each female $100 a month that would serve as sufficient incentive.
    2) Unfair to males. Why should every female start receiving money from the guvmint when they hit age 12, while guys get nothing.
    3) What about when the girl does fall pregnant. She now loses that money? So she and the kid starve?

    I have an alternative proposal. When a girl gets pregnant and comes looking for the DPB, in order to receive it she has to undergo voluntary sterilisation. If she can’t afford to have one child she sure as hell shouldn’t be allowed to keep on breeding more. This should be a reversable procedure in case she manages to improve her circumstances and is no longer dependent on the state for paying for her child.

  • The Gantt Guy

    Cactus Kate has a good opinion on this, similar to (but less extreme than) that of jman. In order to receive DPB, a woman (or a man, for that matter) must each quarter provide a certificate from a doctor that preventatives have been injected or ingested. No certificate, no DPB.

    Of course, after the first taxpayer-funded child rearing, there should be no more. Fool (screw?) me once, shame on you. Fool me twice … the taxpayer won’t pay for your screw-ups.

  • http://www.cadlow.co.nz spanishbride

    Two words WO…BRAIN FART

    It is too silly for words. If you are wanting to save $$ how does paying the MAJORITY of young women who do not become pregnant young,make sense??

    And that is only one glaring flaw in this idea. Surely this is not your own idea but one of those ones where someone whispered in your ear? Please say that it was.

    • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1201173949 petal

      LOL

  • http://www.cadlow.co.nz spanishbride

    Here is another BRAIN FART for you.

    The minute our young boys turn 13 we get them all fixed. Problem solved…..but wait there’s more….
    All the older men could still do some damage, so line them all up beside the very small guillotine
    in the corner

    • Andijandal

      Love it!  After all the blame apportioned to women for becoming pregnant out of wedlock and ‘bludging’ it is nice to see a flip suggestion that the men impregnating us be prevented from doing so, after all, aren’t vasectomies far easier to reverse than tubal ligations? ;)

  • peterwn

    A father tried unsuccessfully to overturn child support payments made in respect of a 16yo no longer at home – she was studying out of town. The mother used the payments for her own lifestyle and not to support her daughter’s education. The father probably would not have objected if the child support payments were made direct to her daughter.

    This sort of grotesque situation needs to be tidied up.

    The present system was a 1990′s National Party policy which was deliberately made rules and procedure bound to make it simple to run (I think Bill Birch was responsible). Various injustices resulted especially in early days such as where a father had made a lump sum settlement just before the new scheme, then got lumbered with child support on top of that when the mother frittered the money then went on DPB.

  • cadwallader

    This is not simply a fiscal topic. When the DPB was introduced it was not just a further type of benefit: it heralded an entirely new class of citizen. With any new form of citizenry comes additional societal difficulties. I surmise that the phasing out of DPB (provided recipients are not shuttled on to another benefit) will obviate the social losses, financial losses and the need to hound non-custodial parents.

  • andrewo

    Hey let’s invent a system where we steal money (via tax) from working middle class people and hand it to deadbeats.

    Wonder where that will lead?…..

    • titanuranus

      Won­der where that will lead?…..

      Up shit creek?

  • andrewo

    If you want a sensible opinion on DPB go to Lindsay Mitchell’s blog

    Fundamentally NZers across the political spectrum don’t want to see beggars on the street. That’s why we have welfare. Ok, the details certainly need sorting out to prevent abuse – particularly DPB because it is the breeding ground of the next generation of criminals.

    But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. This is the alternative none of us want:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathy_Come_Home

  • cadwallader

    To AndrewO,
    We have “beggars on the street!” Our beggars are not solely grasping for money it is power over us they truly crave…these beggars are called politicians.

  • P1LL

    Leave the DPB as a back stop for women / men who have made a mistake . But once on the DPB forbid any more pregnancies ! I have known women who are second generation- get pregnant because the DPB is running out for the current child. They are making a career of it , and this must be stopped.