From: kevin@rotag.mi.org (Kevin Darcy)
Subject: Re: A Modest Proposal: Illegitimate-conception Tax
Organization: Who, me???
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 16:50:17 GMT

In article <1993Jan21.134202.14357@aston.ac.uk> evansmp@uhura.aston.ac.uk (Mark Evans) writes:
>Kevin Darcy (kevin@rotag.mi.org) wrote:
>: In article <1993Jan17.163155.20964@midway.uchicago.edu> thf2@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
>: >
>: >And who registers conceptions?  Do men and women register their sex acts
>: >to the government when they occur?  
>: 
>: Every abortion, birth or miscarriage implies a conception; medical 
>: professionals would be required to report these. There are certain to be
>: some "tax cheaters", sure, i.e. folks whose conceptions go unreported somehow.
>: There are tax cheaters now. But would tax cheating be a unmanageable problem?
>: Probably not.
>
>Just a well you don't try to register conceptions because a high proportion
>of blastaspheres fail to implant or do not produce the right balance of
>hormones to halt the menstral cycle.
>
>I think you would need a vary large number of inspectors.

As previously discussed, conceptions which occurred, and which failed to
produce a miscarriage, abortion or birth, would not be within the scope of 
the Tax.

>: >Who determines the paternity of a fetus?
>: 
>: There is no need to determine paternity while the fetus is still in the
>: process of gestation. It can be determined later, i.e. after abortion, 
>: miscarriage or birth, and then tax payments can be retroactively applied.
>
>I can see civil libetys organisations objecting to this are you going to
>have genetic data stored on all your citizens. (remember the mother
>may well refuse to co-operate, unless saying who the father is has some
>benefit to her, even if it does it is possible that she may be mistaken
>or lying)

Women seeking to go on welfare are currently forced to reveal the paternity
of their children, unless there is a real danger that the father may commit
violence if his identity is revealed. The civil liberties organizations have
already fought that battle, and pretty much lost it. This Tax would require
more revelations of paternity, to be sure, but since the premise of requiring
such revelations, i.e. to reduce the welfare burden on the state, is the same
in my proposal, I imagine that the existing precedents, with their exceptions, 
would apply to it, and that the civil liberties organizations wouldn't have 
much more to say on the matter. _Stare decisis_, and all that.

>: >What happens when rich women have secret abortions outside the country,
>: >figuring the cost of a plane ticket to Canada is cheaper than paying
>: >a graduated income tax?
>: >
>: >For that matter, I easily see a black market of doctors in this country
>: >willing to give secret abortions.
>: 
>: I.e. yet more forms of "tax cheating". I'm not saying that cheating won't 
>: occur, just that the possibility of cheating, in and of itself, is not 
>: sufficient reason to defeat a tax-based approach, unless the cheating is
>: absolutely trivial to do, which I don't think is the case here (requires an 
>: overseas trip, or the necessity to find and induce an unethical doctor, 
>
>depends if a doctors first loyalty is to their patient or to the state?
>Do they still take a hypocratic oath?

I don't think the Hippocratic Oath requires physicians to help their patients
cheat on their taxes...

>: Hmmm? The Tax is premised on marital status AT THE TIME OF CONCEPTION, Ted.
>: No economic incentive is given to marry _after_ conception occurs, which is
>: how I've always understand the term "shotgun marriage".
>
>But you have to prove what time conception occured, you could have marriages
>occuring on the posibility of conception. (or even people manipulating their
>lover into getting married on a claim of pregnancy)

Are you saying these things don't happen now?

							- Kevin
Newsgroups: talk.abortion