I have a real gripe with this kind of politics.
“The peasants are so poor they can’t even afford their basic necessities. Let’s take one commodity and subsidise it, but only for one certain group of people we’re targeting in the next election.”
They can look generous, but they don’t have to touch the overall problem. You could argue that subsidising one thing worsens the poverty, because it causes inflation in other products.
Na, this is called nudging. Obviously contraceptives are not that expensive that poor women under 25 (in France) could not afford them (I think?). It is about giving them a little nudge towards actually taking them. Lots of modern governance wants to work like this… the current and previous UK governments basically tried to make this their prime governing principle.
I think the final verdict if it really works or not is still out. I am more skeptical, but the psychology behind it makes some sense.
Yes I guess there’s that too. France has been very successful in “nudging” women to work fulltime and leave their children in childcare. It is normal in france for children 6 months old to be in childcare 9 hours a day. This is a good cultural shift, because it depresses wages.
It also pushes up house prices, increases people’s stress, and gives people less free time to think and socialise and plan a democratic uprising (which seems to be a real national passtime).
Encouraging contraception is certainly intended to have the same effect.
That’s debatable. Most women don’t exactly enjoy being stuck at home 24/7 taking care of an infant. While I don’t deny that this also has a bit of an impact on the things you describe, in other EU countries you have pretty much the same and nearly no children born because of the lack of day-care.
there’s definitely some controversial bits to my comment. which part do you say is debatable?
i don’t think most parents would chose to put their children in childcare, if they could afford otherwise. it’s hard to know though. but they should be able to afford to chose, and they aren’t.
Obviously contraceptives are not that expensive that poor women under 25 (in France) could not afford them (I think?).
I mean, contraceptives aren’t that cheap. This is information for the US:
Brand name birth control can cost between $60 to $180 a month (depending on which drug) amounting to $720-$2160 a year versus their generic versions costing from $0 (with insurance and the affordable care act) to at least 30% less.
But yeah, insurance reimbursing the costs probably applies even more so to France. (Hard to find reliable information on that, though, without being fluent in French.)
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