CA: Bill would give all newborns in California a $500 savings account

AP on Bakersfield Californian ^ | 2/28/07 | Don Thompson - ap

[yankeedame]

If families added $50 a month to the state's initial contribution, the savings account would grow to nearly $17,500 at 5 percent interest over 18 years

And where, in the name of Mother McGee,

• are you going to find something that will pay a steady 5% per year for 18 years straight over the rate of inflation?? You know, if inflation is running 2% the return on this better be a minimum of 7%; inflation 4%? investment better now pay 9%, etc.;
• and isn't interest on savings taxed?? If not taxed while sitting in the back, is it going to be taxed ***WHAMMO*** when you take it out when your kid starts college?
• And what if junior can't or won't go to college (or place of higher education, like a trade school), do you have the give the $500 back...with interest?

But, still and all, it's sure is great that California -- unlike here in Ohio -- has all its problems solved, and has so much money left over that it can afford to do this!

[cornelis]

This is brilliant. Every school in the Golden State can instantly raise its all-in tuition by $500*(1+tbill yield), pocketing the windfall...

And serpentine.

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

Let that idiot Steinberg pay for all this.

I can just see pregnant illegals coming over the border, dropping a kid, picking up $500 in a savings account, and then disappearing into the great unwashed masses to have more kids.

Hell, half the legal citizens of California are nuts and don't deserve to breed. Now they want to pay everyone with a baby $500. Has Schwarzenneger gone bonkers or what?

[metmom]

The welfare parents would steal it. They even do it with the free personal pan pizzas the kids earn at Pizza Hut for the reading programs at the library.

[yankeedame]

The Founding Fathers always said, When the legislators and the government officials find out they can raid the treasury and then begin to raid the treasury, the time of an end to the republic draws nearer.

Amen! Those are the same reasons why Alexander Hamilton, in his wisdom, insisted the Bank of the United States (ancestor of the Fed.) be a private company, not a branch of the government.

[Shermy]

"I just don't know what to say............."

Welfare for banks.

A Bank Boondoggle.

[theBuckwheat]

Let me get this straight. A politician understands the tremendous power of compound interest working over great periods of time. Will this lesson be carried through as the only real solution to the horrid Social Security mess? No, maybe even the same politician would say we must continue to spend that tax income now on immediate needs, while promising to pay for future benefits from the ability of a future generation to borrow enough to pay the obligation.

The Great Disconnect, once again.

[Tymesup]

I've got an even better idea, maybe twice as good. Why not give newborns in California $1,000? That way, they'll have twice as much money as if they were given $500.

I've got an even better idea than that. Why limit this to just newborns in California? Why discriminate against people who were already born? Give this to everyone in California!

Here's the best idea of all. Why limit this to just Californians? California should give this to everyone!

[ZOOKER]

This is great news if you live in Texas, NM, or Arizona. Guess where all the anchor babies will be born from now on?

And why should illegals have all the advantages? I see a line of buses, trains, and airplanes full of women, ready to pop at any moment, all coming for their check from Uncle Arnold...

Come to think of it, why bother having a baby? The country's awash with fake ID of all kinds, how hard can it be to forge a birth certificate?

[free_life]

If you are born again can you get $1000....grin

[ApplegateRanch]

Great plan.

If they actually did this, they would then start adding the $500/acct into the Accts Receivable column, borrow (i.e. put an IOU into the treasury) against it, and spend it next year.

Next, raise taxes to cover the "inexplicable" deficit/shortfall.

[Brimack34]

Why not just send the money to Mexico, Cut out the middle man I mean child.

[ApplegateRanch]

If the parents could afford to put away $50 a month, why should anyone supply them the first $500?

Suh, iff'n I puts $5 in each of muh 10 chillin's accts, ain't thet be the same diff'ence?

An, den woul'na each of dem only have to pays back $50 when dey's 18?

[Zack Attack]

I hope this is retroactive...with interest.

[beaversmom]

They just don't quit, do they? Did you see this one TX?

[McCloud-Strife]

I use the Limbaugh Doctrine of Government freebies. If $500 is good, then why not $1000, why not $10,000? College is going to be unbelievably expensive in 18 years at the current rate of increase.

I am so glad the Governor of California is a conservative and not some Hollywood Liberal married to a Kennedy, good job guys. Why do Californians always fall for glitz over substance?

[CGTRWK]

Steinberg said that would promote saving money in a culture that now is carrying record levels of debt and has the lowest savings rate since the Great Depression.

Right on! What better way to encourage savings than to steal $500 from me and hand it the nearest Mexican anchor baby as a reward for his mother's fertility?

[The Pack Knight]

Bill would give all newborns in California a $500 savings account.

Who's Bill? And damn, he must be loaded to afford giving every single newborn in California $500!!

What do you say? It's not a person, but a legislative act?

That headline is so full of horse pucky I can smell it from all the way across the country. Pieces of paper don't give money to anyone. The government TAKES that money, effectively at gunpoint, from the people who earned it and gives it to people who did not. I'm sick of both journalists and politicians pretending that the government simply conjures up wealth out of nowhere to spend on whatever the dumb masses "need".

[RVN Airplane Driver]

Thank you canyafornya....now all the illegals here in Texas will go out there and have their babies......and hopefully stay.

What total idiots...anybody who knows anything about the Mexican culture knows that they live for today and tomorrow will have to look out for itself....however the beer store, tattoo parlors, jewelry stores and ho's will be in for a bonanza...

[FreedomCalls]

How about a Federal Tax on all celebrities?

That's damn good idea. $5.00 tax everytime your picture appears on TV for more than one minute and $1.00 tax everytime your name is mentioned on TV or radio. Double for movie screen images, half for mentioning your name on the radio. Triple charges for politicians not in discharge of their duties.