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Should We Have a Sex Tax?
Breakpoint ^ | January 11, 2011 | Chuck Colson

Posted on 01/11/2011 9:46:35 AM PST by Sopater

You heard a lot this election season about cutting taxes. Well in one case, I may be for raising them.

Politicians are always talking about taxes. Some of them want to “soak” the rich; others want to raise “sin” taxes on alcohol and cigarettes. But I can think of one “consumer item” we’ll never see a tax on: sex. But maybe we should. Sex—the wrong kind of sex, that is—is driving up the cost of government.

In a recent column, marriage expert Mike McManus explores the high cost of out-of-wedlock sex. For instance, over 7 million American couples live together. Four out of five of those couples will break up without ever tying the knot. But, McManus writes, if they’ve had a baby, many of those mothers and children will be eligible for Medicaid, housing and day-care subsidies, and food stamps.

Second, even when co-habiting couples DO marry, according to a Penn State study, they suffer a higher divorce rate than couples who don’t live together first. On average, each divorce involves one child. And like the never-married mother, the divorced mom is often eligible for many government benefits. According to the Heritage Foundation, McManus writes, “13 million single parents with children cost taxpayers $20,000 each, or $260 billion in the year 2004.” The total probably comes to $300 billion today, McManus says.

And that’s just the beginning.

A child born out of wedlock is seven times more likely to drop out of school, become a teen parent, and end up in prison. They are 33 times more likely to be seriously abused.

And we’ve all heard of the high rates of STDs affecting America’s teenagers—diseases that cost billions of dollars to treat.

So maybe we SHOULD consider a tax on non-marital sex—everything from one-night stands to living together arrangements. It’s costing us a lot of money. And such a tax might indeed pay off the national debt.

All joking aside, these figures tell us we need to do more to bring down the illegitimacy rate—starting with giving teenage girls the tools they need to say “no” to premarital sex. We must also keep fathers accountable for the children they help bring into the world. And we must preserve traditional marriage—because redefining marriage to mean nothing more than a contract between two or more people of any gender would further undo the institution of marriage, with all resulting costs thereafter.

Mike McManus, who also is the founder of Marriage Savers, has a few more ideas: States ought to create a marriage commissions to encourage marriage over co-habitation. State welfare offices, he says, ought to “provide information on the value of marriage in reducing poverty and increasing wealth, happiness, and longer lives.” And we ought to require public schools and publicly-funded family planning clinics to teach kids about the long-term benefits of rearing children within wedlock over co-habitation.

If we did all this, we could save hundreds of millions of dollars, McManus writes. Well, he’s correct. I wish political candidates were brave enough to take on this issue, but they won’t. Sex is considered the one great sacred right in our post-Christian culture.

But the evidence reveals what happens when we take it out of the God-given context of traditional marriage: poverty, disease, misery—and, yes, higher taxes for all of us.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: colson; taxes
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To: Sopater

Should We Have a Sex Tax?

If we do, homosexuals will be exempt by the government because it would be considered a hate crime.


21 posted on 01/11/2011 10:00:09 AM PST by Le Chien Rouge
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To: Sopater

I support none of these ideas, but must share:

Tax birth control, with exemptions if you show a marriage license.

Tax children, unless both parents are in the house (5 year exemption when a parent dies). Do this by limiting children as tax exemptions to married filing jointly couples.


22 posted on 01/11/2011 10:02:18 AM PST by Atlas Sneezed ("If you touch my junk, I'm gonna have you arrested.")
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To: Sopater

>>According to the Heritage Foundation, McManus writes, “13 million single parents with children cost taxpayers $20,000 each, or $260 billion in the year 2004.” The total probably comes to $300 billion today, McManus says.

Instead of a new tax, why don’t we, the taxpayers, just stop paying women for pumping out rugrats by the bushel? Problem solved.


23 posted on 01/11/2011 10:02:37 AM PST by vikingd00d (chown -R us ./base)
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To: Lurker
How about we just stop the Government paying to clean up after people.

Actually, I think that that is certainly the most sensible solution. Which is exactly why it will never happen.



Neither will a sex tax.
24 posted on 01/11/2011 10:02:37 AM PST by Sopater (...where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. - 2 COR 3:17b)
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To: JohnBrowdie
I suppose you could enjoy favorable tax treatment by having sex inside a Philip Roth IRA.

Your delight will compound tax free until after retirement when you begin to, ahem, withdraw.

25 posted on 01/11/2011 10:03:29 AM PST by billorites (freepo ergo sum)
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To: Sopater

What about homosexual sex? Certainly drives a lot of consumption of medical services and an adadictomy isn’t free either..


26 posted on 01/11/2011 10:04:22 AM PST by IamConservative (Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day. - Truman)
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To: Sopater

The joke here is that after a few years of marriage, married folks wouldn’t be paying much in sex tax anyway.


27 posted on 01/11/2011 10:04:40 AM PST by Melas
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To: Sopater

They would have made a fortune off of the Kennedys.


28 posted on 01/11/2011 10:06:36 AM PST by dragonblustar ("... and if you disagree with me, then you sir, are worse than Hitler!" - Greg Gutfeld)
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To: billorites

Aren’t you getting unwanted sex from them all the time, now?

Why do you want more?


29 posted on 01/11/2011 10:06:36 AM PST by Scrambler Bob (If you could read my mind ... just count up the felonies!)
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To: Beelzebubba
Tax children, unless both parents are in the house (5 year exemption when a parent dies).

This just made me curious. Why five years? Is the child of a woman 7 years widowed somehow less deserving than the child of a woman 4 years widowed?

30 posted on 01/11/2011 10:07:37 AM PST by Melas
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To: Sopater

Sin taxes are a sin. Period.


31 posted on 01/11/2011 10:09:28 AM PST by publana (Time to go Galt.)
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To: Sopater

Should We Have a Sex Tax On Planned Parenthood?


32 posted on 01/11/2011 10:10:30 AM PST by bunkerhill7
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To: Sopater

Should We Have a Sex Tax on Junior & Senior Proms?


33 posted on 01/11/2011 10:14:22 AM PST by bunkerhill7
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To: stuartcr
If God hadn’t made it so much fun and feel so good, I doubt we’d have this problem. He must have known what He was doing and what the results would be.

He also said "Thou shalt not commit adultery" (Exodus 20:14). We just decided not to listen to Him.

Strange that you would blame God when people misuse His gifts. That's like blaming the gun makers when people commit murder, or blaming the alcohol manufacturers when people drive drunk and kill someone.

The more I see of you, the more convinced I am that you are on the wrong forum.
34 posted on 01/11/2011 10:15:42 AM PST by Sopater (...where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. - 2 COR 3:17b)
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To: billorites
argh. you know, if they establish a sex tax, it's just a matter of time before they think of a sex tax credit for having sex in whatever fashion the federal government deems preferable. say, in a prius with a member of your own sex while filling out a union membership card, burning an american flag, and wearing 10 condoms on your head.
35 posted on 01/11/2011 10:15:58 AM PST by JohnBrowdie (http://forum.stink-eye.net)
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To: Sopater

I don’t blame God, I just believe He is ultimately responsible for all that happens. I believe He has a plan, and what happens, must be part of His plan.


36 posted on 01/11/2011 10:18:51 AM PST by stuartcr (When politicians politicize issues, aren't they just doing their job?)
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To: Melas

Hey, in my loony schemes (that I said I don’t agree with) you have to pick a number.

Of course, the reason is to encourage remarriage.

(You may now un-knot your knickers).


37 posted on 01/11/2011 10:21:34 AM PST by Atlas Sneezed ("If you touch my junk, I'm gonna have you arrested.")
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To: Sopater

If the plan calls for something akin to the Earned Income Tax Credit for married Fathers, count me in.


38 posted on 01/11/2011 10:23:00 AM PST by Jack of all Trades (Stop the change - I want to get off!)
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To: Sopater
Should We Have a Sex Tax?

I'd hit it.

39 posted on 01/11/2011 10:23:00 AM PST by Lazamataz (If Illegal Aliens are Undocumented Workers, than Thieves are Undocumented Shoppers.)
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To: Melas

Speak for yourself... ;-)


40 posted on 01/11/2011 10:23:45 AM PST by Dead Corpse (III%. The last line in the sand)
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