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Given the effects of the state on the family, it is highly unlikely that state intervention can fix a dying family. Churches and religion, civic organizations, mutual aid, and charity all must be turned to, not the state, if family flourishing is the goal. An active, managing state does not mean a thriving family. To help families grow and live happier lives, the role of the state must be drastically cut back, allowing families to take back the vital role that they serve.

https://mises.org/wire/family-flourishing-and-state-denigration

Samuel Peterson

There is little doubt that the institution of the family in the West is in crisis. Birth rates have been declining in the USA, and most Western countries have fertility rates below replacement level. Abortions number over five hundred thousand per year, most of which are concentrated among low-income individuals. Famously, around half of all marriages in the USA end in divorce. Rather than ignoring these problems, it is important for all on the Right (conservatives, traditionalists, libertarians, etc.) to address these issues. But what means should be employed to combat a declining family institution?

Some individuals, especially national conservatives, have called for state intervention to solve these issues. Their proposals range from redistribution and welfare to banning bachelor’s degree requirements as hiring criteria. Rather than seeing the state as an obstacle to family flourishing, national conservatives tend to look to the state as a means of addressing family issues. However, the state is often the very creator of family denigration.

Social Security and Medicare

One policy that harms the family is state social insurance. Medicare and Social Security make up approximately one-third of the federal budget, costing around $2 trillion per year. This money is directly taken out of working people’s hands, making it harder to feed, clothe, and house families. State-sponsored social insurance policies create disincentives for individuals to form families. Because of the increased costs, individuals are pushed out of having an additional child, lowering birth rates.

Social insurance also replaces the family with the state in regard to the care of the elderly. Due to Medicare and Social Security, children do not have to aid their elderly parents. This yet again affects fertility. To put it bluntly, why would I have a child who is going to make me sacrifice decades of my own time and cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars only for them to not take care of me in my old age?

A similar case of the state subverting the role of families came with the advent of the welfare state. Historian David Beito writes, “A conservative estimate is that one-third of adult American males belonged to [mutual aid] lodges in 1910.” However, by the 1930s these societies started to fall out of favor due to the rise of the welfare state and American tax code. When it comes to the family, it is unlikely that state welfare programs will fix the problem of a falling birth rate and looser familial bonds. Rather, it is likely that social insurance proposals will subvert the family in the same way that mutual aid societies were subverted.

Trade and Protectionism

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