Rebuttal Argument Argumentative Essay

Introduction

United States is one of the countries in the world where mothers face challenges in raising their children. Parents usually exposed to economic punishment specially mothers. Despite the background differences, it is notable that raising children in all classes is challenging. This essay will try to determine the reason why American society does not fully address the challenge of raising the children. The essay will also determine the sources of these penalties and whether they differ based on class. Finally the essay will discuss the long term consequences

United States has provided supports to the families since colonial period (Coontz, 14). For instance the government of the United States designed social and economic policies to enable economic growth of Americans after the colonial period. The community members interacted in a harmonious way and supported each other. The leaders of the early cities established supportive policies to ensure all the families accessed the local government care programs. Therefore, it is evident that the United States government has always been committed to support its citizens in the development of human capital since colonial era. In addition, the government went ahead in ensuring that the Americans access land and housing (Coontz, 14). The American government has in many years subsidized the mortgage rates of acquiring housing. For instance, in 1935 the mortgage rate was 1 percent as compared to 36% and 47% of France and Britain respectively. This is a proof that the government has always been committed in supporting the family, social life which is part of parenting. The government has also established various social programs that are aimed at improving the welfare of the poor. For instance the government has established social security to enable poor and working families to sustain economic stability especially during economic crisis. For instance, the government has established unemployment benefits which help to curb poverty challenges experienced by the elderly and disabled (Coontz, 17). The government has also established programs such as TANF and AFDC. The government emphasized that the people who are seeking for aid must look for a job first. This shows that the government was not only committed to solve the poverty problem, but also motivated the Americans to free themselves from the poverty trap. In additional the government ensured that the clients who could not find a job during the period of accessing the TANF aids got workfare jobs (Coontz, 17). The government commitment in supporting parental care is also evident by various reforms enacted to support the raising of children. For instance, the government enacted the 1996 reforms which had numerous benefits for the families accessing the TANF aids. For instance, more money was allocated to support the welfare activities, the clients were also equipped competitive labor market skills such as interview skills, childcare subsidies among others. From the above arguments, there is a solid proof that the government of the United States has shown commitment in supporting parents and social welfare of parents.

Counter argument

However, the government In the United States and American society at large have not acted enough to eliminate the challenge of raising children in the States. For instance, in the US working hours have been increasing steadily in the past few years. The middle class families such as managers and other professionals are expected to work for hours, sometimes being called on duty during the night or over the weekends. In additional to that, these families spend a substantial portion of their incomes on raising their incomes in raising their children. For instance, it is notable that the middle class families in US cater for three quarters of the cost of raising their children to produce human capital (Crittenden, 38). The human capital plays a greater role in economic production as compared to machine capital and other forms of capital. In additional, the children are the only link between the current generation and the future generation in a society (Crittenden, 38). Therefore, it is fair enough to conclude that the whole society benefits from the parental care of raising children both economically and socially. As a result, it is unfair for the American society or any other society to leave the burden of raising children solely to the parents. It is unfair for the society to view children as private goods or the decision to have children as private. The American society should recognize the parenting efforts especially motherly care in the crucial role they play in shaping the future generation. The national government should enact flexible laws that support and recognize the role of bringing up children played by the parents. For instance, labor laws should be enacted to ensure that all mothers that go for a maternity leaves are compensated by their clients as they are still performing duties to the best of the whole society. The society should also work on eliminating “mommy tax” and “daddy tax” that are usually associated with parenthood in the United States. It is notable as the society fails to reward the role of mothers in parenting, there is a loss of human capital as majority are forced to quit their jobs and stay at home. New laws should be adopted in all institutions of works such as creating more flexible working hours that will create time for parenting. The institutions also need to reform their working culture by creating better part time job positions with better securities.
In the United States, parenting role is more challenging for the poor and working class families as compared to the middle class families. The poor and working families are considered poor because they lack work ethics. However, as (Hay, 24) notes the American society is the major contributing factor of the poverty in the US. The US is among the countries with the widest income inequalities in the world. This leads to lack of social policies that would protect low income earners from poverty. The United States society believes that the poor family and welfare workers contributed to their own problem of poverty by engaging in unacceptable behaviors. For instance, the society associates welfare with unmoral behaviors such drug abuse, teen pregnancy, unwed motherhood among others (Hay, 24). As a result, the majority of Americans believes that poor and welfare families have an alternative to get out of welfare and assume social responsibilities like their fellow Americans. However, Hay (26) notes that the States have to create decent jobs for the family in the welfare before criticizing them to assume civic obligations. It is also worthy to notes that majority of the families in the welfare views the benefits of being married being equal with the accruing benefits of the welfare. To curb the problem of poverty among poor families, the US has established several programs to assists the family to fight poverty. Programs such as AFDC and TANF were established to provide means of reducing poverty rates in the US society. However, such programs have not lived to meet the expectations of many of the US residents. For instance, the two programs have poor perception of the poor families and welfare workers such as they are lazy and have a wrong lifestyle (Hay, 26). The jobs provided by these programs also have a little impact as they rarely pay income below poverty lines. AFDC and TANF are based on rewards and punishments. However, as Hay (24) notes, the punishments exceed the rewards. For instance, a welfare worker is not supposed to quit a job that has a low pay without informing the relevant authorities. In addition, programs such as TANF emphasize on the workforce at the expense of children care. (Hay, 26) notes that TANF expects a mother to look for an employment opportunity three months after giving birth. Such requirements may have a negative may have more negative impacts in the family life as a three year old child is still young and requires mother care. TANF also has rules that are considered demeaning by majority of American citizens. For instance, the programs limit its client in accessing skills that will help them in qualifying for a higher job (Hay, 24).The programs have also failed to address the real cause of poverty which has resulted to inadequate solution to reduce poverty. For instance, the welfare programs view marriage as the practical solution to eradicate poverty
Conclusion

Works cited

Crittendent, Ann. The price of motherhood. ppt (n.d)
Hay, Sharon. Flat broke with children. ppt. (n.d)
Coontz, Stephanie. “we always stood on our own two feet” ppt. (n.d)