Thanks, but I think we are actually in rather stark disagreement.

I believe that wage subsidies would be unnecessary if we fielded fewer workers. So, it’s the staying at home that should be directly subsidized. Supporting parents’ natural incentive to stay home would put upward pressure on wages as we move the workload from humans to machines. I would advocate for stronger unions, but unions are inherently Luddite.

Congress could also drive wages by taxing low-wage imports. A comparative advantage in unskilled labor should, as an ethical matter, not be a basis for international trade. It’s how the antebellum South sold so much cotton. But rejecting cheap foreign labor will increase the use of robots, not humans, so distributing the benefits of technology, as opposed to resisting them, remains our biggest challenge. Subsidizing child-rearing seems to me the best possible place to start that process.