To the extent that Jack Salmon’s arguments against Senator Romney’s child allowance are sound, they’re arguments against some other proposal — not against Romney’s plan.
He complains that Romney’s plan does not deregulate child care to make it more affordable. But that misunderstands the point of Romney’s plan. It’s to help parents and children — including parents who care for their own children at home. Deregulating child care may be a fine idea, but it would do nothing to help that group, and there’s no reason to make it an either/or choice with Romney’s proposal.
Meanwhile, the sorts of criticisms that Salmon makes of child-care subsidies (they’re regressive, they are designed in ways that punish marriage, etc.) simply do not apply to the Romney plan — or, for that matter, to Senator Marco Rubio’s idea for paid family leave, which Salmon criticizes in passing. And neither of those plans amounts to “nationalizing child-rearing,” as he puts it in a final flourish.
Salmon’s cautions are worth saving for a target that actually justifies them.