I had an electric toothbrush that my cat loved to rub against. Every evening when I got ready for bed, he got up and went to the bathroom with me, only to meow at me loudly until I sit down with him and let him rub his head against the handle of the toothbrush while I was brushing my teeth.
He disliked the toothpaste smell, but the face massage was always worth it haha.
Barely any pension, but that’s fine because they have kids to take care of them. This sounds nice, except for when you think of it for more than a few seconds. How would a homosexual couple survive while they’re old? They can’t have kids. They can adopt, but that does nothing to enlarge the population. What about people that can’t conceive for medical reasons? Should they have to suffer with “barely any pension” just because they got unlucky? This might be fine for most, but policies like that come at the expense of minority groups, which are already often at a disadvantage. And if you suggest adoption… If having kids is the only way to have a decent life after retiring, adopting would be an easy choice, because it saves you the pregnancy hassle as well as maybe some stressful first years of childcare. Surely the demand for adoptions would skyrocket, making it close to impossible for every person in a group that can’t have children to actually get them. Also, since kids are so valuable, supply for adoptions would fall, because who in their right mind would give up their pension that easily!
And let’s say a couple can and does have children because of the policy. In your mind they might have been ‘forced to make a better decision’, but ultimately ended up with the right choice, right? Have you considered that having kids might not be a healthy choice for a couple? Maybe the parents are just not cut out for the stress and suffer greatly while their kids grow up. Maybe the kids suffer as well, because a parent that is forced to have kids would hardly be a loving and enthusiastic parent, would they? You’d have to admit that forcing people into a choice is not exactly a good recipe for ensuring that they are happy, right?
Moving the financial burden of taking care of the elderly to an individual level works fine for some people, like your granddad enjoying your financial support, but greatly hurts people in different circumstances that they have no fault to be in. We should support everyone, not just a few lucky ones.
It’s wild to me that you’re equating having children with doing effort in your life. These people were supporting you in your choices too! They were paying taxes, maybe they were open to babysitting because they had no children of their own, maybe they financially helped parents within their family that were struggling. You’re kind of suggesting a two-class society, where childless people are off to fend for themselves with minimal support, regardless of what good they might have done in their lives. It’s like sending firefighters only to houses of other (ex-)firefighters, and letting all other houses burn because they ‘put in no effort’ themselves.
High adoption demand is good for the kids, but not for people relying on kids for their survival at an older age!
Ruminate on that for a second. Think about how a government would determine if you’re unable. If you’re gay, does the government need to see you having sex with a man to be sure? What if a person has e.g. endometriosis and getting pregnant is far more unlikely but not impossible. Were they unable? Or just not trying enough? And what if a person wasn’t even diagnosed but just thought they were unlucky? We’d need a ridiculously thorough health check for every pensioner just to determine one factor in their eligibility.