Since when did we become a greedy nation?
Watching QandA last night I was struck dumb when a young female member of the audience pounced on Bill Shorten for the government not matching the handout she could expect under Tony Abbott’s PPL scheme. It wasn’t so much the question she threw at Shorten that stunned me, but her attitude.
I cannot remember her question word-for-word, though I remember she introduced herself as a young, ambitious lady who would soon be entering the workforce and confidently embarking on a successful career. In her opinion, as a successful young lady, she feels she would deserve to be paid a bucket load of money to have a baby.
Is it just me, or is that attitude wrong?
Good luck to her in her career, which I hope is very rewarding. I also hope her success matches her enthusiasm. She might know that success in a career usually comes from putting in the hard yards. Do that, and the rewards will more than likely come. Nobody is going to hand success to her on a platter. Yet she wants the government, nay, taxpayers, to give her $75,000 for six months of baby time.
Why should she have the expectation that her pre-supposed success should be rewarded? Why should she have such a sense of outrageous entitlement? Or rather, why should she expect anything at all?
I don’t have issues with paid parental leave but I do have issues with people who expect the government to cater for their every whim. Women or anybody for that matter who is in need of government support should be able to receive it, but why should a successful person be entitled to receive more for something (that is basically a life choice) than a person who is unable to make that choice purely based on financial grounds? In essence, this young lady expects the government to give her a handout. A huge one.
Maybe I’m showing my age but I don’t recall these greedy attitudes from older generations. Since when have we become a country of people who want something for nothing and expect hard-working taxpayers to provide it for us.
This young lady made it clear – without saying so – that her vote would go to the party prepared to give her the most money to have a child. There was little-expressed concern that most of the taxpayers who foot the bill earn less in a year than she would pocket under Abbott’s PPL scheme (assuming, of course, that she is in a successful, high-paying job as she expects to be).
I don’t like Abbott’s scheme for a few of reasons. Firstly, I can’t see it as being viable (which I won’t go into as it is not the purpose of this post). Secondly, I find it discriminatory (again, I won’t expand on this). Thirdly, and most importantly, as shown on QandA last night it produces a sense of ‘unearned’ entitlement and greed. And sadly, at the expense of people who are more needy.
Someone is sure to enlighten me by announcing that her attitude is typical of today’s generation. If it is, then I was seriously unaware of it. If it is, then I find it extremely disappointing. If it is, do we really need to keep encouraging it?
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