September 8, 2026 • 34 mins
Using tax dollars to give stay at home parents $9,000 a year. The tax code being confusing helps politicians. Where does this parent pay money come from? Steve Moore tells us more.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Hey, welcome back.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
If you're just joining us, I am Mary Walter, sitting
in for a vacationing Jesse Kelly. You know, they let
him take some time off every now and then. You know,
a couple times.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And that's good. I'm glad.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
And thank you for allowing me to be here with you.
Coming up later in the show, Stephen Moore will be
joining us. We're going to talk about this program that
I want to discuss with you right now. And if
you could get cuts 15 to 17.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Ready, great.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
So, because there's been a lot of discussion about this today,
I have very, very mixed emotions. And you are allowed
to join me here. That's why I want to bring
it up without our guests. I want to bring up
the cuts and everything and have a conversation before he
joins us.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
877-377-4373.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Super easy number.
Speaker 5 (00:58):
877-377-4373.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
Three, seven, seven 43 73, or you go to X
tag me in a post on X at Mary Walter radio.
And I will do my best to, um, to multitask
and read your, your comments at, at the same time.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Let's see.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Not somebody else.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
All right.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
I have a lot of, a lot of comments coming
in and thank you for everyone who's following me. I
try to, I try to do my best to follow back,
but a lot of times it gets past me. So
I apologize if I don't get you right now, I'll
try to get you the next time I see a
comment from you.
Speaker 6 (01:31):
All right.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
So the Trump administration has drafted a proposal that would
pay some stay at home parents using funds from a
federal program that was originally designed to help working families
afford childcare. It's called the stay at home parent childcare
subsidy proposal. And it was actually started under the Clinton
administration to help low income and working class families pay
(01:52):
for childcare.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
The program currently provides about 9,000 per child annually. Now
this is In addition to the $ 3, 000 tax credit that
they get for having had a kid, right? So that's
on top of that with funds that are typically paid
directly to the childcare providers. So, cause usually it's a
single mom, right?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
She's got to work.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
So there is no one to watch the kids. So she,
she gets her $ 9, 000 per.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Child to pay for childcare.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
So that money goes from, um, goes from the government
and it's paid directly to the childcare provider.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
And hopefully it's not the Learing Center.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
So that part of this bothers me because I see
a lot of room for fraud here. Now, the funding
would come, this expanded benefit. So the New York Times
reported that the plan would create what could become the
first federal grant program to directly compensate parents for staying
(02:51):
home to raise their children. Now the proposed benefit will
only apply to married couples. So they're trying to incentivize
getting married in order to have children, as opposed to
when you have someone in the home. the way their
income is calculated, you wind up not qualifying for some
(03:15):
of these things.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And I do believe there is a gap.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
There is a gap that when someone starts working and
they start to get themselves going in the right direction
or they get married, which we want, we want children
to go up in homes with people who are married.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I'm 100% behind that.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Because if you don't, you're little valedictorians running around outside
dressed in black block and swarming a 7-Eleven and destroying it.
So I think that having two parents at home, you're
much less likely to have your child's name on the
11 o'clock news.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
So I think it's a good thing. I just don't
know if we're going about it the right way. But
we had programs in the past that.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Disincentivized it and incentivized this, you know, having kids without
a father in the home.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
And that's backfired on us bigly.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
All right, so as I said, the funding would come
from the Child Care and Development Fund that was created
during the Clinton administration to help the low-income and working-class people. Okay,
under this proposal, eligible stay-at-home parents could receive payments directly
from the government. Now, to qualify, families have to meet
a couple of requirements.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
You have to be married.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
You have to have one spouse working at least 35
hours per week. Have the other spouse stay home to
care for the children. you have to meet income requirements
which vary by state. Unmarried couples with a stay-at-home parent
do not qualify, nor do single parents who are not employed.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Hallelujah.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Now, the National Women's Law Center, Amy Matsui works there,
and she warned that expanding eligibility without increasing funds could
create more competition for.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Already limited sources.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yes, If you're going to start giving this pot of
money that Congress has appropriated for this program, for this purpose,
and you're going to put a whole bunch of other
people on it, they're not all going to be getting
$ 9, 000 anymore.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
There's not enough money.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
I'm terrible at math. Terrible at math. I tell my
husband all the time, I'm math blind.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
It's a disability.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
But even I can look at this and go, well,
that just isn't going to work. You can't double the
number of people, maybe triple the number of people on
that program taking money out of the same pot without
expanding the pot. This is going to cost me more money.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Not happy.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
She said, even if we doubled the amount of child
care funding for CCDF, that would not be enough to
serve all the families who need child care. Now, supporters
of the proposal argue that stay-at-home parents should receive comparable
support to families that you subsidize childcare services.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
I'm sorry. No one told you you had to have children.
I'm glad you want to have children. That's awesome.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
But if you don't make enough money to have three kids,
then you don't have three kids. I don't think the
government should be paying you to make that dream come true.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
I just don't.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
You know, I, I, I, I don't like this idea
of using tax and our money to incentivize behavior. Instead
of incentivizing it, maybe we should make making the wrong
decision painful. Maybe that's what should hurt instead of the other.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And people are like, well, the children.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
I'm like, look, there's going to be one generation that's
going to have to go through something really hard. They're
going to have to go through something really hard and
learn a really hard lesson for this society to right
itself and come out on the other side and say, huh,
having children with several different men and not without the
benefit of marriage wasn't a really good idea.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
And that's just going to wait. It's have to be.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
You can disagree with me, 877-377-4373, or tag me in
a post on X at Mary Walter Radio. Yitzhak Didi said,
think about two parents in the home. The amount of
daycare money, trouble, and raising the little thugs would be
reduced greatly.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
No issue with that. Yeah, I just don't know if
I should be paying for it. I pay for everything. Plus,
they get $ 3, 000 for each little urchin they have on
their tax credits, and they probably get tax reimbursements on
taxes they don't even pay. What do I get? I
get nothing. I get nothing. I live in the People's
(07:31):
Socialist Republic of New Jersey, and I love it here.
I love this place.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
When my grandparents came to America, they settled in New Jersey.
When my great-grandparents on my mother's side came to America,
they settled in New Jersey. I love this state. I
think it's a fantastic state. However, my property taxes are
$ 20, 000 a year. And I live in a 150-year-old home
(08:00):
that needs a lot of work. It's a constant. It's
like owning a boat. It's just a hole that I
put money.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Into. $ 20, 000 a year.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Why?
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Why?
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Should I say, yes, tax me some more? I don't care.
All right.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
And I have some opinions from other people coming up
here to share with you. 877-377- 43 73 let's head
to maryland al welcome you are on the jesse kelly
show al how you doing.
Speaker 6 (08:35):
Mary it is so good i'm doing great it's so
good to hear your voice i listened to you for
some years um i won't mention the station out of
a station in dc and you i i loved every
minute of all your shows you were fabulous and then
one day you weren't there and i've been mourning ever
since um i'm just glad to hear you on the
(08:55):
air Where can I catch you regularly? Because I intend
to do it.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Well, actually, I will be on Newsmax TV tomorrow morning
at 7.05 a.m.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Eastern Time. I am all over Newsmax.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
All right.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And I do fill in on radio stations all over
the country.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
And I have a podcast on Tuesday evenings, not tonight,
because it starts at 7.15 Eastern Time.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
So that would be right now.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Um, so it won't be tonight, but it is live
on YouTube and rumble and getter. And I have all
sorts of guests that are political, not political names. You
will know Al, uh, and, and then the audio is
available on Apple podcast, Spotify, and speaker easiest way. Follow
me on Facebook at Mary Walter radio, or follow me
on X at Mary Walter radio. And I always put
up notices about where I'm going to be and when.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
That's fabulous. And by the way, you didn't pay me
to make this call. This was not a paid call.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
No, it's not. It really truly is not. But thank
you so much, Al. That's so sweet. I appreciate it.
Speaker 6 (09:54):
You're fantastic. I love hearing your voice again. Thank you.
And on a substantive point, your discussions about the sort
of built independence, independence, not independence, the built independency that
we have created in this country, of course, it goes
(10:15):
way back, as you know. You've alluded to that. And
when I was in law school in the Stone Ages,
I graduated in 1975 from law school. And one of
the courses I took was called social justice law. And
even then they were, you know, stupid.
Speaker 7 (10:32):
And I took it.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
It was actually a really interesting course. And I remember
debating in class the efficacy of the Civil Rights Act.
And remember the shoes under the bed law, you know,
if there was a man in the house. You know,
they couldn't get, they couldn't get what, so that what
happened then is marriages fell apart. Men didn't marry the
(10:55):
women that they impregnated. And the thing has gotten a
hundred times worse than it, than it was before. And
we've ended up with the same poverty rates that we
had before the Civil Rights Act. So, or maybe worse.
And you've always, you know, you've had a beam on that.
And I heard you talking about it just five minutes ago.
You were dead right. I'm 76 years old, been around
(11:20):
a long time, and watched this happen both professionally and personally.
And I'll leave you with this one last thing, because
I don't think all hope is lost. I was with
my son earlier today talking about exactly this kind of stuff.
And my son is 35. He went to college, but
after two years, he said, this is stupid. I'm not
(11:41):
learning anything that's going to get me a job. So
he now has a a, a good job with, um,
he's got a public sector job with, um, one of
the beach towns in Maryland. Again, I won't, I won't
mention the town. Um, and he said, you know, quickly,
I got this job because this, this, it's a real job.
And if, you know, it's, I didn't go to college,
(12:02):
get a degree for four years and then drive a truck.
I've got a real job because I learned some skills
and he's appalled at what he sees from his generation.
He's 35 and he, He doesn't understand. He even said,
why are they socialist Democrats? And I went into a
long rant that I'll spare you with.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah, we've got to run anyway. Al, I don't mean
to be rude to you.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
You're so sweet, but thank you so much for your call.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
And thank you. It was very kind of you.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
All right, we've got more calls coming up. You're listening
to The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
This is a free choice. It's America after all. But
because some public policy has disincentivized marriage and birth, at
least 13 disincentives in some of our safety net programs
for those two things, you eliminate those and then maybe
use some of that money to do the opposite, to
incentivize marriage and birth. And then you're saying this is
still America. You make your choice. And I believe that
(12:57):
there are enough Americans who want to do this if
you look at public opinion surveys. that will benefit from
these policies. My guess is that you'll get a much
more receptive audience amongst Republicans than you will amongst Democrats.
Speaker 6 (13:08):
That's correct.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I don't mean to malign.
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Anybody here, but that's the way the cookie crumbles at
this moment, it seems like.
Speaker 6 (13:14):
No, that's right.
Speaker 5 (13:15):
My friend Tim Carney, who works in Washington, D.C., a
great social science scholar, talks about places with high social capital.
There are some places like Bethesda, Maryland, that are predominantly
left of center, where you actually have Very high marriage
and birth rates. But those, to your point, Stuart, are
few and far between. Ultimately, that would be great, right?
Because we get to the middle part of this century
and conservatively minded people are having more kids. I like
(13:38):
the effect on public policy from that.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
That was Kevin Roberts.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
He is the president of the Heritage Foundation, and he
was on with Stuart Varney there talking about he likes this.
He thinks this is great and incentivizes marriage and having babies.
I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I'm a
big fan of marriage.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
I've been married for a really long time. Love you, honey.
I've been married for a really long time. So it's fine.
That's okay. I just have a problem with marriage.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
With government picking winners and losers, and I'm going to let,
I cut 16 here, I'm going to let Lawrence Jones
on Fox News kind of say my piece for me here.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Here's Lawrence Jones.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Definitely a political winner. I see what the president is doing,
but I think it's a terrible idea. The socialism, just
give me the money. Just give me more of my money.
Speaker 4 (14:30):
I don't want any of these programs.
Speaker 8 (14:32):
You want just a tax, like lower my taxes.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Just lower my taxes. I don't want all these programs. Again,
I understand that this is a political winner, In this
new age of populism. But the government consistently choosing who
they are going to give these tax benefits instead of
just giving us the money. And if you want that
money to pay for lower child care, then you can
(14:58):
use that money for that. But, for example, I would
not fall in this category. I'm definitely going to pay
for it. But I wouldn't fall in this category at
this point in my life.
Speaker 8 (15:07):
But you're paying for that pot of money anyway.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
It's fungible.
Speaker 8 (15:11):
No, but you're paying, no, I'm talking about the money
set aside to pay for childcare is going right now
to daycare centers and to women who are unmarried. And
it incentivizes people not to get married in order to
get this money. And now this says, no, if you're
(15:31):
an at-home mom, you're working, too, and you're going to
get a piece of that money, too.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I think it really sends.
Speaker 8 (15:38):
A powerful philosophical message that, one, we want to encourage
marriage because that's good for kids. And we want to
encourage kids to be home with their parents, home with
their moms, which is also great for society.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
In principle, yes.
Speaker 8 (15:53):
I thought you said you weren't a libertarian anymore.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
It's not even about being a libertarian. It's just a
basic conservative philosophy. It's like instead of the government choosing
what money and what you should do, just give me
my money and not decide which different sectors they want
to support.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Just give me my money.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
I'm a big fan of just saying, this is how
much you're going to pay in taxes. We need to
revamp the tax code, period. And I know President Trump
wanted to do that. It's not going to happen because
tax accountants and too many lobbyists, it's just never going
to happen. The tax code being ridiculously complicated is the
way they want it. And also, politicians can't buy votes
(16:40):
with your money if, you know, they're.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
You know exactly how much you're supposed to pay.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
If everybody's treated the same, they use your money to
buy votes from specific groups. And some groups are more
favored than others. If you are married and don't have
kids and work really.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Hard, you are screwed. You're not getting anything.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
You're just going to keep paying and paying and paying.
And for Rachel there to sit there, Rachel Campos Duffy,
you heard her there, to sit there and say that,
but it's all coming out of the same pot.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
The pot of money is already there. That's such, that's.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
So disingenuous because there's going to be far more people
than there is money and everybody's going to be getting
a dollar. It's not going to pay for healthcare. It's
not going to help with childcare. It's going to become
a joke. And then what are they going to.
Speaker 6 (17:26):
Have to do?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
They're going to have to appropriate more money.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
And it's going to grow and grow and grow and
grow and grow like every other government program grows and
grows and grows and grows and grows.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
All right.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Coming up to talk about this, Steve Moore will be
joining us. He will be coming up next year on
The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
Jesse Kelly.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Welcome back to The Jesse Kelly Show. I'm Mary Walter
sitting in for Jesse. Tomorrow, Kelly Nash is in and
then Jesse is back.
Speaker 7 (17:54):
All right.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Joining us now, Stephen Moore.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
What a great guy. He's the co-founder of the Committee
to Unleash Prosperity. He's the host of More Money.
Speaker 6 (18:01):
Get it? More Money.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
He is a writer for the Wall Street Journal and
a founder of the Club for Growth. Also the author
of Trump Economic Miracle. Stephen, thank you so much for
joining me.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Great to have you. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (18:13):
Hey, Barry.
Speaker 7 (18:15):
It's so great to hear your voice. Great to be
with you. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
All right. So I want you to unravel this for us.
So the stay at home parent child subsidy proposal coming
out of the white house will, um, will reward people
for being married, having one spouse working at least 35
hours a week, having the other spouse stay at home
to care for the children. And they have to meet
income requirements, which vary by state. Now, me personally, I
(18:40):
just see another leering center here. We're going to have 10,000,
just like we had 10,000 Medicare offices. We're going to
have 10,000, you know, people who are, who are quote
unquote married. And, um, And there'll be no checking to
see if they're married. It'll be like your voting status.
Feel free to register. No one's going to check.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
And they say that it's $ 9, 000. Well, that's what it
is now.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
But once you add all these married people into this,
everybody's going to be getting two bucks. So I don't
see how this works without increasing the amount of money
in this pot. And then it just grows and grows
and grows and grows. What is your take on this?
Speaker 7 (19:15):
Well, it's a tough one for me. I mean, I
think I was listening intently to what you were saying
because I'm still trying to make my mind up my
mind on it. You know, it's complicated because we give all.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
These subsidies for daycare and for, you know, two parent families,
you know, that have a daycare or child care subsidy
or rewarding.
Speaker 6 (19:39):
Mothers for working.
Speaker 7 (19:39):
And by the way, I don't want to sound like
a sexist.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
I'm not against mothers working and I'm not against mothers
not taking care of their kids.
Speaker 7 (19:46):
It's up to the woman.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
But I do worry that this is the sort of
nanny state, and the government is stepping in and kind
of putting their thumb on the scale about whether women
work or stay at home. We're also running a massive
$ 2 trillion a year deficit. It's not like we have
money to throw around.
Speaker 6 (20:03):
So I'm kind of.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
On the fence on this one. What about you?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
I don't like it.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I just don't like the fact that there's so much
fraud in all of our programs that if we got
rid of the fraud, people would have more money in
their pockets to begin with.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Right.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
I don't like like just growing another program. I don't
like it. I don't like politicians using.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Money to buy my vote. I just, like you said,
it's a nanny state. Instead of trying to incentivize people
to get married, how about we disincentivize having children without
two people in the home, right?
Speaker 2 (20:38):
How about we.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Disincentivize behavior instead of incentivizing behavior that the government wants
us to have? And I don't think there's anything wrong
with incentivizing marriage and having children.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
I think that that's great.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
We need more taxpayers because, um, you know, I'm not
going to get Medicare or social security and I'm a
little annoyed at that. So please start popping out babies
to pay for it. But, um, I think ultimately in
the end, the whole tax system needs to be revamped
and I know that's never going to happen, but the
whole tax system needs to be revamped. Everybody has to
have skin in the game, give the money back to
the people. Well, start charging us less to begin with
(21:12):
so that hopefully it's a, it's a net sum game. And, um,
instead of, cause they're going to have to increase the
money on this.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
I don't like it. So no, I don't like it
at all. Can you tell? Oh, we lost him.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
Oh, the end of an epic rant and we lose him.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Oh, oh, timing's everything. Well, I'm in good company.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Cause Mark Levin, Put on X, he said, how the
hell do Republicans and pseudo conservatives propose more government programs
when a 40 trillion dollar debt is hanging over us
and future generations soon to be 50 trillion? Social Security
is going broke in six short years. Medicare is going
broke in seven short years and we need to increase
defense spending. Who do these Republicans and pseudo conservatives think
(22:00):
is going to.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Pay for all this?
Speaker 3 (22:01):
They act like they've come up with some kind of
magical program for families, when in fact they are contributing
to what would be an unspeakable financial collapse on the
head of every family in this country.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Where are their priorities? Where is their focus?
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Socialism light is nothing new. Government spending is nothing new.
More debt is nothing new. They go on and on
about rhinos, but that's exactly what they are, if not worse.
And they think they've stumbled upon a new ideology. Let
me put it in simple terms. You don't create new
entitlement programs when existing entitlement programs are tanking and the
debt threatens to crash the economic system in the not-too-distant future.
(22:38):
How does any of this help working people, the middle-class families,
or anyone else?
Speaker 2 (22:44):
It's a great question. How does it help them? Chris Lash,
Dana Lash's husband, posted this.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
If $ 9, 000 is the thing that is going to let
moms stay at home and for families to have more children,
then make it a $ 9, 000 tax credit. If you want
them to have $ 9, 000, then the government shouldn't take the
$ 9, 000 from them to start with.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Exactly.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Because they take it, they put it through all of
the government hands, and then it goes away.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
And then you're giving back $ 9, 000. Just let them keep
it in a tax credit. Why not? All right, Steve
is back. Steve, that was an epic rant, and we
lost you.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
And I was really– I was in my groove, so
I'm a little disappointed that we lost you.
Speaker 7 (23:27):
A little bit about what you said. I lost some
cell coverage there, so sorry about that. But, you know, look,
this is a tough call. I don't like the government
playing the role of, you know, intervening in, you know, families. Look,
I'm all for– you know, my– wife stayed home, took
care of the kids. And, you know, we were fortunate
that we had the opportunity to do that. It's a
(23:48):
financial sacrifice, right? If the mother stays at home and
I get that. So I just think that the government
should stay out of these issues and it should be
up to the family and the parents themselves.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Yeah, I agree with that.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
But what about a tax credit instead of collecting the
money from them, right? Which they're not paying into it anyway.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
They're not.
Speaker 3 (24:11):
But just give them a tax credit, because my money
is paying for this, obviously, because I pay for everybody.
I pay for everyone. And it goes into the government.
It passes through 10,000 hands, and it's got to be processed,
and all those people have to be paid. So that
$ 9, 000 that they started out with to give them, in actuality,
is like three, and you've got to get the money
from somewhere else to make up for it.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
So just give them tax credits. Why does it always
have to be a check or a deposit?
Speaker 7 (24:34):
Yeah, well, I don't even like tax credits. I mean, look,
I'm a flat tax guy, Mary. Yes. You and I
don't owe you for 25 years, so... I always believe
get all the credit, all the deductions, all the loopholes,
all the special interest provisions. Have one flat rate of 18%.
Everybody pays it. But you get one deduction, and that's
for your children. And so if you have four kids,
(24:56):
you get whatever the number is, $ 7, 000 deduction per kid.
Don't make it so complicated. I don't like using the
tax code for social policy. But this is also tied
to another issue that I find troubling as an economist
and just as an American, which is we have record
low birth rates now for young women. And that is
(25:19):
a problem. We're going to be soon facing negative population growth.
And this is a problem that has plagued Europe, China, Japan. Remember,
people worried about China overpopulating the world.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Right.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
I don't know.
Speaker 7 (25:31):
I don't understand why we're seeing lower marriage rates and
lower birth rates. I think it's a problem for our society.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
It is, but you know what? This isn't going to
fix that because it's cultural. It's societal, right? It's societal.
It's cultural. Right, it's cultural, 100%.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
We decided to raise up little girls back in like
the 80s, right? And we did that by pushing down
little boys and telling them that it's toxic masculinity and
all that stuff. And now we have more young ladies
going to college, more young ladies graduating from college. And
they don't want to marry someone who doesn't make as
much money as they do because that part of the
old culture still exists there, right? Right.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
Right.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
So they don't want any part of that.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
And you have an entire generation of young men who
are directionless.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
They don't have jobs. They're sitting at home. They got nothing.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
And we kind of really failed them.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
So you could throw as much money as you want
for people to get married. It's not going to change
this dynamic, I don't think.
Speaker 7 (26:30):
Yeah, you also hit your nail on the head on
this one. I mean, there was just a piece in
The Washington Times, which was very troubling, about double the
number of young males that are not working and, B,
not getting married. And if they're not working, they're not management, right?
I mean, so this is a big problem. But here,
(26:50):
I have a question for you, Mary. I've been waiting
to do this interview. And so we had something in
our hotline. You get our hotline in the morning, don't you?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
I do not.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
You don't need to put me on.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
I think I asked you the last time.
Speaker 7 (27:02):
I want every one of your listeners to go to UnleashedPosperity.com,
sign up for the hotline. It's absolutely free. Mary, do
this as soon as this show is over. And I'll
sign you up. But we had an item today. It
was a 2025 poll, and it asked 1,000 women, do
you blame men for your problems? And here's what was
(27:23):
so interesting about the subject, the outcome. Who do you
think was more likely to think that men were the
source of their problems, Republican women or Democratic women?
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I'm going to go Democrat with the under 30 crowd.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
By two to one. By two to one.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Boom!
Speaker 7 (27:42):
By two to one, 60% of Democratic women say they
blame them for their problems. Only 30 percent of Republican
women do. That's an interesting statistic.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Well, because I think there's also a study that was
out and I have it somewhere here on my desk.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I don't know where it is.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
But the under 30 women overwhelmingly don't don't just don't
like men.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
They don't like men.
Speaker 7 (28:03):
They're men haters. They're men haters.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
Absolutely. And then they make videos. I see that, by.
Speaker 7 (28:08):
The way, in some of my relatives.
Speaker 5 (28:10):
I see it.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
Yeah, and then they make videos sitting in their car
crying because they can't find an alpha male, right?
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I want someone who's going to, and I'm like, you're
looking for a white rhino. It doesn't exist.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
You want someone who's going to stand in an abortion
protest with you, but also drive a Ford F-150 and,
you know, be the sole provider for you and pay
all your bills. Like, that animal doesn't exist. Yeah.
Speaker 7 (28:34):
Well, we also had an item in our hotline the
other day about how, you know which the hottest schools
in the country are and what region they are?
Speaker 4 (28:43):
Uh, colleges, colleges, South.
Speaker 7 (28:46):
Yep. South, the Southeast, the old Southeast conference. When I
graduated from college, you know, those were like the safety schools.
Now those are hurts, you know, Mississippi, Vanderbilt, Tennessee, Florida, uh,
LSU because, uh, and one of my speculations is these
schools are fun. You know, you weren't learned, but you're fun.
And you know what? The girls dress up as girls,
not men.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Very true. That is, that is very, very true. Steve,
our Villanova's not on there, though, so that's all I'm
going to say.
Speaker 7 (29:15):
Oh, you know, my son went to Villanova.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
I know.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
That's why I said it.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (29:18):
Because I went to Villanova.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
We had an entire conversation about this.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
Oh, you know what?
Speaker 7 (29:23):
I've completely forgotten about that, but it was a great school.
He got a great education, met a lot of great people.
He has friends for life from Villanova.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Absolutely. We've got to run. Thank you so much, my friend.
Speaker 7 (29:33):
Now we're just getting started here.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
I know.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Well, they're yelling at me to get rid of them
to let you go, unless you want to stay, and
you can stay over to the other side, and we
can talk about.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
The jobs report, but that's up to you.
Speaker 7 (29:44):
I'll do it. I'm having fun with you.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Hang on then. Hang on. All right. More coming up
with Steve Moore on The Jesse Kelly Show. I'm Mary Walter.
Speaker 3 (29:53):
And for Jesse Kelly here, our guest Stephen Moore is
the co-founder of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, the host
of More Money, a writer for The Wall Street Journal
and co-founder of the Club for Growth. He also wrote
The Trump Economic Miracle. And go to UnleashProsperity.com. Sign up
for their newsletter, which, by the way, Mr. Moore, last
time I spoke to you, you told me you were
(30:13):
going to sign me up for it.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
So that's all I'm going to say.
Speaker 7 (30:15):
You have to text me your email so I have that.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
You do have my email. I'll send it to you again.
Speaker 7 (30:21):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
It's okay. I'll just go sign.
Speaker 6 (30:23):
Up for it.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
No big deal.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
All right.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
So let's talk about jobs. You were kind enough to
stay for another segment. I love that. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
So Scott Besant, who, by the way, can we run
Scott Besant for president? I love this man. And I'm
kind of fangirling a little bit over Scott Besant. Because
he just says, like, isn't he so smart that he
runs circles around people and they don't even know what
happened to them, which is fantastic. Now, he said that
(30:52):
Americans are not paying enough attention to the acceleration of
business formation. in the U S and he said, as
part of Trump's, you know, pro growth policies. And we
know there's a lot of things that are in place
to bring manufacturing back into this country and, and, um,
investments that are being made by foreign countries.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
However, that's not something people talk about at the dinner table.
It's just not.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
So is that why people are so sour on the economy?
And president Trump has what negative 57% among Republicans on
the economy.
Speaker 4 (31:23):
Is that why?
Speaker 7 (31:24):
So, I mean, I think there are a couple. First
of all, it's a strong economy. It's not a great economy.
It's a good economy. Because people are still angry about
high prices.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
I am.
Speaker 7 (31:34):
I just paid $ 4. 25 a gallon to fill up, so
I don't like doing that. But we are by far
the best economy in the world. So every other country
in the world would trade places with the United States
in a second. China would, Japan would, Europe would, the U.K. would,
Canada would. We are by far the best economy. We
have the best businesses, the most productive. We've got the
best stock market. I know the stock market is in
(31:56):
the economy, but we have very profitable and productive businesses.
We now have more job openings, Mary, than we have
people looking for jobs.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
We know a bunch of young men who could fill
those jobs.
Speaker 7 (32:11):
Exactly. So the problem has been four or five months ago,
we had the situation in Iran. The oil price went
way up and When oil prices go up, everything else
goes up in price. And so that's why people are angry,
because of high gas prices, which leads to high food prices, transportation, manufacturing.
We've got to get that oil price down. It will happen.
(32:32):
I don't know when. It went up a bit today.
So that's the story of the economy. I'm going to
give it a B, not an A, but a B.
Speaker 2 (32:42):
So how do we get that message across to people,
to the voters?
Speaker 7 (32:47):
I'm just pulling out my hair on that. You're the communicator.
You're the one who's supposed to tell us what the
message is because it is a strong company. By the way,
four years ago, you know what the inflation rate was?
Speaker 3 (32:59):
9%.
Speaker 7 (32:59):
9%, yeah. Now we're at 3.5%. People are unhappy. And look,
we have to get inflation down below 2%. The new
Fed chairman, Kevin Warsh, is fantastic. He's going to be
a superstar. He will bring the inflation rate down. But
until it comes down, people are going to still be
angry because groceries cost a lot. Before I came on
(33:21):
the show, I did some grocery shopping for my wife
and me. I just bought a few things for $ 100.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
But I will say that groceries are still less than
they were under Biden. Because eggs were $ 5.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
$ 5 a dozen.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
But I think the American people have the retention of
a three-month-old golden retriever puppy that just saw a ball, right?
Speaker 2 (33:43):
They're like, woo-hoo, ball, and off they go.
Speaker 7 (33:44):
Right?
Speaker 2 (33:45):
Right. They don't remember anything.
Speaker 3 (33:48):
So I think the only thing people really talk about
is gas prices. No one goes into work and talks
about the jobs report. Like this just doesn't happen where
you work.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
They do.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
But most normal people, that's just not how they talk.
But they do talk about what you just talked about,
which is the price of gas.
Speaker 7 (34:04):
Well, the other thing is, Mary, that you know this
because you've been in this game a long time. You
could ask, we could have the Garden of Eden economy,
and half the people would say they hate it.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Why?
Speaker 7 (34:13):
Because they don't like Trump, right?
Speaker 5 (34:14):
Right.
Speaker 7 (34:15):
So that's part of the problem with these, you know,
if you're starting with 50% people against you, no matter
what happens, now even some Republicans are saying they're not
happy with things. But there's a total divide in how
Republicans look at the world today and how Democrats look
at the world. Unless you're a Democrat socialist, you're in
the wrong, you know, Democrat party. You've been taken over
(34:35):
by these people who believe that the solution to all
the problems is to get rid of the Supreme Court
and the United States Senate.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
Of course.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
Steve, I don't mean to cut you off, but we've
got to run. We're up against the clock, my friend.
Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it.
Tell your wonderful wife I said hello.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Don't go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
We've got more coming up on The Jesse Kelly Show.
This is The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Hey, welcome back.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
If you're just joining us, I am Mary Walter, sitting
in for a vacationing Jesse Kelly. You know, they let
him take some time off every now and then. You know,
a couple times.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And that's good. I'm glad.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
And thank you for allowing me to be here with you.
Coming up later in the show, Stephen Moore will be
joining us. We're going to talk about this program that
I want to discuss with you right now. And if
you could get cuts 15 to 17.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Ready, great.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
So, because there's been a lot of discussion about this today,
I have very, very mixed emotions. And you are allowed
to join me here. That's why I want to bring
it up without our guests. I want to bring up
the cuts and everything and have a conversation before he
joins us.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
877-377-4373.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Super easy number.
Speaker 5 (00:58):
877-377-4373.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
Three, seven, seven 43 73, or you go to X
tag me in a post on X at Mary Walter radio.
And I will do my best to, um, to multitask
and read your, your comments at, at the same time.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Let's see.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Not somebody else.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
All right.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
I have a lot of, a lot of comments coming
in and thank you for everyone who's following me. I
try to, I try to do my best to follow back,
but a lot of times it gets past me. So
I apologize if I don't get you right now, I'll
try to get you the next time I see a
comment from you.
Speaker 6 (01:31):
All right.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
So the Trump administration has drafted a proposal that would
pay some stay at home parents using funds from a
federal program that was originally designed to help working families
afford childcare. It's called the stay at home parent childcare
subsidy proposal. And it was actually started under the Clinton
administration to help low income and working class families pay
(01:52):
for childcare.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
The program currently provides about 9,000 per child annually. Now
this is In addition to the $ 3, 000 tax credit that
they get for having had a kid, right? So that's
on top of that with funds that are typically paid
directly to the childcare providers. So, cause usually it's a
single mom, right?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
She's got to work.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
So there is no one to watch the kids. So she,
she gets her $ 9, 000 per.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Child to pay for childcare.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
So that money goes from, um, goes from the government
and it's paid directly to the childcare provider.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
And hopefully it's not the Learing Center.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
So that part of this bothers me because I see
a lot of room for fraud here. Now, the funding
would come, this expanded benefit. So the New York Times
reported that the plan would create what could become the
first federal grant program to directly compensate parents for staying
(02:51):
home to raise their children. Now the proposed benefit will
only apply to married couples. So they're trying to incentivize
getting married in order to have children, as opposed to
when you have someone in the home. the way their
income is calculated, you wind up not qualifying for some
(03:15):
of these things.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And I do believe there is a gap.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
There is a gap that when someone starts working and
they start to get themselves going in the right direction
or they get married, which we want, we want children
to go up in homes with people who are married.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I'm 100% behind that.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Because if you don't, you're little valedictorians running around outside
dressed in black block and swarming a 7-Eleven and destroying it.
So I think that having two parents at home, you're
much less likely to have your child's name on the
11 o'clock news.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
So I think it's a good thing. I just don't
know if we're going about it the right way. But
we had programs in the past that.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Disincentivized it and incentivized this, you know, having kids without
a father in the home.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
And that's backfired on us bigly.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
All right, so as I said, the funding would come
from the Child Care and Development Fund that was created
during the Clinton administration to help the low-income and working-class people. Okay,
under this proposal, eligible stay-at-home parents could receive payments directly
from the government. Now, to qualify, families have to meet
a couple of requirements.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
You have to be married.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
You have to have one spouse working at least 35
hours per week. Have the other spouse stay home to
care for the children. you have to meet income requirements
which vary by state. Unmarried couples with a stay-at-home parent
do not qualify, nor do single parents who are not employed.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Hallelujah.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Now, the National Women's Law Center, Amy Matsui works there,
and she warned that expanding eligibility without increasing funds could
create more competition for.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Already limited sources.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yes, If you're going to start giving this pot of
money that Congress has appropriated for this program, for this purpose,
and you're going to put a whole bunch of other
people on it, they're not all going to be getting
$ 9, 000 anymore.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
There's not enough money.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
I'm terrible at math. Terrible at math. I tell my
husband all the time, I'm math blind.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
It's a disability.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
But even I can look at this and go, well,
that just isn't going to work. You can't double the
number of people, maybe triple the number of people on
that program taking money out of the same pot without
expanding the pot. This is going to cost me more money.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Not happy.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
She said, even if we doubled the amount of child
care funding for CCDF, that would not be enough to
serve all the families who need child care. Now, supporters
of the proposal argue that stay-at-home parents should receive comparable
support to families that you subsidize childcare services.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
I'm sorry. No one told you you had to have children.
I'm glad you want to have children. That's awesome.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
But if you don't make enough money to have three kids,
then you don't have three kids. I don't think the
government should be paying you to make that dream come true.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
I just don't.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
You know, I, I, I, I don't like this idea
of using tax and our money to incentivize behavior. Instead
of incentivizing it, maybe we should make making the wrong
decision painful. Maybe that's what should hurt instead of the other.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And people are like, well, the children.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
I'm like, look, there's going to be one generation that's
going to have to go through something really hard. They're
going to have to go through something really hard and
learn a really hard lesson for this society to right
itself and come out on the other side and say, huh,
having children with several different men and not without the
benefit of marriage wasn't a really good idea.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
And that's just going to wait. It's have to be.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
You can disagree with me, 877-377-4373, or tag me in
a post on X at Mary Walter Radio. Yitzhak Didi said,
think about two parents in the home. The amount of
daycare money, trouble, and raising the little thugs would be
reduced greatly.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
No issue with that. Yeah, I just don't know if
I should be paying for it. I pay for everything. Plus,
they get $ 3, 000 for each little urchin they have on
their tax credits, and they probably get tax reimbursements on
taxes they don't even pay. What do I get? I
get nothing. I get nothing. I live in the People's
(07:31):
Socialist Republic of New Jersey, and I love it here.
I love this place.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
When my grandparents came to America, they settled in New Jersey.
When my great-grandparents on my mother's side came to America,
they settled in New Jersey. I love this state. I
think it's a fantastic state. However, my property taxes are
$ 20, 000 a year. And I live in a 150-year-old home
(08:00):
that needs a lot of work. It's a constant. It's
like owning a boat. It's just a hole that I
put money.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Into. $ 20, 000 a year.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Why?
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Why?
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Should I say, yes, tax me some more? I don't care.
All right.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
And I have some opinions from other people coming up
here to share with you. 877-377- 43 73 let's head
to maryland al welcome you are on the jesse kelly
show al how you doing.
Speaker 6 (08:35):
Mary it is so good i'm doing great it's so
good to hear your voice i listened to you for
some years um i won't mention the station out of
a station in dc and you i i loved every
minute of all your shows you were fabulous and then
one day you weren't there and i've been mourning ever
since um i'm just glad to hear you on the
(08:55):
air Where can I catch you regularly? Because I intend
to do it.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Well, actually, I will be on Newsmax TV tomorrow morning
at 7.05 a.m.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Eastern Time. I am all over Newsmax.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
All right.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And I do fill in on radio stations all over
the country.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
And I have a podcast on Tuesday evenings, not tonight,
because it starts at 7.15 Eastern Time.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
So that would be right now.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Um, so it won't be tonight, but it is live
on YouTube and rumble and getter. And I have all
sorts of guests that are political, not political names. You
will know Al, uh, and, and then the audio is
available on Apple podcast, Spotify, and speaker easiest way. Follow
me on Facebook at Mary Walter radio, or follow me
on X at Mary Walter radio. And I always put
up notices about where I'm going to be and when.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
That's fabulous. And by the way, you didn't pay me
to make this call. This was not a paid call.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
No, it's not. It really truly is not. But thank
you so much, Al. That's so sweet. I appreciate it.
Speaker 6 (09:54):
You're fantastic. I love hearing your voice again. Thank you.
And on a substantive point, your discussions about the sort
of built independence, independence, not independence, the built independency that
we have created in this country, of course, it goes
(10:15):
way back, as you know. You've alluded to that. And
when I was in law school in the Stone Ages,
I graduated in 1975 from law school. And one of
the courses I took was called social justice law. And
even then they were, you know, stupid.
Speaker 7 (10:32):
And I took it.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
It was actually a really interesting course. And I remember
debating in class the efficacy of the Civil Rights Act.
And remember the shoes under the bed law, you know,
if there was a man in the house. You know,
they couldn't get, they couldn't get what, so that what
happened then is marriages fell apart. Men didn't marry the
(10:55):
women that they impregnated. And the thing has gotten a
hundred times worse than it, than it was before. And
we've ended up with the same poverty rates that we
had before the Civil Rights Act. So, or maybe worse.
And you've always, you know, you've had a beam on that.
And I heard you talking about it just five minutes ago.
You were dead right. I'm 76 years old, been around
(11:20):
a long time, and watched this happen both professionally and personally.
And I'll leave you with this one last thing, because
I don't think all hope is lost. I was with
my son earlier today talking about exactly this kind of stuff.
And my son is 35. He went to college, but
after two years, he said, this is stupid. I'm not
(11:41):
learning anything that's going to get me a job. So
he now has a a, a good job with, um,
he's got a public sector job with, um, one of
the beach towns in Maryland. Again, I won't, I won't
mention the town. Um, and he said, you know, quickly,
I got this job because this, this, it's a real job.
And if, you know, it's, I didn't go to college,
(12:02):
get a degree for four years and then drive a truck.
I've got a real job because I learned some skills
and he's appalled at what he sees from his generation.
He's 35 and he, He doesn't understand. He even said,
why are they socialist Democrats? And I went into a
long rant that I'll spare you with.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah, we've got to run anyway. Al, I don't mean
to be rude to you.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
You're so sweet, but thank you so much for your call.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
And thank you. It was very kind of you.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
All right, we've got more calls coming up. You're listening
to The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
This is a free choice. It's America after all. But
because some public policy has disincentivized marriage and birth, at
least 13 disincentives in some of our safety net programs
for those two things, you eliminate those and then maybe
use some of that money to do the opposite, to
incentivize marriage and birth. And then you're saying this is
still America. You make your choice. And I believe that
(12:57):
there are enough Americans who want to do this if
you look at public opinion surveys. that will benefit from
these policies. My guess is that you'll get a much
more receptive audience amongst Republicans than you will amongst Democrats.
Speaker 6 (13:08):
That's correct.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I don't mean to malign.
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Anybody here, but that's the way the cookie crumbles at
this moment, it seems like.
Speaker 6 (13:14):
No, that's right.
Speaker 5 (13:15):
My friend Tim Carney, who works in Washington, D.C., a
great social science scholar, talks about places with high social capital.
There are some places like Bethesda, Maryland, that are predominantly
left of center, where you actually have Very high marriage
and birth rates. But those, to your point, Stuart, are
few and far between. Ultimately, that would be great, right?
Because we get to the middle part of this century
and conservatively minded people are having more kids. I like
(13:38):
the effect on public policy from that.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
That was Kevin Roberts.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
He is the president of the Heritage Foundation, and he
was on with Stuart Varney there talking about he likes this.
He thinks this is great and incentivizes marriage and having babies.
I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I'm a
big fan of marriage.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
I've been married for a really long time. Love you, honey.
I've been married for a really long time. So it's fine.
That's okay. I just have a problem with marriage.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
With government picking winners and losers, and I'm going to let,
I cut 16 here, I'm going to let Lawrence Jones
on Fox News kind of say my piece for me here.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Here's Lawrence Jones.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Definitely a political winner. I see what the president is doing,
but I think it's a terrible idea. The socialism, just
give me the money. Just give me more of my money.
Speaker 4 (14:30):
I don't want any of these programs.
Speaker 8 (14:32):
You want just a tax, like lower my taxes.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Just lower my taxes. I don't want all these programs. Again,
I understand that this is a political winner, In this
new age of populism. But the government consistently choosing who
they are going to give these tax benefits instead of
just giving us the money. And if you want that
money to pay for lower child care, then you can
(14:58):
use that money for that. But, for example, I would
not fall in this category. I'm definitely going to pay
for it. But I wouldn't fall in this category at
this point in my life.
Speaker 8 (15:07):
But you're paying for that pot of money anyway.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
It's fungible.
Speaker 8 (15:11):
No, but you're paying, no, I'm talking about the money
set aside to pay for childcare is going right now
to daycare centers and to women who are unmarried. And
it incentivizes people not to get married in order to
get this money. And now this says, no, if you're
(15:31):
an at-home mom, you're working, too, and you're going to
get a piece of that money, too.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I think it really sends.
Speaker 8 (15:38):
A powerful philosophical message that, one, we want to encourage
marriage because that's good for kids. And we want to
encourage kids to be home with their parents, home with
their moms, which is also great for society.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
In principle, yes.
Speaker 8 (15:53):
I thought you said you weren't a libertarian anymore.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
It's not even about being a libertarian. It's just a
basic conservative philosophy. It's like instead of the government choosing
what money and what you should do, just give me
my money and not decide which different sectors they want
to support.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Just give me my money.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
I'm a big fan of just saying, this is how
much you're going to pay in taxes. We need to
revamp the tax code, period. And I know President Trump
wanted to do that. It's not going to happen because
tax accountants and too many lobbyists, it's just never going
to happen. The tax code being ridiculously complicated is the
way they want it. And also, politicians can't buy votes
(16:40):
with your money if, you know, they're.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
You know exactly how much you're supposed to pay.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
If everybody's treated the same, they use your money to
buy votes from specific groups. And some groups are more
favored than others. If you are married and don't have
kids and work really.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Hard, you are screwed. You're not getting anything.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
You're just going to keep paying and paying and paying.
And for Rachel there to sit there, Rachel Campos Duffy,
you heard her there, to sit there and say that,
but it's all coming out of the same pot.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
The pot of money is already there. That's such, that's.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
So disingenuous because there's going to be far more people
than there is money and everybody's going to be getting
a dollar. It's not going to pay for healthcare. It's
not going to help with childcare. It's going to become
a joke. And then what are they going to.
Speaker 6 (17:26):
Have to do?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
They're going to have to appropriate more money.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
And it's going to grow and grow and grow and
grow and grow like every other government program grows and
grows and grows and grows and grows.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
All right.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Coming up to talk about this, Steve Moore will be
joining us. He will be coming up next year on
The Jesse Kelly Show.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
Jesse Kelly.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Welcome back to The Jesse Kelly Show. I'm Mary Walter
sitting in for Jesse. Tomorrow, Kelly Nash is in and
then Jesse is back.
Speaker 7 (17:54):
All right.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Joining us now, Stephen Moore.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
What a great guy. He's the co-founder of the Committee
to Unleash Prosperity. He's the host of More Money.
Speaker 6 (18:01):
Get it? More Money.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
He is a writer for the Wall Street Journal and
a founder of the Club for Growth. Also the author
of Trump Economic Miracle. Stephen, thank you so much for
joining me.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Great to have you. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (18:13):
Hey, Barry.
Speaker 7 (18:15):
It's so great to hear your voice. Great to be
with you. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
All right. So I want you to unravel this for us.
So the stay at home parent child subsidy proposal coming
out of the white house will, um, will reward people
for being married, having one spouse working at least 35
hours a week, having the other spouse stay at home
to care for the children. And they have to meet
income requirements, which vary by state. Now, me personally, I
(18:40):
just see another leering center here. We're going to have 10,000,
just like we had 10,000 Medicare offices. We're going to
have 10,000, you know, people who are, who are quote
unquote married. And, um, And there'll be no checking to
see if they're married. It'll be like your voting status.
Feel free to register. No one's going to check.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
And they say that it's $ 9, 000. Well, that's what it
is now.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
But once you add all these married people into this,
everybody's going to be getting two bucks. So I don't
see how this works without increasing the amount of money
in this pot. And then it just grows and grows
and grows and grows. What is your take on this?
Speaker 7 (19:15):
Well, it's a tough one for me. I mean, I
think I was listening intently to what you were saying
because I'm still trying to make my mind up my
mind on it. You know, it's complicated because we give all.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
These subsidies for daycare and for, you know, two parent families,
you know, that have a daycare or child care subsidy
or rewarding.
Speaker 6 (19:39):
Mothers for working.
Speaker 7 (19:39):
And by the way, I don't want to sound like
a sexist.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
I'm not against mothers working and I'm not against mothers
not taking care of their kids.
Speaker 7 (19:46):
It's up to the woman.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
But I do worry that this is the sort of
nanny state, and the government is stepping in and kind
of putting their thumb on the scale about whether women
work or stay at home. We're also running a massive
$ 2 trillion a year deficit. It's not like we have
money to throw around.
Speaker 6 (20:03):
So I'm kind of.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
On the fence on this one. What about you?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
I don't like it.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I just don't like the fact that there's so much
fraud in all of our programs that if we got
rid of the fraud, people would have more money in
their pockets to begin with.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Right.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
I don't like like just growing another program. I don't
like it. I don't like politicians using.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Money to buy my vote. I just, like you said,
it's a nanny state. Instead of trying to incentivize people
to get married, how about we disincentivize having children without
two people in the home, right?
Speaker 2 (20:38):
How about we.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Disincentivize behavior instead of incentivizing behavior that the government wants
us to have? And I don't think there's anything wrong
with incentivizing marriage and having children.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
I think that that's great.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
We need more taxpayers because, um, you know, I'm not
going to get Medicare or social security and I'm a
little annoyed at that. So please start popping out babies
to pay for it. But, um, I think ultimately in
the end, the whole tax system needs to be revamped
and I know that's never going to happen, but the
whole tax system needs to be revamped. Everybody has to
have skin in the game, give the money back to
the people. Well, start charging us less to begin with
(21:12):
so that hopefully it's a, it's a net sum game. And, um,
instead of, cause they're going to have to increase the
money on this.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
I don't like it. So no, I don't like it
at all. Can you tell? Oh, we lost him.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
Oh, the end of an epic rant and we lose him.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Oh, oh, timing's everything. Well, I'm in good company.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Cause Mark Levin, Put on X, he said, how the
hell do Republicans and pseudo conservatives propose more government programs
when a 40 trillion dollar debt is hanging over us
and future generations soon to be 50 trillion? Social Security
is going broke in six short years. Medicare is going
broke in seven short years and we need to increase
defense spending. Who do these Republicans and pseudo conservatives think
(22:00):
is going to.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Pay for all this?
Speaker 3 (22:01):
They act like they've come up with some kind of
magical program for families, when in fact they are contributing
to what would be an unspeakable financial collapse on the
head of every family in this country.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Where are their priorities? Where is their focus?
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Socialism light is nothing new. Government spending is nothing new.
More debt is nothing new. They go on and on
about rhinos, but that's exactly what they are, if not worse.
And they think they've stumbled upon a new ideology. Let
me put it in simple terms. You don't create new
entitlement programs when existing entitlement programs are tanking and the
debt threatens to crash the economic system in the not-too-distant future.
(22:38):
How does any of this help working people, the middle-class families,
or anyone else?
Speaker 2 (22:44):
It's a great question. How does it help them? Chris Lash,
Dana Lash's husband, posted this.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
If $ 9, 000 is the thing that is going to let
moms stay at home and for families to have more children,
then make it a $ 9, 000 tax credit. If you want
them to have $ 9, 000, then the government shouldn't take the
$ 9, 000 from them to start with.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Exactly.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Because they take it, they put it through all of
the government hands, and then it goes away.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
And then you're giving back $ 9, 000. Just let them keep
it in a tax credit. Why not? All right, Steve
is back. Steve, that was an epic rant, and we
lost you.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
And I was really– I was in my groove, so
I'm a little disappointed that we lost you.
Speaker 7 (23:27):
A little bit about what you said. I lost some
cell coverage there, so sorry about that. But, you know, look,
this is a tough call. I don't like the government
playing the role of, you know, intervening in, you know, families. Look,
I'm all for– you know, my– wife stayed home, took
care of the kids. And, you know, we were fortunate
that we had the opportunity to do that. It's a
(23:48):
financial sacrifice, right? If the mother stays at home and
I get that. So I just think that the government
should stay out of these issues and it should be
up to the family and the parents themselves.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Yeah, I agree with that.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
But what about a tax credit instead of collecting the
money from them, right? Which they're not paying into it anyway.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
They're not.
Speaker 3 (24:11):
But just give them a tax credit, because my money
is paying for this, obviously, because I pay for everybody.
I pay for everyone. And it goes into the government.
It passes through 10,000 hands, and it's got to be processed,
and all those people have to be paid. So that
$ 9, 000 that they started out with to give them, in actuality,
is like three, and you've got to get the money
from somewhere else to make up for it.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
So just give them tax credits. Why does it always
have to be a check or a deposit?
Speaker 7 (24:34):
Yeah, well, I don't even like tax credits. I mean, look,
I'm a flat tax guy, Mary. Yes. You and I
don't owe you for 25 years, so... I always believe
get all the credit, all the deductions, all the loopholes,
all the special interest provisions. Have one flat rate of 18%.
Everybody pays it. But you get one deduction, and that's
for your children. And so if you have four kids,
(24:56):
you get whatever the number is, $ 7, 000 deduction per kid.
Don't make it so complicated. I don't like using the
tax code for social policy. But this is also tied
to another issue that I find troubling as an economist
and just as an American, which is we have record
low birth rates now for young women. And that is
(25:19):
a problem. We're going to be soon facing negative population growth.
And this is a problem that has plagued Europe, China, Japan. Remember,
people worried about China overpopulating the world.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Right.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
I don't know.
Speaker 7 (25:31):
I don't understand why we're seeing lower marriage rates and
lower birth rates. I think it's a problem for our society.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
It is, but you know what? This isn't going to
fix that because it's cultural. It's societal, right? It's societal.
It's cultural. Right, it's cultural, 100%.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
We decided to raise up little girls back in like
the 80s, right? And we did that by pushing down
little boys and telling them that it's toxic masculinity and
all that stuff. And now we have more young ladies
going to college, more young ladies graduating from college. And
they don't want to marry someone who doesn't make as
much money as they do because that part of the
old culture still exists there, right? Right.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
Right.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
So they don't want any part of that.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
And you have an entire generation of young men who
are directionless.
Speaker 4 (26:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
They don't have jobs. They're sitting at home. They got nothing.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
And we kind of really failed them.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
So you could throw as much money as you want
for people to get married. It's not going to change
this dynamic, I don't think.
Speaker 7 (26:30):
Yeah, you also hit your nail on the head on
this one. I mean, there was just a piece in
The Washington Times, which was very troubling, about double the
number of young males that are not working and, B,
not getting married. And if they're not working, they're not management, right?
I mean, so this is a big problem. But here,
(26:50):
I have a question for you, Mary. I've been waiting
to do this interview. And so we had something in
our hotline. You get our hotline in the morning, don't you?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
I do not.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
You don't need to put me on.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
I think I asked you the last time.
Speaker 7 (27:02):
I want every one of your listeners to go to UnleashedPosperity.com,
sign up for the hotline. It's absolutely free. Mary, do
this as soon as this show is over. And I'll
sign you up. But we had an item today. It
was a 2025 poll, and it asked 1,000 women, do
you blame men for your problems? And here's what was
(27:23):
so interesting about the subject, the outcome. Who do you
think was more likely to think that men were the
source of their problems, Republican women or Democratic women?
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I'm going to go Democrat with the under 30 crowd.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
By two to one. By two to one.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Boom!
Speaker 7 (27:42):
By two to one, 60% of Democratic women say they
blame them for their problems. Only 30 percent of Republican
women do. That's an interesting statistic.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Well, because I think there's also a study that was
out and I have it somewhere here on my desk.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I don't know where it is.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
But the under 30 women overwhelmingly don't don't just don't
like men.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
They don't like men.
Speaker 7 (28:03):
They're men haters. They're men haters.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
Absolutely. And then they make videos. I see that, by.
Speaker 7 (28:08):
The way, in some of my relatives.
Speaker 5 (28:10):
I see it.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
Yeah, and then they make videos sitting in their car
crying because they can't find an alpha male, right?
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I want someone who's going to, and I'm like, you're
looking for a white rhino. It doesn't exist.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
You want someone who's going to stand in an abortion
protest with you, but also drive a Ford F-150 and,
you know, be the sole provider for you and pay
all your bills. Like, that animal doesn't exist. Yeah.
Speaker 7 (28:34):
Well, we also had an item in our hotline the
other day about how, you know which the hottest schools
in the country are and what region they are?
Speaker 4 (28:43):
Uh, colleges, colleges, South.
Speaker 7 (28:46):
Yep. South, the Southeast, the old Southeast conference. When I
graduated from college, you know, those were like the safety schools.
Now those are hurts, you know, Mississippi, Vanderbilt, Tennessee, Florida, uh,
LSU because, uh, and one of my speculations is these
schools are fun. You know, you weren't learned, but you're fun.
And you know what? The girls dress up as girls,
not men.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Very true. That is, that is very, very true. Steve,
our Villanova's not on there, though, so that's all I'm
going to say.
Speaker 7 (29:15):
Oh, you know, my son went to Villanova.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
I know.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
That's why I said it.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (29:18):
Because I went to Villanova.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
We had an entire conversation about this.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
Oh, you know what?
Speaker 7 (29:23):
I've completely forgotten about that, but it was a great school.
He got a great education, met a lot of great people.
He has friends for life from Villanova.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Absolutely. We've got to run. Thank you so much, my friend.
Speaker 7 (29:33):
Now we're just getting started here.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
I know.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Well, they're yelling at me to get rid of them
to let you go, unless you want to stay, and
you can stay over to the other side, and we
can talk about.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
The jobs report, but that's up to you.
Speaker 7 (29:44):
I'll do it. I'm having fun with you.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Hang on then. Hang on. All right. More coming up
with Steve Moore on The Jesse Kelly Show. I'm Mary Walter.
Speaker 3 (29:53):
And for Jesse Kelly here, our guest Stephen Moore is
the co-founder of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, the host
of More Money, a writer for The Wall Street Journal
and co-founder of the Club for Growth. He also wrote
The Trump Economic Miracle. And go to UnleashProsperity.com. Sign up
for their newsletter, which, by the way, Mr. Moore, last
time I spoke to you, you told me you were
(30:13):
going to sign me up for it.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
So that's all I'm going to say.
Speaker 7 (30:15):
You have to text me your email so I have that.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
You do have my email. I'll send it to you again.
Speaker 7 (30:21):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
It's okay. I'll just go sign.
Speaker 6 (30:23):
Up for it.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
No big deal.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
All right.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
So let's talk about jobs. You were kind enough to
stay for another segment. I love that. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
So Scott Besant, who, by the way, can we run
Scott Besant for president? I love this man. And I'm
kind of fangirling a little bit over Scott Besant. Because
he just says, like, isn't he so smart that he
runs circles around people and they don't even know what
happened to them, which is fantastic. Now, he said that
(30:52):
Americans are not paying enough attention to the acceleration of
business formation. in the U S and he said, as
part of Trump's, you know, pro growth policies. And we
know there's a lot of things that are in place
to bring manufacturing back into this country and, and, um,
investments that are being made by foreign countries.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
However, that's not something people talk about at the dinner table.
It's just not.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
So is that why people are so sour on the economy?
And president Trump has what negative 57% among Republicans on
the economy.
Speaker 4 (31:23):
Is that why?
Speaker 7 (31:24):
So, I mean, I think there are a couple. First
of all, it's a strong economy. It's not a great economy.
It's a good economy. Because people are still angry about
high prices.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
I am.
Speaker 7 (31:34):
I just paid $ 4. 25 a gallon to fill up, so
I don't like doing that. But we are by far
the best economy in the world. So every other country
in the world would trade places with the United States
in a second. China would, Japan would, Europe would, the U.K. would,
Canada would. We are by far the best economy. We
have the best businesses, the most productive. We've got the
best stock market. I know the stock market is in
(31:56):
the economy, but we have very profitable and productive businesses.
We now have more job openings, Mary, than we have
people looking for jobs.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
We know a bunch of young men who could fill
those jobs.
Speaker 7 (32:11):
Exactly. So the problem has been four or five months ago,
we had the situation in Iran. The oil price went
way up and When oil prices go up, everything else
goes up in price. And so that's why people are angry,
because of high gas prices, which leads to high food prices, transportation, manufacturing.
We've got to get that oil price down. It will happen.
(32:32):
I don't know when. It went up a bit today.
So that's the story of the economy. I'm going to
give it a B, not an A, but a B.
Speaker 2 (32:42):
So how do we get that message across to people,
to the voters?
Speaker 7 (32:47):
I'm just pulling out my hair on that. You're the communicator.
You're the one who's supposed to tell us what the
message is because it is a strong company. By the way,
four years ago, you know what the inflation rate was?
Speaker 3 (32:59):
9%.
Speaker 7 (32:59):
9%, yeah. Now we're at 3.5%. People are unhappy. And look,
we have to get inflation down below 2%. The new
Fed chairman, Kevin Warsh, is fantastic. He's going to be
a superstar. He will bring the inflation rate down. But
until it comes down, people are going to still be
angry because groceries cost a lot. Before I came on
(33:21):
the show, I did some grocery shopping for my wife
and me. I just bought a few things for $ 100.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
But I will say that groceries are still less than
they were under Biden. Because eggs were $ 5.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
$ 5 a dozen.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
But I think the American people have the retention of
a three-month-old golden retriever puppy that just saw a ball, right?
Speaker 2 (33:43):
They're like, woo-hoo, ball, and off they go.
Speaker 7 (33:44):
Right?
Speaker 2 (33:45):
Right. They don't remember anything.
Speaker 3 (33:48):
So I think the only thing people really talk about
is gas prices. No one goes into work and talks
about the jobs report. Like this just doesn't happen where
you work.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
They do.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
But most normal people, that's just not how they talk.
But they do talk about what you just talked about,
which is the price of gas.
Speaker 7 (34:04):
Well, the other thing is, Mary, that you know this
because you've been in this game a long time. You
could ask, we could have the Garden of Eden economy,
and half the people would say they hate it.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Why?
Speaker 7 (34:13):
Because they don't like Trump, right?
Speaker 5 (34:14):
Right.
Speaker 7 (34:15):
So that's part of the problem with these, you know,
if you're starting with 50% people against you, no matter
what happens, now even some Republicans are saying they're not
happy with things. But there's a total divide in how
Republicans look at the world today and how Democrats look
at the world. Unless you're a Democrat socialist, you're in
the wrong, you know, Democrat party. You've been taken over
(34:35):
by these people who believe that the solution to all
the problems is to get rid of the Supreme Court
and the United States Senate.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
Of course.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
Steve, I don't mean to cut you off, but we've
got to run. We're up against the clock, my friend.
Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it.
Tell your wonderful wife I said hello.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Don't go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
We've got more coming up on The Jesse Kelly Show.
Host
Jesse Kelly
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