Child Care: The time has come to bring this one home for families
By Joan Lombardi, Ph.D.
1971 was the year I started my first job. It was the year that featured movies like Clockwork Orange and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It was the year the first e-mail was sent, the year Elon Musk was born and the year President Nixon vetoed the Comprehensive Child Development Act, setting public financing of child care in the United States back for years to come.
Women were expected to stay home full time, but most did not. The decades passed: 1981, 1991, 2001, 2011… The need for child care grew. The debate about the role of public support for child care continued. Yet despite some legislative action over the years, the vast majority of families were still left on their own to cover increasing costs.
Families were forced to use an old path when their lives needed a highway.
The facts piled up:
In 40 states and the District of Colombia, the annual price of child care for two children exceeds annual mortgage payments for homeowners.
83% of parents with children under 5 say that finding affordable child care is a challenge.
The medium annual income of child care providers before the pandemic was only $24,230, around $11.65 per hour.
Then the pandemic hit.
Families were forced to leave work as schools and child care closed. The realities that parents need public support for child care came into focus. Temporary funding was provided, but the need for child care financing is not temporary. Caregivers were called essential but their paychecks do not show it. Benefits for child care providers remain sporadic despite the growing health risks.
The voices of families and caregivers are more important than ever. Thousands of parents responding to the RAPID-EC national survey of households with children under age 5, conducted by the University of Oregon since the beginning of the pandemic, have shared their personal reflections on the importance of child care in their lives and the lives of their children. As one parent simple put it: Our biggest concerns are paying our rent and getting child care while we are working.
The children of 1971 are now all grown up; they have children and even grandchildren of their own. Fifty years is long enough to wait. Parents need time off, they need good jobs that pay adequate wages, they need social and economic supports, and they need quality child care. They need this endless debate to stop. In order to return to work parents need a place where their children can learn and thrive. This should not be an American dream, but an American reality.
It is summer and baseball is back. We’ve played a full nine innings and the score is tied. Proposals to build a stronger child care system have emerged with the potential for real change. We are moving into extra innings, and it is time to rally. It is time to bring this one home for families once and for all.
Joan Lombardi, Ph.D. served as the first Director of the Child Care Bureau launched in l995 (now the Office on Child Care) and is the author of Time to Care: Redesigning Child Care to Promote Education, Support Families and Build Communities (Temple University Press, 2003). She Chairs the National Advisory Team for the RAPID-EC national survey.
Sources
The US and the High Price of Child Care An Examination of A Broken System, 2019 Report, Child Care Aware of America
Affordable Child Care and Early Learning for All Families, A National Public Opinion Study, Center for American Progress, September 2018
The Early Childhood Workforce Index 2020, Center for the Study of the Child Care Employment