Federal legislation has stalled, so states are stepping in. In some places, that could mean looser regulations, like 16-year-olds caring for children, without supervision.
Tag Archives: Child Care
Working Mothers, Punished by Pandemic, Mostly Kept Working
When it came to who lost jobs, education mattered much more than gender, a broad new analysis found.
If Roe Is Overturned, Where Should the Pro-Life Movement Go Next?
“Now is not the time to brag or gloat or celebrate. Now is the time to get to work.”
What It Takes to Get America’s Moms What We Need
This Mother’s Day, think about how far we have to go — and remember how far we’ve come.
Some Care Workers Are Seeing a Bump in Pay. They’re Working to Make It Last.
Care workers are organizing for better work conditions and to keep pandemic gains going.
The Ukrainian Refugee Crisis Is a Women’s Crisis
A wave of displaced women and children into Poland is forcing the country to address its lack of protections for working women.
Parents Who Stay Home Should Get Public Child Care Support Too
Is being in the formal workplace necessarily a sign of progress?
Child Care: Where Republicans and Democrats Agree and Differ
In a new bill, Republican senators adopted many of the Democrats’ goals, but they remain far apart on elements like how to pay for it.
New York Toughens Bail Law in $220 Billion Budget Agreement
Gov. Kathy Hochul’s first budget also includes more than a billion dollars in child care funding, a green light for three casinos and a return of to-go drinks.
New York Is About to Blow Its Budget Deadline. Here’s Why.
Contentious social issues, such as revising the state’s bail law, have delayed passage of what is expected to be largest budget in the state’s history.
The Nuclear Family Is No Longer the Norm. Good.
Our society is making room for different family structures.
Child Care: New York’s Next Big-Ticket Budget Priority
Gov. Kathy Hochul and the State Legislature have plans to significantly increase spending on child care and to make more families eligible for subsidies.
Parents, What Would Make Your Lives Better?
Two years into the pandemic, what still needs fixing?
How to Fix Child Care Before the Next Pandemic Wave
January was awful for parents and caregivers. We can do better.
How Parents With Young Children Are Coping With Work-Life Imbalance
Facing an uncontrolled surge of virus cases, parents of children under 5 are again forced to wrestle with child care crises as the rest of the world appears eager to move on.
American Families Are Drowning in Care Costs. Here’s How to Change That.
Ai-jen Poo on the economic potential of a public investment in child care, elder care and paid family leave.
Mississippi Asks: If Women Can Have It All, Is Roe Necessary?
One argument in the case before the Supreme Court is that the need for abortion rights has passed, because decades of progress have made it easier for women to balance work and family.
What’s in the $2.2 Trillion Social Policy and Climate Bill
The package includes $400 billion to bolster support for children and families, $555 billion for climate change programs and $166 billion in housing aid.
House Narrowly Passes Biden’s Social Safety Net and Climate Bill
The vote was months in the making for the roughly $2 trillion measure, one of the most consequential bills in decades. Now it faces a difficult path in the Senate.
The Manny Diaries
Chapter one: This job is hard. Chapter two: Leaving it is harder.
How Public Preschool Can Help, and How to Make Sure It Doesn’t Hurt
Congress is considering universal pre-K and subsidies for child care. Research shows how these policies can benefit children, and when they can backfire.
Facing Moderate Revolt, Democrats Put Social Policy Bill on Hold
Leaders pressed for a vote on a separate infrastructure bill, but the fate of both measures was in doubt amid party divisions, despite pleas from President Biden.
Why Paid Family Leave’s Demise This Time Could Fuel It Later
In failing to secure a benefit with bipartisan appeal, President Biden joins a long line of frustrated politicians. But some Republicans say it could be resurrected on its own.
What if It Never Gets Easier to Be a Working Parent?
The shock of the pandemic threw care taking arrangements into disarray. Many families find themselves back in the same precarious arrangement they had before, with the burden still on mothers.
What the Democrats’ Plan Would Do for Parents
Paid family leave was dropped. Public pre-K and subsidized child care remain, and could substantially lower the cost of raising children.
Pre-K, Child Care and Other Priorities
Readers discuss the social programs in the budget bill and negotiations about what to trim. Also: Dave Chappelle; ride-sharing.
Why Is Raising a Child in the United States So Hard?
Family welfare policies never took off in the United States as they did in the rest of the wealthy world. Some Democrats think the country is ready.
‘History Will Not Be Kind to Senator Joe Manchin’
Readers criticize Mr. Manchin as someone putting his interests ahead of the country’s. Also: Racial equity in child care; a civil conversation; social media.
Of Four Family Policies in Democrats’ Bill, Which Is Most Important?
We asked 18 academics what they would choose if they could pick only one, as Senator Manchin has reportedly advised.
Is Child Care a Public Responsibility?
Democrats believe the system is broken — and they have a proposal for fixing it.
Joe Manchin’s Choices on Family Policy
How the conservative Democrat should be negotiating with his party.
Child Care Has High Costs for Parents, Low Wages for Staff
President Biden’s social policy legislation aims to address a problem that weighs on many families — and the teachers and child care centers serving them.
Benefits for All or Just the Needy? Manchin’s Demand Focuses Debate
As Democrats ponder cutting a $3.5 trillion social safety net bill down to perhaps $2 trillion, a proposal to limit programs to the poor has rekindled a debate on the meaning of government itself.
How Other Nations Pay for Child Care. The U.S. Is an Outlier.
Rich countries contribute an average of $14,000 per year for a toddler’s care, compared with $500 in the U.S. The Democrats’ spending bill tries to shrink the gap.
Why Hiring for Child Care Is a Huge Struggle
The Biden administration is trying to address a problem with private child care that has worsened during the pandemic.
‘Can’t Compete’: Why Hiring for Child Care Is a Huge Struggle
The Biden administration is trying to address a problem with private child care that has worsened during the pandemic.
Lessons on Child Care, From the Military
The military transformed what was once an underfunded, scattershot child care system into one of the best in the country. Some see it as a model to emulate.
It’s time for the VC community to stop overlooking the childcare industry
Square. Uber. Zillow. Airbnb. Besides being some of the biggest technology companies, what else do these titans have in common? They all operate in entrenched, highly fragmented, geographically localized and regulated industries. That means they required a lot of upfront venture capital investment to disrupt their respective markets. And the investment has paid off — these are now some of the most valuable companies in the world.
Venture capital alone hasn’t funded some of the largest companies. One of today’s most successful tech entrepreneurs was funded by massive infusions of investment from the federal government — Elon Musk received $4.9 billion in public subsidies for his companies, including SpaceX and Tesla. Moreover, government investment, via tax credits for electric vehicle purchases, made it more affordable for consumers to buy the green transportation they needed.
But one massive industry has not yet benefited from the large amounts of money that both venture capital and government can provide: Childcare. Families in the United States spend $136 billion on infant and child care every year, and the market is only growing. If you include school-age care and education for all children under 18, that number grows to $212 billion. In investor terms, the TAM (total addressable market) is huge.
To put things in perspective, one new company has raised more funding in 2021 than the entire childcare industry.
So where is the investment? Biden’s current compromise on an infrastructure plan does not include many provisions for childcare. Venture investment in this space is nascent and insufficient. In 2020, only $171 million was invested in care and early childhood education. The funding situation has improved in 2021, with $516 million invested in childcare, but it’s still just a tiny fraction of the $288 billion of venture capital invested so far this year.
To put that in perspective, a single new company has raised more funding in 2021 than the entire childcare industry.
Funding emerging childcare technology may require a lot of upfront capital. For starters, the industry is regulated and safety is and should remain a priority. Caring for and educating young children takes training, skill and love — it cannot be done by a computer.
But there are so many facets of the industry that are ripe for innovation. Parents sometimes take weeks to find a childcare provider that meets their needs. In some markets, there is not nearly enough supply (three children for every licensed slot) to meet the demand. Assessing quality, pricing and availability is challenging, and payments and business operations tools for the nation’s 300,000+ daycares are still often pen, paper and Excel spreadsheet affairs.
This industry just needs patient investors with long-term perspectives.
This is a great time to diversify investment portfolios and support relatively recession-proof companies meaningfully expanding access to childcare. COVID has finally started to bring this largely offline industry online. Parents are now willing to go digital for childcare decisions and providers are adopting new online technologies at a record pace. These tailwinds provide the perfect conditions for startups.
Solving this problem is a huge business opportunity that affects so much else. When the millions of parents with young children can’t find care, they can’t work. We saw this over and over again since the start of the pandemic. The average American family can spend up to 25% of their income on early childhood care, while the average care worker makes approximately $12 an hour.
Unlocking innovation here at scale will require public and private investment. Government shapes and enables markets, from the explosion of technology that followed from Kennedy’s investment in the space race to more recent fundamental investments in wind, solar and electric vehicles. NASA catalyzed dozens of new technologies in the 1960s because it had both a generous budget and the flexibility to work with the best private-sector contractors available to solve specific problems.
The revitalization of the childcare sector would benefit from an ambitious and galvanizing “moonshot” goal, like providing universal, free childcare for all Americans.
By collaborating with flexibility and creativity across the public and private sectors, we can achieve a basic shared goal that other democracies have already fulfilled — the accessible provision of high-quality childcare for all members of society.
Scoring Biden’s ‘Care Economy’ Plan
If human capital is an asset, how should Congress measure the payoff?
On Embracing Faith, or Rejecting It
Readers react to Ross Douthat’s invitation to “think yourself into” religious faith. Also: Working mothers; how to make friends.
No, the Unvaccinated Aren’t All Just Being Difficult
“Sometimes you have to make it too convenient so that people can’t say no.”
How Much Must I Give Up for My Schizophrenic Brother?
The magazine’s Ethicist columnist on weighing a sibling’s needs against your own — and more.
Do Falling Birthrates Spell Doom?
Americans are having fewer children, and some economists are raising alarm bells. A debate over how worried you should actually be.
How to Have the Hard Vaccination Conversations
Asking someone if they’ve had a Covid shot can be tricky. Here’s how to navigate the new norms of health disclosure.
Emily Oster Fought to Reopen Schools, Becoming a Hero and a Villain
The economist Emily Oster offers loads of data-driven advice about children and Covid-19. Many parents live by her words. Others say she’s dangerous.
Child Care Is Not the Place for Biden to Skimp
While the idiotic controversy over what constitutes infrastructure rages, the president should look to his former rivals to improve his family plan.
Turning Child Care Into a New Cold War
Republicans talk a good game about families. And then stiff them.
Why Was the ‘She-cession’ Worse in the U.S. Than Germany?
Millions of women were forced to quit or downsize their careers, but lack of child care was only one factor. One study found that several other policies also had a significant impact on their employment losses.
How Child Care Went From ‘Girly’ Economics to Infrastructure
Experts who sounded the alarm about the care economy were often shunted to the side of policy discussions. Not anymore.
Biden and the Future of the Family
There’s a good case for doing more to improve physical assets. There’s an overwhelming case for doing more to help families with children.