What if the Current Fight to Protect Child Care is Also an Opportunity to Transform it?
By Alyssa Fortner
This is the first blog in a series exploring a shared vision for universal child care and CLASP’s efforts, alongside partners, to turn this vision into a reality. The full series can be found here.
The need for a stronger, universal child care system is clearer than ever as the Trump Administration is actively working to dismantle it. The administration has laid off over half of the Office of Child Care and Office of Head Start staff; illegally moved to freeze child care funding for states they consider political opponents; peddled unfounded fraud allegations that attack the integrity of child care providers and the state administrators that help families access care; and released regulations that destabilize the child care and early education sector further when it is in need of critical support.
At the same time, our child care system has continued to be shaped by racial, gender, and economic inequities and decades of underinvestment. Despite the immense value of child care, from supporting children’s development to sustaining a strong economy, it remains inaccessible and unaffordable for many families. Per the most recent data, only 1 in 7 eligible children had access to a subsidy through the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), the primary federal funding source created to provide child care assistance for families with low incomes. And the child care workforce remains deeply underpaid and undervalued, earning less than 97 percent of other professions and frequently lacking benefits like health insurance and retirement. The harm is even more pronounced for Black and Latina early educators, who despite holding equivalent educational credentials, earn thousands less than white early educators.
But what if the current fight to protect child care is also an opportunity to transform it?
| A universal child care system is one where every family who needs child care can access it. To create the supply needed to make care universal, providers must be adequately compensated and supported to stay in the field and provide high-quality care. Through fully funded public investment, a universal system ensures cohesive and clear availability and accessibility to care and learning for all families with children, regardless of race, immigration status, income, disability, geography, and other factors that have historically impeded access. It also ensures that the child care workforce is well-paid, provided with benefits like health care and retirement, and has access to training or higher/continuing education if desired, advancement opportunities, and more. And, to do this, the lived experience of the families and providers who rely on and sustain the system is centered in policy design and implementation. Ultimately, a universal system ensures that child care is a public good, not the family’s private responsibility. |
We can already see what’s possible: while the federal government is undermining the sector, states like New Mexico and New York are stepping up to move the work forward and deliver on the true needs of children and families. And while states should not carry this responsibility or financial burden alone, their transformational efforts offer exciting proof points for what is possible when child care is seen and valued as a public good. Building on significant investments during the COVID-19 pandemic, New Mexico has expanded free child care for all families regardless of income or immigration status, while New York is pursuing expanded access through investments in child care infrastructure and beginning to implement free “2-K” in New York City.
In the past, we’ve even seen congressional action in working toward universal child care, too. In 1971, Congress passed the bipartisan Comprehensive Child Development Act (CCDA). And in 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration’s proposed Build Back Better (BBB) plan would have made historic, robust investments in child care and pre-kindergarten to lay the groundwork for universal child care as well. Unfortunately, President Nixon’s veto of the CCDA and the failure of the Senate to pass BBB stalled both major federal efforts. However, current congressional interest, combined with many state actions, shows us that not only is universal child care possible, it is essential.
The lessons learned, strong partnerships with directly impacted people, and the positive proof points we are seeing at all levels of government, make it clear that we have an opportunity to leverage these efforts to preserve what exists to create a vision for the future of child care that is inclusive, comprehensive, and truly meets the needs of all who participate in it.
Now is the time to turn the defense of what we have into the power we need to work together to build the system children, families, and providers have always deserved.
To learn more about what it means to build a truly equitable universal child care system, please join us for CLASP’s next installment of Equity Matters, “What if the Current Fight to Protect Child Care is also an Opportunity to Transform it?” on October 22 from 1-2:30 pm ET. Register here.
