By Arthur Delaney

Excerpt:

Last year, Congress boosted funding for the Child Care And Development Block Grant, currently the federal government’s main program for helping parents pay for care, which until then had seen its real funding level slide 17 percent since 2000. But even with that boost, the program only reaches 1 out of every 6 eligible children.

“Reliable, high-quality child care is a lynchpin issue for families, particularly families with low incomes,” said Christine Johnson-Staub of the Center for Law and Social Policy. “What we know about access to high-quality child care is that it not only helps children be prepared for education and do better later on but also it helps families be more economically stable and so it really is important in terms of turning around poverty and bringing families out of poverty.”

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