Children play at the Little Flowers Early Childhood and Development Center located in the Sandtown-Winchester neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland, on Jan. 11, 2021. | Source: The Washington Post / Getty
Early childhood education and care reduces inequalities over the life of the child, while supporting children to receive the academic, social and emotional and enrichment services they need to be successful in kindergarten and beyond. It also enables parents to work while knowing their most precious resource – their children – are safe. Unfortunately, the United States severely underfunds child care, and this leaves families and child care providers struggling to keep up.
On July 31, U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine (D-VA), and Katie Britt (R-AL), introduced the Child Care Availability and Affordability Act and the Child Care Workforce Act. The companion bills aim to make child care more affordable and accessible by strengthening existing tax credits to lower child care costs and increase the supply of child care providers. These bills demonstrate that there is bi-partisan support for ensuring affordable and accessible child care, but it is imperative that members of Congress work with impacted communities, especially working moms of color, on any measure intended to improve the child care system in the U.S. They cannot possibly create a quality system without consulting the people disproportionately impacted by the lack of such a system.
MORE: A National Day Without Child Care: Black Providers, Parents Explain Urgency Of The Moment
To be clear, I appreciate even modest steps to reach a better system. But let us not lose sight of the importance of Congress striving for comprehensive solutions to the child care crisis. This means that they must address every aspect of child care, including supporting a variety of options for parents so they can meet their families’ needs; ensuring fair compensation for early educators; lowering child care costs for families; and providing safe, nurturing, learning environments for children. Elected officials can’t do any of this with fidelity without being in touch with directly impacted parents and providers.
If they connect with parents and providers, they’ll hear directly from the source what policy proposals are needed. If they connect with parents and providers, they’ll learn the policies that on their face sound good, but cause harm. If they connect with directly impacted parents and providers, they’ll enact policy while doing no harm. This means that with the introduction of policy, they will have a commitment to ensure that any new requirements on states or providers come with the resources to enact them.
I share this perspective as a Black woman, a working mother of two, and the Co-CEO of 9to5. I know that working moms of color are not consistently consulted for our policy recommendations. I know that there are few spaces where we can offer input and have that input enacted. While I cautiously welcomed Britt and Kaine’s bill, we need so much more than what’s in their proposal.
Every day, I meet parents who would be unable to work without child care. But I also meet parents who are not receiving enough subsidies to meet their family’s need. More often than I can count, I meet child care providers who struggle to retain staff and pay them a competitive wage. There is nothing more painful than seeing a talented child care educator leave the field because they don’t earn enough to care for themselves and their own families. And being able to care for one’s family is a fundamental desire.
Unfortunately, childcare workers are substantially underpaid (the average child care educator earns around $13 per hour) and providers operate on razor-thin margins. There is no getting rich, and often no making ends meet, in this business. The reality is that these measures (Britt and Kaine’s bills) don’t address the root causes that providers face nor will they enable all parents to work. Solutions to the childcare crisis must be dual-sided and address the needs of working families and the providers who make care possible.
These bills are a starting point, not a finish line. We need bold, comprehensive action that centers the experiences of women of color and low-income families who have been disproportionately impacted by our broken childcare system for generations. We cannot afford half-measures when the stability of working families and our entire economy hangs in the balance. Further, we cannot attempt to move forward without the input and guidance of directly impacted advocates, parents and providers.
Mica Whitfield is the co-director of 9to5 Georgia and an advocate for affordable and accessible child care.
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