Thanks for the link to the article on day care presumably lowering the crime rate later. I agree with you on your assessment regarding social worker visits... but I think I also agree with them that getting serious about decent day care and pay for day care workers possibly having indirect benefit for those kids later in life.

Back in the day, when I was supporting two kids on my own and (barely) staying off welfare - I qualified, I just never applied - I used to wish SO strongly that instead of having a welfare system where they give you money and then penalize you if you earned your own, that they would just please please please give us *decent* day care, or vouchers so we could our kids someone decent so we could work without worry. Cheap daycare at that time took up about half my income - and it was constant worry over whether they were alright.

I finally made arrangements with my roomie for her to NOT work, and I would support all of us, including her own kids, if she would take care of mine. It worked... the girls were safe and they wouldn't have been any assurance of that if I'd taken other measures, but the trade off was I worked up to 15 hours a day and often didn't get to see them. I couldn't have pulled that off much longer than the 2 years I did it. I supported the 7 of us on tips and kept us out of the system.

I don't know about crime, but decent affordable daycare with some assurances that the kids won't be neglected or abused would make a huge different in quality of life, not to mention the possibility of the parent being able to get educated to be more self-supporting. (If 50% of a poor person's income is going to bad daycare, they sure can't afford day care while they attend school)

Somehow, I can't help but think that that would pay off later for the kid's ability to stay out of trouble with the law - adequate income and a parent that is able to be around now and then.

-- Anonymous, May 01, 2000

Answers

I definitely think you're right, Lynda, and I think child care is definitely one of the most important issues on the national agenda. (In fact, I think it ought to get at least as much attention as abortion rights, but since child care costs money and isn't otherwise interesting to talk about, don't look for that to happen anytime soon.)

But I thought the article really over simplified the issue, as did Hillary Clinton's soundbite. Families that can't find or afford child care are likely to have a whole host of other strikes against them that would also impact future criminality. I'm not sure better daycare is the end-all answer to the problems plaguing kids living in poverty. And I also suspect that daycare dollars are likely to benefit kids in higher income brackets before they benefit kids living in poverty.

I still think the bit about social worker visits was just dumb. That's like saying, "Families that receive regular visits from the police are ten times more likely to experience domestic violence!" Cart before horse, or something like that.

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

I totally think day care should be a priority. Canada is having the same debate, according to the pamphlet I got from our friendly socialist party leader Alexa McDonough (federal government opposition, but not the official opposition) - I don't recall seeing much about it in the news.

While I agree with Beth that money will probably end up helping out most the people who need it the least (ain't that always the way), it's certainly possible to foresee this and design the system for balance. Perhaps what is needed is some sort of mix of tax deductions and vouchers. Tax deductions wouldn't be useful for people who already don't pay taxes, but would help out struggling lower to middle income families who do, and vouchers could be available to anybody who makes less than a certain amount. Not knowing anything at all about the US tax system I have no idea what dollar amounts would make sense in American terms, but it would probably make sense to offer vouchers to anybody below or at the poverty level.

Joanne
Parietal Pericardium

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

Or - goodness - we could just make it free, and the government could pay the staff.

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

Oh yea, Beth, it was definitely an oversimplification! And maybe I am oversimplifying the solution, but it always seemed to me that if they could offer food stamps (which run on the premise that a lower income person maybe won't spend actual money on what they need foodwise) that they could offer daycare vouchers for licensed daycare as well to the same income bracket, so a person could go earn their own. heh.. I'm really addressing that issue more than the lowered crime later, I think - I believe that is an indirect benefit that would be brought by getting a family self-sufficient, and lower those risks *for those parents that are only suffering lack of income* and inheriting the rest of the risk-factors that go along with being poor. It's probably not going to help if the parents themselves are a part of that risk factor, other than by providing the kid some alternate adult contact. Pretty ethereal gain, that.

On a totally different subject, but not, I hate politicians during campaign years... trot out all the 'who could argue with that' bs, without much substance in it at all.

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

Lynda, you are right on about a voucher system or something for affordable daycare. I think this country has a lot to be embarrassed about when it comes to childcare. It's one of the lowest paying jobs.

I have a 3 year old daughter. I quit working because we paid $310 a week for daycare. My company had a daycare right on-site so I could go visit during lunch or whenever. The place was awesome. 7 babies in a room with 3 teachers. All the teachers had early childhood degrees and were experienced. I got to know one of the teachers and found out she was making $19,500 a year. I was horrified and wanted to know where my $310 a week was going.

I ended up quiting. I just didn't make enough money after paying for the daycare. I do have my daughter in a nursery school 3 mornings a week. I'm happy that there are outsiders that see her. If anything wrong was going on or if she wasn't developing the skills she should, there are more people to catch it.

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

Or - goodness - we could just make it free, and the government could pay the staff.

Whaaaat?

Please tell me this was a joke, Joanne.

-- Anonymous, May 02, 2000

I think the day care situation in this country is an outrage. A couple of years ago an Englishman said to me, "Americans do not love their children" and I think it's true -- as a society, we destroy civil liberties left and right because "we must think of the children!" But when it comes to taking care of said children, we fail.

There isn't enough daycare (my sister's tales of looking for daycare in SF are outrageous), it's ridiculously expensive, and the staff is woefully underpaid.

What is so outrageous about the concept of the government picking up the tab for childcare for parents who can't afford it? We're so damn gung-ho about getting welfare mothers off of welfare we're forgotten about the "mothers" part of the equation.

I may be wrong on this, but isn't daycare a national priority in France? Isn't everyone's daycare taken care of there? So parents don't have to, you know, WORRY about what they're going to do with their offspring?

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

I think irresponsible people will have children no matter whether they get free day care, etc, or not. They're doing it now, aren't they?

Out of enlightened self interest I think the government should pay for it, like they pay for schools and othe stuff for children. It benefits everybody.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

As soon as the government mandates that everybody learn about and understand the use of birth control -- they don't have to use it, they do have to know what it is -- and as soon as the government no longer mandates 8% unemployment, and as soon as the government doesn't continue to use the minimum wage with zero external support (such as health care) as a way to create and keep an underclass, THEN they're off the hook.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Without sounding too Libertarian here, but...the "government" doesn't pay for anything. Taxpayers do.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

...the "government" doesn't pay for anything. Taxpayers do.

Bingo!

Thank you, Joy. I'm glad someone else spotted the absurdity of that statement.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Well, no, I'd say the latter statement is more absurd than the original one. If you're going to nitpick, the appropriate phrasing would be to say that the government, which is primarily funded by taxpayers, should pay for daycare. The government actually does have one or two sources of revenue other than taxpayers, so yes, the government does pay for things. And yes, the cost is generally funded by taxes, but if you're going to nitpick about semantics, you should at least get it right.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

It isn't just 'irresponsible' people who have kids to raise in a low- income situation. A good parentage of 'welfare mothers' became welfare mothers due to divorce. Alas, one can't guarantee that the financial status they have when they choose to have children is guaranteed to be there for the next 18 years.

The average American is less than one months lost paycheck away from poverty, whether that be due to divorce, illness, layoff or death. To imply that irresponsibility is in place because someone requires assistance is as simplistic as suggesting that the solution is 'free' anything.

Of course it's not free... but if it helps create tax-paying citizens rather than lifelong welfare recipients (which is what happens when you give someone cash assistance and penalize them if they attempt to earn their own), then there is pretty solid reason to look into it as an alternative.

I used to get blasted with the 'bad mom' rap - by welfare mothers and those who weren't, because I worked around the clock and didn't see them. No matter how bad a rap the welfare moms get, at least SOME of them don't see a benefit in going out to get a low paying job that will kill off the welfare check *and* create a need for daycare to cut into that earning *and* make them lose time with their kids. I was the one being regarded as irresponsible for the path I chose. I just knew that if I ever got sucked in to the system as it is, I'd never get back out and neither would my kids.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

If I was interested in nit-picking about semantics, I'd have become a lawyer.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Come on, Joy. Everybody knows the government can print all the money it needs.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Everyone realizes, that when we say "!government pays" we mean "we ourselves, as taxpayers, pay".

Coming from the late Soviet Union, where day-care was supposed to be not only free, but mandatory - mothers had to return to their jobs 6 months after giving birth in nineteen sixties. Gradually the unpaid maternity leave was lengthened until it reached 3 years just before the end of the Soviet Empire - I am well aware of all the problems that still remain unsolved.

Still I am voting for free day-care, even up to social workers picking up the children from their homes every morning, if possible.

I do believe that good pre-school day-care does raise the chances for children to get better start for life - in Estonia every child is supposed to read and write already when they start school, so the children without day-care experience or home schooling are behind others from the very start...

And good education is a start for the children to grow up to be good taxpayers themselves.

So - I do believe that by providing best possible (and I do realize that at the moment Estonian "best possible" is a lot lower than the level Americans take for granted) "free" health care and day-care for ALL children we are only doing what is good for OUR OWN future.

BTW, my own children spent the time between 8 am till 7 pm in day-care for five days a week . How else could I afford to return to work and became a taxpayer again?

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

I don't believe that I was nitpicking semantics at all. The content of Jackie's comment was clear to me - my question was whether her tone was sardonic or serious.

The government's sources of income are almost entirely taxes, of one form or another: taxes on personal incomes, taxes on businesses, excise taxes, taxes on employers, customs duties, and the like. Personal income taxes accounted for 35% of federal receipts in FY1997, or 60% if you add in social insurance and retirement receipts. Specific taxes of one form or another accounted for 99% of federal receipts in FY 1997, according to the summary statistics available online at the U.S. Treasury website.

So, okay, I'll agree that maybe some sort of non-tax income is wrapped into that 1% miscellaneous receipts category, but it is nevertheless a tiny amount. Your statement - "The government actually does have one or two sources of revenue other than taxpayers, so yes, the government does pay for things." implies that this 1% somehow changes the nature of the other 99%, making it the government's money and not the taxpayers' money. It is still the taxpayers' money, Beth, yours as well as mine. The government doesn't pay for anything but with money taken in from taxpayers.

Subsequent posts further illustrated the point, albeit unwittingly. Aet's response, in particular, illustrated the curious circle of working to pay the taxes that support the daycare center which watches the children while the parents are working to pay the taxes that support the daycare center which watches the children so that the parents can work to pay the taxes etc. etc. etc. Anything you ask the government to pay for ultimately costs you and everyone else money - among other things.

There is no "free" anything from the government. To suggest otherwise is absurd.

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

I don't quite get your point. Obviously, if the government pays for it, then so do taxpayers. How does that invalidate the point? I don't see where it's any more radical a suggestion than public education.

-- Anonymous, May 06, 2000

Public education was considered a radical proposal when it first arose, and many communities still vote in favor of low property taxes over adequately-funded public schools.

For this reason, I think publicly-funded daycare would probably be a hard sell for American taxpayers.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000