The Role of Employers in our Child Care System
Free Resource
Child care advocates across the United States are confronting whether or not to support policies that will transform child care not from a private to public good — but to a benefit of employment.
In this guide, you will find considerations, talking points, and alternatives for advocates and business leaders as you think through whether to support employer-side solutions in your child care advocacy.
In the face of legislative stalemates, tight budgets, and federal gridlock, employer tax credits and programs like Tri-Share (which splits the cost of child care between employers, the government, and families) have increasingly been offered as solutions by elected leaders on both sides of the aisle. Simultaneously, venture-capital backed startups and well-connected public speakers have pitched employer-sponsored child care as the one quick trick to give “family-friendly” companies the edge in a tight labor market.
There has been relatively little concerted effort to push back against those who assert that child care becoming an employee benefit is a step in the right direction, or even a stopgap on the way to a public good. This brief argues that the decision to pursue this path could derail progress towards systemic solutions for decades to come in favor of a cheap, palatable fix that shifts the burden of action from government back to individuals.
Additional resources:
How can business leaders support a better child care system? - Printable one-pager
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