Democrats have yet to prioritize universal childcare and paid leave, and it's hurting mothers, children, and the economy
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- Paul Constant is a writer at Civic Ventures and the cohost of the "Pitchfork Economics" podcast.
- He says the Inflation Reduction Act is a good start, but now Democrats should prioritize families.
- Affordable childcare and paid leave can boost the economy and close the gender pay gap.
- This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
The Biden administration is closing out a summer of tremendous legislative accomplishments. From a bipartisan gun-responsibility package to the Inflation Reduction Act and a push to bring semiconductor manufacturing back to American shores, Biden and Congressional Democrats have managed to pass a thick docket of laws that pundits in January 2022 would have sworn were outright impossible.
But in the months of secret negotiations between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Joe Manchin that eventually turned President Biden's huge Big Back Better bill into the leaner Inflation Reduction Act, a number of important economic policies, including quality, affordable childcare and a federal paid family and medical leave, were cut.
Those popular policies should be moved to the top of the priority list for Democrats moving forward. After all, if they've learned anything over the last month of victories, it's that doing popular things is popular.
Quality, affordable childcare can help close the gender pay gap
We saw in the early days of the pandemic that the American economy collapses if families don't have access to quality, affordable childcare.
More than 2 million women — almost half of whom were women of color — dropped out of the workforce in 2020, when lockdowns shuttered schools and children had to stay home. And while that's the most dramatic and obvious representation of how important childcare is to a functioning workforce, millions of women have for decades paid the economic cost of our nation's lack of basic support for families with children.
A recent World Economic Forum report showed that 80% of the gender pay gap is made up of the "motherhood penalty," in which women's paychecks start to shrink compared to their male peers after they have children.
Policies enacting or subsidizing quality, affordable childcare would help close the gender pay gap in two ways: First, its reliability would level the playing field between working mothers and men who aren't stereotypically expected to sacrifice their jobs for parenthood in the same way that women are. And second, the Build Back Better Act expanded access to preschool and limited costs of childcare while also raising the wages of childcare providers — 95% of whom are women.
Paid leave boosts the economy and ensures better outcomes for children
A federal paid-family-leave program, on the other hand, would make it easier for parents to stay home with sick children. But the long-term effects of the policy could also change millions of lives: Studies have shown that paid family leave could lower the amount of infant deaths per year, lower the risk of poverty for mothers, and increase the average household income. It would also allow more women to fully participate in the economy, creating jobs with their consumer spending.
And if lawmakers were serious about improving outcomes for all children, they would also revive the child tax credit, which cut child poverty by nearly 30%. This program, which sent every parent monthly payments of $250 to $300 per child, immediately raised almost 3 million children out of poverty, making it one of the most efficient and successful antipoverty programs in United States history.
In order to show real progress to the American people, Democratic lawmakers were forced to make compromises with their own trickle-down colleagues. But just because Schumer couldn't get Manchin to agree on the importance of economically empowering women and providing quality care to all children doesn't mean that Democrats should give up on these policies. By ensuring that families can afford to have children, and that women can participate fully in the workforce without being penalized for their motherhood, Democrats will invest in the future by building an economy that truly works for everyone.
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