Why Don't We Pay Stay at Home Parents?

Childcare cost are astronomical, and our current system isn't working. The solution is easier than many are willing to admit.

Photo by Brett Sayles: https://www.pexels.com/photo/girl-sitting-on-smiling-man-s-shoulder-1378866/

Welcome to another post from my essay series titled, “Politics and Bullshit.” This week we’re talking about paying stay at home parents. You can find the previous post here.

A couple of years ago, I had the pleasure and horror of working for an elected official in New York City. Actually, he was a council member. The job was difficult for many reasons, but I did great work, and it also taught me a lot. We helped constituents apply for citizenship, save people from illegal evictions, and pushed for more affordable housing opportunities when we could. But this was Brooklyn in 2013, the Barclays center had just opened, and gentrification was coming on strong. I often spent more time feeling helpless than I did productive or successful. 

One of the things you have to get used to as a low-level staffer for an elected official is the limits of your powers. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of opportunities to do good work, or connect people to resources, but some problems are too big for you to solve. The story I’m about to share is a perfect example of that. On a slow Thursday, a married couple came to our office looking for support. The wife had given birth to their son a couple of months ago and she needed to return to work so they could afford their rent. The landlord of their building was raising their rent by an additional $300, and there was no way they could afford to stay with just the husband’s income.

After a couple of weeks of searching, she found a job, but there was one obstacle in the way: childcare. She and her husband checked out a couple of daycares in the neighborhood and the cheapest childcare they could find was for $900/week. The husband was making $45,000/year and the job the wife found only paid $30,000. There was no way they would be able to afford this and still pay their $1900 a month rent. 

They came to our office looking for any kind of government assistance they could get to pay for this expense. There was nothing I could do. She made too much money to qualify for childcare. Her only options were not to work and get half of the childcare covered, or keep the job and find creative ways to care for their child. She walked away without any clear answers, and I went through another constituent, frustrated with the way our system makes life unreasonably hard for regular people. 

I’m a couple of years removed from that experience and my politics have evolved. Back then I didn’t like that we couldn’t help her but didn’t know what we could do. I thought it was just one of those problems that would never have a solution. That version of Stanley was wrong. The United States is one of, if not the wealthiest nations in the world, we can do whatever the hell we want. Our challenges only exist because the people we have trusted with leadership are unwilling to do what is necessary and smart.

These same leaders are urging people to get back to work, meanwhile, millions of parents must find a way to do so without adequate childcare, and many of them would rather be home. If that’s the case, why not just pay stay-at-home parents?

Does this idea seem crazy? It shouldn’t, our current childcare system is extremely expensive and ineffective. According to a report from the national network, Childcare Aware, the average cost of childcare in the United States is over $10,000 a year, and according to the Lending tree, "Across the U.S., parents are seeing an average annual cost increase of 41% for center-based childcare providers, and spending an average of $14,117 annually, up from $9,977 pre-pandemic.” Parents are spending up to 20% of their income on childcare and for what?

The American Recovery Act introduced the expanded childcare tax credit. Under it, qualifying families received monthly payments of up to $300 per child under 6 and up to $250 per child under 18.  Families could claim the remaining money from the credit when they filed their tax returns for the year. While active, the program helped lift 3 million Americans out of poverty. Unfortunately, because of “Moderate Democrats” like Joe Manchin, and newly minted independent, Kirsten Sinema, Democrats were unable to extend or improve this program. Instead, they were forced to let an effective policy expire while millions of families suffered. 

What if we took the victories from the expanded Childcare tax credit and expanded it? The concept is simple, if you have a child, and are willing to commit to being a full-time stay-at-home parent, the federal government would pay you $35,000 per year or $2900 a month. That kind of additional income would be a game-changer for working families. The research is on our side, cash benefits for parents can dramatically cut child poverty. Just look at the UK. According to an article from Vox.com, British Prime Minister, “Tony Blair and the Labour Party introduced a universal benefit in the UK in 1999. The measure was part of a broader set of proposals meant to tackle child poverty, including tax credits, means-tested programs, a national minimum wage, a workers' tax credit, universal pre-K, expanded child care, and much longer parental leave. The result was that absolute poverty fell by more than half from 1999 to 2009.”

The UK isn’t the only place that provides generous cash benefits to parents, 11 of the richest nations in the world do, and the results are fantastic. Unfortunately in the U.S, families are struggling to make ends meet, and parents are missing critical time with their children. The truth is, our elected leaders are once again skirting the edges, giving speeches with bold statements but refusing to push for real transformational change. Their motivation always seems to be driven by achieving some sort of “moderate” style of governing, but as we have discussed already, there is no such thing as a moderate politician. If that’s the case, what’s stopping us from doing the right thing for children and families? The answer is simpler than you might imagine. I’ll get into that in my next essay.