Five myths about child care
November 5, 2021
Democrats in Congress are working furiously toward an agreement on a social programs bill that would, among other things, set up free universal prekindergarten for 3- and 4-year-olds and provide subsidies to make child care free or low-cost for 90 percent of U.S. families. That these provisions have remained in President Biden’s whittled-down Build Back Better package shows how far we have come as a country since 1971, when President Richard Nixon vetoed a universal child-care bill after labeling it anti-family. But we still haven’t dispelled some misconceptions about this sector.
Child-care costs can be backbreaking, eating up between 14 and 35 percent of budgets for lower- and middle-income families. Many Republican and libertarian commentators blame heavy regulation. A 2015 report from the right-leaning Mercatus Center at George Mason University suggested that “removing costly regulations of the child care industry could provide greater benefits to all families by lowering the cost of care without sacrificing quality.” Economist and former Bloomberg Opinion columnist Noah Smith similarly opined that “regulatory overhead” and high rents must be to blame.
