Thread by @CitizenCohn

Elizabeth Warren today unveils a *major* child care proposal that would...

...cap expenses at 7% of household income

...make it free for families below 2x the poverty line

...tie quality to standards of Head Start & Department of Defense (1)

huffpost.com/entry/elizabet…

The impact would be ... enormous.

Check out some of these findings from @USAChildCare

Example: Couples nationally pay more than 10% of household income.

That's just one child, with enormous variation from place to place, community to community (2)
usa.childcareaware.org/2018/10/child-…

The part about variation is important. You can get a feel for that with this @EconomicPolicy interactive.

Costs for infant care is 16.5% median income in my state of Michigan. It's worse in other states. (3) epi.org/child-care-cos…

@EconomicPolicy Or read one of several @EconomicPolicy reports on the subject (4) epi.org/publication/ch…

@EconomicPolicy Internal estimates suggest net federal cost would be $700B over ten years. That takes into account effects of resulting economic growth, etc., so immediate outlays would probably be higher.

Regardless, we’re talking the largest federal investment in early childhood ... ever. (5)

@EconomicPolicy The one time the U.S. really did something on child care was in World War II, in a program for women working in factories.

It was a big success, but lawmakers didn’t renew it after the war. Via @brycecovert (6) thinkprogress.org/heres-what-hap…

@EconomicPolicy @brycecovert In 1971, Congress passed a major child care bill that looks a lot like Warren’s today.

Nixon, responding to conservative advisers, vetoed it and said it was anti-family.

Via @nancylcohen @newrepublic (7) newrepublic.com/article/113009…

@EconomicPolicy @brycecovert @nancylcohen @newrepublic Gender had a lot to do with that veto -- and with the politics and economics of child care more generally.

It’s been treated as “women’s work,” which means the caregivers aren’t paid well enough and the issue doesn’t get serious attention in Washington. (8)

@EconomicPolicy @brycecovert @nancylcohen @newrepublic That’s been changing lately. Obama gave the issue serious attention. Hillary Clinton had a big proposal in 2016, plus a long history of advocacy on the issue.

But, you know, emails and all that. Few people paid attention. (9) huffingtonpost.com/entry/hillary-…

@EconomicPolicy @brycecovert @nancylcohen @newrepublic In Congress, @PattyMurray & @BobbyScott have put together a major initiative called the Child Care for Working Families Act.

They'll be reintroducing it soon and it's got a lot in common with the Warren proposal, though different policy particulars. (10) zerotothree.org/resources/2237…

@EconomicPolicy @brycecovert @nancylcohen @newrepublic @PattyMurray @BobbyScott That bill, like Warren's, pays attention to quality as well as affordability.

That's important, because the quality of child care in the U.S. is inconsistent and sometimes shockingly terrible. newrepublic.com/article/112892… (11)

Both proposals also seek to boost wages for child care providers, which is not just good for the children. It's also good for the providers, who are absurdly underpaid. (12) cscce.berkeley.edu/2018-early-chi…

Back to Warren, the specifics of the proposal probably matter less than the statement it makes about the issue's salience now -- and the emphasis Warren intends to give it.

She's talked about this. A lot. (13)

One more thing: This isn't a complicated tax scheme.

The idea is to fund child care centers that will meet quality standards, then offer care to all families -- poor, middle-class, rich -- on a sliding income scale.

Some paperwork, yes, but more straightforward... (14)

...and more like a publicly funded good or service, rather than government simply giving you a tax break to offset your expenses on X or Y. (15)

Here's how Warren explains it (16) medium.com/@teamwarren/my…