Excerpts
Universal child care has long been viewed as a pie-in-the-sky item on the progressive policy agenda.
But the idea recently took on new life in some circles, after Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City, pledged to make free child care available to every resident in the country’s largest city.
Even proponents of free universal child care acknowledge that the United States is unlikely to establish a national program along these lines anytime soon. Yet Mr. Mamdani’s promise has jolted the conversation about the government’s role in child care and the potential economic impact of a more comprehensive system.
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In a short video explaining his plan, Mr. Mamdani said the lack of universal child care has had a “major cost to our economy.” He nodded to a report from the New York City Economic Development Corporation that found that parents leaving the city or cutting back their work hours because of caregiving responsibilities cost the city $23 billion in 2022.
Critics of universal child care typically cite the significant cost to taxpayers of subsidizing not just low-income families but also higher-income families.
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In interviews with economists and child care policy experts, however, many said that zeroing in on the cost to taxpayers of a universal system did not factor in its potential economic effects.
Most arguments in support of universal child care — as opposed to programs with income limits, say — revolve around more readily quantifiable economic impacts, including an increase in the share of mothers with young children in the labor force, a rise in their number of hours worked and greater lifetime earnings. Because families would no longer have to devote large portions of their budgets to child care, proponents say, they would have more disposable income.
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There is already a large body of evidence that universal preschool programs pay big economic dividends. A working paper published in May that analyzed the effects of universal prekindergarten programs in nine cities and states found that they resulted in a 1.2 percent rise in labor force participation, a 1.5 percent increase in employment and 1.6 percent growth in hours worked. The paper analyzed programs in Georgia, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Florida, Iowa, Wisconsin, Washington, D.C., Vermont and New York City.
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The child care system in Quebec offers another salient case study. In 1997, the Canadian province introduced universally accessible, highly subsidized child care, extending the coverage to all children up to age 4 by September 2000.
Research published last year found that the Quebec program’s impact — including improving maternal labor force participation rate — was attributable to the increased availability of child care, not just its reduced price.
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