Mr. President, there is no day-care crisis

BY MAGGIE GALLAGHER

President Clinton has clearly signaled that new subsidies for day care in '98 are one of his top legislative priorities. In the State of the Union address, the President will propose a new increase in tax credits for parents choosing commercial child care, as well as new tax goodies for companies that provide on-site day care.

The alleged goal of policies like these is an increase in what day-care advocates like to call the supply and quality of "child care:' This is an interesting use of language. If new subsidies available only for commercial day care lure more families into the paid childcare market, is that really fairly described as an increase in the nation's supply of child care? Or is it merely a transfer of child care from families to the marketplace?

The child-care debate is shaping up as a classic case of a large, growing industry seeking to use the power of government to increase its market share. When industries do this, naturally they do not say to Congress: We'd like more customers and more money. Instead they argue-and sometimes even believethat the diversion of tax money into their pockets represents a compelling public interest.

Listen to how Yasmina Vinci, executive director of the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies, described "three of the most critical issues" facing the country: "affordability, quality and compensation of child-care workers."

Even tax credits for what she called "working parents" (read: parents who use commercial child care) "will do little on these issues," she complained.

For the day-care industry, the real competition is not among different profit-making or even nonprofit providers. The biggest drag on the growth of the day-care industry is what might be called zero-profit providers, a.k.a. families. The best-kept secret in this childcare debate is that the vast majority of American youngsters are cared for by their parents or other family members. Finding Good Day Care

`Not a Problem at All'

In a national survey last February of parents with children under age 4 by Princeton Survey Research Associates, 72% said their child was cared for primarily by its mother or father. An additional 10% report some other relative cares for the child while parents work. The fact that more than eight in ten small children are cared for by family members may help explain why in one recent survey only 13% of parents of young children reported that finding child care was "a major problem." Sixty-nine per cent indicated it was "not a problem at all." Similarly, when asked, "How much do you worry that you won't be able to find or afford good day care for your child?" just 12% of parents said, "A lot," while 59% said, "Not at all."

And in a January 1997 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, Americans were asked to name the two or three most important issues facing the nation "that you personally would like to see the federal government in Washington do something about." Guess how many named day care? One per cent.

Such polls indicate the demand for government day care is underwhelming, to say the least.

The day-care debate is often portrayed as pitting old-fashioned, stay-at-home moms against the needs of modem working women.

But the reality is that almost half of mothers of young children who work are not "in the market" for child care at all. Direct subsidies to providers and tax credits available only for paid, commercial care bypass not only women who are homemakers, but all women who choose to keep their kids' care in the family-in other words the vast majority of all American mothers of young children.

Miss Gallagher, a nationally syndicated columnist, is author of The Abolition of Marriage.

Copyright Human Events Publishing, Inc. Jan 16, 1998
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