Universal child care has moved from a long shot on a progressive wish list to the mainstream of the American policy debate. Even The Dispatch—a conservative outlet—recently featured the topic in its Debate Series, in which I participated along with IFS Senior Fellow Jenet Erickson. Proposals to shift much of young children's care from families to government-funded programs are now gaining serious traction at both state and federal levels.

The remarkably successful campaign to sell universal child care to the American public has been built on three core claims—repeated so routinely and accepted so widely that they now function as assumed premises—that serve as the invisible foundation beneath an increasingly ambitious policy agenda. These claims have shaped the debate, the direction of policy, and the assumptions of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Yet all three are false.

Claim 1: "It's what parents want"

Child care advocates insist that most families prefer quality child care programs to parental care. But three recent national surveys—by American Compass, the Bipartisan Policy Center, and the Institute for Family Studies—reveal the opposite. Most parents do not want their young children cared for by paid providers.

In the American Compass survey, for example, fewer than 1 in 5 married adults with household income under $150,000 said the best family arrangement is two parents working full-time with their children in full-time child care. Among working-class couples,...

Read Full Story: https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMijwFBVV95cUxQQmNBbG9Fd0ljX0Q1aUZ4YUlT...