Skip to content

Republish This Story

* Please read before republishing *

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives Creative Commons license as long as you follow our republishing guidelines, which require that you credit The 19th and retain our pixel. See our full guidelines for more information.

To republish, simply copy the HTML at right, which includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to The 19th. Have questions? Please email [email protected].

— The Editors

Loading...

Modal Gallery

/

Menu

  • Our Mission
  • Our Team
  • Latest Stories
  • Upcoming Events
  • Contact Us
  • Newsletter
  • Donate
  • Work With Us
  • Fellowships
    • From the Collection

      Changing Child Care

      Illustration of a woman feeding a baby a bottle
      • As climate change worsens hurricane season in Louisiana, doulas are ensuring parents can safely feed their babies

        Jessica Kutz · May 5
      • Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito argued abortion isn’t an economic issue. But is that true?

        Chabeli Carrazana · May 4
      • Pregnant people are at 'greater risk' in states hit hard by wildfire smoke, air pollution, new report shows

        Jessica Kutz · April 20
    • From the Collection

      Next-Gen GOP

      Illustration of a woman riding an elephant
      • A banner year for Republican women

        Amanda Becker · November 11
      • Republican women could double representation in the U.S. House

        Amanda Becker · November 4
      • U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik wants to elect more Republican women into office

        Barbara Rodriguez · August 13
    • From the Collection

      On The Rise

      Illustration of three women marching
      • Jessica Cisneros takes on the last anti-abortion U.S. House Democrat

        Amanda Becker · February 25
      • Meet J. Michelle Childs, South Carolina judge and possible Supreme Court contender

        Candice Norwood · February 18
      • ‘The bench is loaded’: A record number of Latinas are running for governor

        Barbara Rodriguez · February 11
    • From the Collection

      Pandemic Within a Pandemic

      Illustration of four people marching for Black Lives Matter with coronavirus as the backdrop
      • Some LGBTQ+ people worry that the COVID-19 vaccine will affect HIV medication. It won’t.

        Orion Rummler · November 23
      • Why are more men dying from COVID? It’s a complicated story of nature vs. nurture, researchers say

        Mariel Padilla · September 22
      • Few incarcerated women were released during COVID. The ones who remain have struggled.

        Candice Norwood · August 17
    • From the Collection

      Portraits of a Pandemic

      Illustration of a woman wearing a mask and holding up the coronavirus
      • For family caregivers, COVID is a mental health crisis in the making

        Shefali Luthra · October 8
      • A new database tracks COVID-19’s effects on sex and gender

        Shefali Luthra · September 15
      • Pregnant in a pandemic: The 'perfect storm for a crisis'

        Shefali Luthra · August 25
    • From the Collection

      The 19th Explains

      People walking from many articles to one article where they can get the context they need on an issue.
      • The 19th Explains: The governor’s races we’re watching in 2022

        Barbara Rodriguez · May 3
      • The 19th Explains: What to know about Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing

        Candice Norwood, Terri Rupar · March 21
      • The 19th Explains: Colleges are dropping the SAT in admissions. That’s a good thing for most girls.

        Nadra Nittle · March 3
    • From the Collection

      The Electability Myth

      Illustration of three women speaking at podiums
      • Do term limits help women candidates? New York could be a new testing ground

        Barbara Rodriguez · January 11
      • Girls are being socialized to lose political ambition — and it starts younger than we realized

        Barbara Rodriguez · September 23
      • Kathy Hochul’s rise in New York spotlights the barriers to women becoming governors

        Barbara Rodriguez · August 23
    • From the Collection

      The Impact of Aging

      A number of older people walking down a path of information.
      • Woman alleges that an assisted living facility denied her admission because she is transgender

        Sara Luterman · November 8
      • LGBTQ+ seniors fear having to go back in closet for the care they need

        Sara Luterman · October 12
      • The pandemic continues to strain nursing homes. What happens if a lot of them close?

        Mariel Padilla · September 9
    • From the Collection

      Voting Rights

      A series of hands reaching for ballots.
      • Florida’s redistricting fight continues. The head of the state League of Women Voters talks about what’s at stake.

        Barbara Rodriguez · April 19
      • Women have been sounding the alarm ahead of Texas’ first-in-the-nation primary

        Barbara Rodriguez · February 28
      • LGBTQ+ people of color are at risk from rising voter restrictions as federal protections falter in the Senate, advocates say

        Orion Rummler · January 19

    View all collections

  • Explore by Topic

    • Abortion
    • Business & Economy
    • Caregiving
    • Coronavirus
    • Education
    • Election 2020
    • Elections 2022
    • Environment & Climate
    • Health
    • Immigration
    • Inside The 19th
    • Justice
    • LGBTQ+
    • Politics
    • Race
    • Sports
    • Technology

    View All Topics

Home
  • Our Mission
  • Our Team
  • Latest Stories
  • Upcoming Events
  • Contact Us
  • Newsletter
  • Donate
  • Work With Us
  • Fellowships

We’re an independent, nonprofit newsroom reporting on gender, politics and policy. Read our story.

The 19th News(letter)

News that represents you, in your inbox every weekday.

You have been subscribed!

Submitting...

Uh-oh! Something went wrong. Please try again later.

Donate to get our member newsletter

The 19th thanks our sponsors. Become one.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul plays with a child at a child care center.
Then Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul plays with a kid during child care funding announcement at Early Childhood Center of Bronx Community College. (Photo by Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Caregiving

New York poised to increase child care budget by billions, which could help women reenter the workforce

The state of New York is poised to approve a multibillion-dollar budget boost for child care services as national efforts to expand that infrastructure have failed.

Sara Luterman

Caregiving reporter

Sara Luterman, The 19th

Published

2022-03-31 05:00
5:00
March 31, 2022
am

Share

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Email

The state of New York is poised to approve a multibillion-dollar budget boost for child care services as national efforts to expand that infrastructure have failed. Experts agree New York’s move will boost workforce participation for women. 

“No one should ever need to choose between supporting their family and providing child care,” Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou told The 19th. “This is a preventable problem that has been ignored because it disproportionately impacts women of color, but a lack of child care access hurts everyone.”

Currently, families making 200 percent of the federal poverty line qualify for subsidized child care in New York. The state Senate’s version would allow families making up to five times the federal poverty level to claim the child care subsidy by 2024, a $4 billion investment. The state Assembly’s $3 billion version is four times the federal poverty level but includes after-school programming for children over the age of 5. Gov. Kathy Hochul’s proposal would extend it to families at three times the poverty level, a $1.4 billion investment.  The final budget is due April 1. State Sen. Jabari Brisport told the New York Times, “We’re clearly on a path to reach a full, universal system in which all people are eligible for subsidized child care.”

The 19th thanks our sponsors. Become one.

This would inject billions of dollars into a system that, particularly during the pandemic, has left families with few choices. In 2020, when the pandemic began, an  estimated 700,000 parents, almost two-thirds of them  mothers, had left the American workforce. The loss of available child care due to school and day care closures was at the heart of the first women’s recession.

Even before the pandemic, the cost of child care in New York had soared: The average cost of child care is $15,394, more than both the cost of in-state college tuition and average rent, according to the Economic Policy Institute. 

As the economy has recovered, women have reentered the workforce, but child care struggles remain. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse survey, from March 2–14, 647,578 women with children under 5 left a job because of child care compared with 314,650 men. In that same time frame, 735,163 women with children under 5 reported that child care duties kept them from looking for a job, compared with 389,259. 

  • More from The 19th
    transgender flag austin texas 2021
  • What Transgender Day of Visibility means for trans Texans this year
  • As election workers face increased threats and intimidation, some states are trying to protect them
  • ‘They just gave up’: More than two-thirds of the military community report challenges to building a family

New York’s budget expansion now depends on negotiations between Hochul — the state’s first woman governor —  state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie. 

On the federal level, efforts to address the affordability of child care have stalled along with the rest of President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda. 

Chris Herbst is a professor at Arizona State University whose research focuses on how social safety net programs impact low-income families. “There’s almost no argument over the importance of policies lowering families’ child care costs… Every dollar you spend lowering child care costs for low-income families, you get that dollar back from the increase in [women’s] employment you see as a result,” he said. 

The move would not only benefit low-income women. Herbst also stressed the importance of extending free child care to medium-income families, who he said “can still spend a significant portion of their income on child care. [Adding funding] would probably generate a positive employment response.”

Jessica Brown, an assistant professor of economics at the University of South Carolina, expressed concern about the details of the funding. She noted that the design of the program may cause difficulty for parents at the edge of qualifying for the subsidy. This is called a “benefit cliff.” For example, someone whose income is 399 percent of the federal poverty level qualifies, but someone whose income is 401 percent does not. That person is not comparatively wealthy and may continue to struggle accessing child care. 

“This can create a dilemma for parents who want to work but also want to ensure that their income stays below the eligibility threshold,” Brown said. This may incentivize women to work less than they might otherwise choose to, or to remain in lower-wage jobs in order to continue receiving subsidized child care.   

Bob Townley, the executive director of Manhattan Youth, which provides free after-school programming to elementary and middle school students, expressed similar concerns to Brown’s. “The devil is in the details,” he said. 

“We want everyone to have equal opportunity,” Townley said. “That means not segregating people. At our programs you can’t tell who has $5,000 in the bank and who has $5 million. They all play together. That’s really important.”

Share

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Email

The 19th News(letter)

News that represents you, in your inbox every weekday.

You have been subscribed!

Submitting...

Uh-oh! Something went wrong. Please try again later.

Donate to get our member newsletter

From the Collection

Changing Child Care

Illustration of a woman feeding a baby a bottle
  • As climate change worsens hurricane season in Louisiana, doulas are ensuring parents can safely feed their babies

    Jessica Kutz · May 5
  • Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito argued abortion isn’t an economic issue. But is that true?

    Chabeli Carrazana · May 4
  • Pregnant people are at 'greater risk' in states hit hard by wildfire smoke, air pollution, new report shows

    Jessica Kutz · April 20

Up Next

Rep. Pramila Jayapal speaks with reporters outside the U.S. Capitol.

Politics

House progressives urge Biden to support caregiving workforce and execute other Build Back Better priorities

With negotiations on the bill stalled in the Senate, lawmakers call on the White House to use executive authority ahead of the midterm elections.

Read the Story

The 19th
The 19th is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization. Our stories are free to republish in accordance with these guidelines.

  • Donate
  • Subscribe to the Newsletter
  • Attend an Event
  • Jobs
  • Fellowships
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • Community Guidelines
  • Membership
  • Membership FAQ
  • Major Gifts
  • Sponsorship
  • Privacy
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram