Child care in America is broken.
Working parents with young children are stretched thin; a year of daycare can easily cost more than a year of tuition at an in-state college. At the same time, child-care workers are severely underpaid, often earning barely enough to get by and with no real path to ever make much more.
It is a problem with broad repercussions for the entire economy. Parents who can’t afford quality care, or can’t find it, can’t work. Young adults who are scared off by the cost of care might be less likely to have that second child, or even to have children in the first place.
So, is there even a solution? We asked leading thinkers to weigh in.