Childcare Reform Act (Debating)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I cannot support this unless we are sure of the cost.

Bore you said $2.25 billion for "the holidays" and then later said "$1 billion". Is the "we" in that sentence a reference to Britain and hence the inclusion of "5 billion" in the amendment?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

This is why something like this should be regionalized or have a regional component of some sorts. There are parts of the country where subsidizing 50% or even 25% of people making 100,000 is pretty ridiculous, like in the rural areas of the South and Midwest. It does make sense in New York or LA though.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yes. I noted the same thing of Yankee about the cost, but I presented his amendment because it should be debated and because there are improvements in points 1 and 2.

I agree it should be debated and it is probably an improvement in the sense that it is more realistic.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It would cost 6.3Billion?
But we have a surplus of 15B right? So we can afford it!

It would cost $6.3b per year and we have a $15b surplus, this year. But that's a pretty tiny surplus for an economy of this size and wouldn't take much to wipe it out.

But I still support the measure.

I thought bore just said it was $75 billion a year.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

AYE

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I have long been in favor of expanding the minimum income, though preferably as a substitute for the higher levels of the minimum wage. I think such an approach would be more efficient economically and allow more people to get to work whilst ensuring that people get a fair amount of compensation for their work.

As for this bill right here, I do sympathize with the point made by Nix and that we should not encourage parental abandonment, as that can be a critical factor in the growth and developement of a child. I do think some of the formulaic approach who gets support and what incomes shall do some good in resolving that problem, but admitedly the problem does still exist.

I also can see Hagrid's point that the presence of the the gov't subsidy is what creates the incentive in the first place. Branching off of his argument, I worry that we could also see massive inflation in the costs of childcare similar to the sharp rise in tuition in the era of massive subsidization. The presence of such eliminates the price competition as a factor and thereby removes the downard presures on costs. We have seen this push tuition rates to sky high levels and this could do the same as well. The best answer to this is ensuring some degree of price competition and ensuring that the inflationary effects still cause a countering downard pressure in the form of a competitor winning the service instead as a result. I am uncertain as to how well the present numbers will preserve such price competition.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I am not criticizing the presence of a percentage, in fact it is undoubtedly a better approach with regards to the inflation concern then say that of an overal sum as Polnut has referenced. I would support his strict basis, which I think can chart a middle course between simplicity on the one hand and dealing with the inflation concern on the other.

Mr. President, do you think it totally impossible for childcare facilities to garner a certain reputation and thus have a similar, if not quite to the same extent, effect as the aura of a prestigious institution of higher learning?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

People are seriously pandering about which Kindergarten is better for their kiddoes?

But to come back to topic, bore does make the most sensible and important point here: We are not subsidising parents to send their children to a childcare facility of their choice, let's say the one at the local country club; but we are offering every child a place at the logistically cheapest, nearest facility. There is a difference between that and college loans, and it is precisely this difference that generated the problems associated with college loans, and thus, this programme will not entail the same problems.  

Yes, but are you resting all of that on the words "Reasonably local"? I also don't see anything about cheapest in the text, but maybe I am missing it somewhere.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Yes, it's pretty clear that the bureaucrats administering this would choose adequate, affordable childcare, not the luxury ones or their like.

Why is such clear? Bureacrats act under the guidelines they are restricted to. If they are not then such guidelines will be determined by mid level and maybe higher officials who may be subjected to bias either of a personal nature or as a result of outside pressure.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

How about you give people a subsidy, assuming the subsidy format is used, an amount equivalent to said percentages of the cost at daycare matching said X,Y,Z criteria. Parents still have choice and at the same time will be limited as far as the subisdy goes with amount said daycare costs, versus the quality delivered of coursed.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Damn thirteen days and no response to my post, or anything in general for that matter.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It would very much depend on what those conditions were. If they were just to do with quality then we'd have a university tuition fee hyperinflation situation pretty quickly. If they included cost as well that's slightly different, but again we'd have to be very careful, lest we get a situation where, as often happens with price controls, it just becomes uneconomic to supply any childcare.

My favoured solution is something similar to schools where the government guarantees childcare (although actually, now I think about it, this should probably be qualified so that childcare is not expected to be delivered to people living in an incredibly remote village or farm) but not specific ones. So people would be allowed to claim the discount for at least one, and maybe more childcare centres.

Oh dear, the rural wars are spreading.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

We seem to be going in circles over the question of how best to ensure the application of childcare subsidies so as to answer a range of concerns.

1. Distance
2. Current Cost
3. After-effects
                a. Quality of Childcare
                b. minimizing potential cost inflation.

The best balance of these is what we need to find.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Capitalistic-nationalist propagandizing? Hitler Youth!


Seriously though, the big reason would be cost and allocation of resources and I don't think the gov't could provide quality service on the scale necessary to provide for what the private market can.


There is good quality childcare out there and though there are some that lack access we need to find a balancing act that minizes the diminution of quality while maximizing access. If a private market with a subsizies for the poor is the best route to take, then I think it would be preferable to take such then to nationalize it as a simple dogmatic answer to a complex problem.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I see this has died once again.

On the question of distance, what would be an acceptable distance? Would a facility that in rural areas differ from that of the city on the account of transportation access and such forth?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I still think the best option is to give an amount of how many hours of free childcare each family gets per week, and act under what's called 'a pupil prenimum' which we have in the UK where the govt give funding per student.

I mean I'm only against giving it on the basis of wealth, because there's going to be a cut off point where a single  mother on 20,001 is not going to get any free childcare, whilst a couple both earning 19,000 get it. I know that's not what the bill says but it's a common problem when you have these caps in regards to education

Shua used to be a big critic of what he called "benefit cliffs" or something like that where you go a dollar over and you are screwed. He used to prefer to use sliding scales and that was how we approached the health care law last Spring to minimize the impact of these cliffs on people.

I don't know if such would work here, but it is a possibility.

Also, you could set a high overall cap and to make sure you are covering most all of the poor and middle class, but not Bill Gates and the like of course.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I am sure we already have the same information being collected by existing agencies for other programs even on top of the tax collections and such so there should be some way to efficiently acquire this information without have the need for too much more in the way of bureaucratic largess.

Healthcare and the Social Security system under the CSS Act, would be likely places where this is occuring.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Its unfortunate, but unavoidable.