Free childcare could raise money - article in Guardian

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

If you look past the fact this article assumes it's only 'mums' who need childcare, it's interesting - they're saying that the cost of providing free childcare would be small compared to the amount of tax parents would generate if they could access free childcare:

www.guardian.co.uk/money/2011/dec/11/free-childcare-millions-tax-mums

So, the government would make money if they funded more childcare because the amount it cost to fund the childcare would be less than what they'd get in taxes from more parents working?

Interesting.

That does of course only work if there are enough jobs to go around.

LRD - interesting article. I agree with the IPPR that more childcare support especially for families on lower income would be a good thing (and better than tax deductable childcare which would be regressive)... But I think these discussions on childcare tend to miss the point a bit.

This is illustrated by the interview with the mother in the piece "I have a degree and marketing qualifications and would love to have a job if childcare wasn't so expensive. Most of the jobs available are in care homes or as Avon ladies, so they don't pay enough to cover all the costs."

As a paragraph this doesn't make any sense ....she has a degree in marketing, but the cost of childcare is preventing her getting work....as a care home assistant??

But as a working parent it makes complete sense, because of the unspoken assumption that she can only look for CHILDCARE COMPATIBLE jobs (local, flexible, limited hours, no travel etc..).

Focusing just on low cost childcare to allow women to do childcare compatible 'lady jobs' with no prospects is just not good enough, it just subsidises women into low paid dead-end jobs.

I wonder what the cross country data from the OECD shows? In the other countries where there is cheaper childcare and more women are working, are they doing the same jobs as men, or are they in a service-and-care ghetto?

I read this article this morning and thought it was a great idea at first. However, I also thought the lady with the degree talking about care work was a bit odd. It would seem that the intention would be to allow women to do certain low and middle income jobs.

In addition, what if you don't want your children in nursery full-time? Despite the fact that I worked full-time after ds1 and have worked 4 days a week since ds2 was born, until this September the boys only ever went to nursery one day per week. This was because dp did a job share, so he was able to be at home in the week and they spent a day with grandparents. I wouldn't have wanted to put my 7 month old in full-time nursery.

If you read the article, it also says the nurseries could be funded by cutting other things or means testing winter fuel allowance. I think it's missing the point about why women don't work or are under employed.

Himalaya- 8-6 m-f year round child care would enable parents to do all 9-5 jobs, I don't see how this is dead end?

I think it's a great idea and should have happened years ago.

Rosy- the way universal benefit is going to go is that BOTH parents will be expected to work full time to claim any benefits eg child tax credit and housing benefit.

It's a philosophical thing- in other European countries women expect to work full time all their lives except during stat mat leave. All this part time 'mummy tracking' is very peculiar to the uk.

Sorry, been out all day.

I just linked the article because I thought it'd be interesting to people here - I am the opposite of informed about it all.

Having said, aubergine, FWIW my brother was telling me today that his mate's wife (a doctor) found that in Bavaria where they were living, she was interviewing for jobs for over a year, and they'd simply turn her down saying 'but you have children. We don't give jobs to women with children. You are needed at home'.

That sounds worse that the UK to me (or more blatant at least), but then I suppose it may be a very localized issue.

Aubergine -

I am all for affordable childcare/subsidised childcare for families on low incomes.

But I think that to focus so much on the cost of childcare as the only obstacle to women working, as is often the case in public discussions on women's work opportunities is to miss the reasons why many women are not working/not working as much as they would like/working in jobs for which they are overqualified and not being stretched (dead ends...).

Where I live (outer outer London suburb) 8-6 childcare is not enough to enable a woman to do a 9-5 job in central London as long as she is also 100% responsible for pick-ups and drop-offs, not to mention that there are few jobs in the private sector beyond basic administration where people religiously get in at 9 and leave at 5 each day.

The problem is not that the salary for these kinds of jobs doesn't cover childcare (particularly in a two earner family) it is that they are not compatible with family life, and particularly not if only one partner is responsible for childcare.

If you start of with the answer = subsidised childcare, you get into lines of thinking like with the woman interviewed, where she was saying that with subsidised childcare she could afford to be an Avon lady or work in a care home, rather than thinking about would it would take for her to get back into the work that she trained for in hope of a career.

Subsidised childcare can be a good thing but does not deal with the underlying issues (men without access to subsidised childcare don't sacrifice their career the moment they become dads...).

LRD- yes in Germany women are 'expected' to stay at home until their youngest is over 3, then they are expected to work. Sex discrimination laws are European so they were breaking the law by saying that to her.

Himalaya- i'll admit that I'm no expert on the private sector, but in the public and voluntary sectors there are plenty of good (managerial, well paid) 9-5 jobs. Commuting time in the UK is the longest in Europe, and even higher than USA so I think we should be sorting that rather than having longer childcare so people can do 3 hour commutes. It isn't good for anyone, parents or not to be wasting over 2 hours a day travelling. Also that is predominately a SE/London problem, where most people dont live. Part of that problem is overinflated housing costs and dual-income couples who cant get jobs close to each other so live in the middle and both commute or sacrifice the woman's job and move near the man's.

We also have a very long working week, again not good for anyone. These cultures need to change, but dont you think that free 8-6 childcare and therefore an army of staff who can work these hours will shift the patterns for everyone?

I dont think that the woman was saying that she would use subsidised childcare for avon/care jobs- these would be out of hours, ie the kind she could do now if she worked in the evenings/weekends when her DH is home. THAT kind of working pattern is dead end. Subsidised childcare would help her get back to her career.

My experience of Germany (Berlin rather than Bavaria) was a little different in that although childcare was heavily subsidised it tended to be part time. Most women I knew would take a year maternity leave but then go back part time, as childminders were only open til 2 or 3pm, lots of children would finish nursery at 3pm too. Some did work full time and have their children in full time nursery, and some had live-in au pairs who would do the 3pm pick up, but mothers working part time seemed the norm from my experience.

Saying that, the subsidised cost of childcare in Berlin was good, with 30 hours a week at a childminder costing aroun £100 a month. Though they generally have higher child to adult ratios than in the UK.

Here is Belgium 99% of children start the Maternelle system aged 2.5 - this is free with a small charge for before / afterschool care. My dd's school is open 7.30 til 6pm every day. And there is not the same culture of Presentism - my office is deserted by 5pm. Many of my female colleagues work 4/5ths as do some of the male ones.

Yet in Belgium only 50% of (working age) women work. I expect this is linked to Family friendly tax policies - a working person with non-working partner and 3 dependant children is the optimum position I think. Plus child benefit increases the more children you have - eg about 100 euros for the first, 150 for the 2nd and 220 for the 3rd.

Tax is really high here -so if you have maxed your tax breaks and have more than one child, it really is better financially for one partner NOT to work unless they are a really high earner. And of course - because of other factors - that tends to be woman....

Aubergine - I agree, working patterns, the way we build cities, the fact that suburban schools are seen as better and less challenging environments than inner city ones - all of this matters for why women disproportionately give up their career aspirations on becoming parents, even if they eventually go back to some kind of work which fits around motherhood.

I agree the answer is not longer childcare - the answer may not be to do with childcare at all.

I think the answer has to challenge the deeply engrained idea that becoming a mother is fundamentally different than becoming a father, that women only have "starter" careers which they can put down for spells of 5 years or more, that part time work is out of the question for the primary earner, that women's careers matter less and that women should be expected to be the primary parent.

If men faced a situation where having a couple of children meant giving up work for 5 years and then only being able to go back to local/no pressure/regular hours/no travel positions (for which they will be competing with 100s of other dads willing to accept low pay in return for family-friendliness) ...and that that is ok because they would get subsidised childcare (to make up for the fact that they had so stunted their careers that it is hardly worthwhile to work at all...) - I don't think many would have children in the first place.

(by the way, I think the subsidised childcare and family tax breaks etc... offered in many European countries were designed as measures to counter falling birth rates, not inequality at work)

It doesn't sound like the model of subsidised childcare in Bavaria, Berlin and Belgium has done the trick to make expectations of mothers and fathers equal .

yes- definately true that tax/childcare policies were more about raising birth rates so stave off the demographic timebomb (and raise income tax income in the short run) and not for equality reasons

The demographic hit is really going to come in the next 20 years- and work patterns WILL change- whether this will benefit women or not remains to be seen