Continues. Host we are back now with Lisa Hamilton. She is the president and ceo of the annie e. Casey foundation. Good morning, lisa. Guest good morning. Host welcome to washington journal. Lets start off by talking about the annie e. Casey foundation. What is the mission . Tell us more about your organization. Guest the annie e. Casey foundation is based in baltimore, we were started by jim casey, the founder of ups, and his mother was any we are focused on helping all children have a brighter future. We focus on trying to make sure kids were up in strong families, that their families have the economic stability to provide for them and that they can all live in strong, healthy community. Host you say the founder of ups is also who founded this condition. Is that how you are funded privately or are there other Funding Sources . Guest we have an endowment greeted by jim casey. We are created by jim casey. We are selffunded. Host your organization released the 2023 Kids Count Data book. Can you tell me about this document . What does it entail . Guest for 34 years, the foundation has created a databook to provide policymakers and the public with Accurate Information about childrens wellbeing. We identify 16 key indicators of Child Wellbeing in four demands four domains, health, communication, community, and economic wellbeing and every year provide information at the National Level and the state level so that we all know how children are very in this country are faring are faring in this country. We rank the states to see whether they are doing well and take inspiration from other jurisdictions on how they can improve the lives of the children in their communities. This is our 34th databook. We also take the opportunity to highlight a particular issue each year and this year we highlighted the issue of childcare. Host speaking of childcare, what are some of the findings . How would you describe the current state of childcare in the u. S. . Guest we have a broken childcare system in this country which is troubling because childcare is important for many reasons. It is important for children. There are 23 million children in this country under the age of five. About 12 million of them will exit our childcare system at some point during their childhood. We want others children to get off so that they are prepared for kindergarten when they start school. It is important for children that we have a strong childcare system. It is also important for parents. Parents need childcare in order to go to work and to care for their families about that more than 50 of people are working parents. They need the childcare support to enable them to go to work. Childcare is important for our economy. Want to make sure we have workers available to meet the talent needs of this country. We estimate 122 billion is lost in this country, that is the Economic Impact of not having a strong childcare system. We know there are charges in this system from access to affordability to locate childcare workers. We wanted to bring attention to this issue so i policymakers can make sure we have the right childcare infrastructure for our country. Host we are talking again with Lisa Hamilton who is the president and ceo of the annie e. Casey foundation. We are going to get to some of your calls in a moment. We want to get the phone lines because they are different than normal. If you are in the eastern or central time zones, call us at 2027488000. If you are in the mountain or pacific time zones, call us at 2027488001. We have a special phone line for parents or caregivers of children. That number is 2027488002. If you are a childcare worker, we want you to call us at 2027488003. You can use those phone lines to start calling in now if you have any questions or if you want to share your thoughts or experiences in childcare or obtaining childcare. Go ahead, start calling in now. While we wait for calls to come in, lisa, you talked about the childcare system in your words being broken. What are some of those big challenges that lead to this broken system . Guest it is certainly a capacity issue. In this country, there are not enough slots for the children who need care. We have a capacity issue. There are issues with affordability. The average cost of childcare in this country is about 10,600 for toddler care. More expensive for infant care. If you think about the rising costs of everything from rented to food, to housing, having this significant expense and a rising expense puts a strain on any house Household Budget. For single parents, it approaches 30 of their budget. Affordability is a tremendous challenge. Accessibility, a lot of childcare is not on Public Transportation where low income parents might need to access it and the issue is challenging for rural parents and childcare is many miles away from their homes. Those are issues for those try to access childcare. There are also issues for those who are providing the childcare. One out of every 100 workers in this country are in childcare industry, but they are among the lowest paid workers in our economy. That certainly puts a strain on their household, but also has ripple effects in their communities. Nearly all childcare workers are women and a large portion of them are women of color. When you think about the impacts to their families and their community, there are tremendous ripple effects from the located jobs in the childcare the lowpaid jobs in childcare industry. It is unaffordable, and accessible, we dont have the capacity we need and there are challenges for those providing care in this industry. Host before we get to the phone lines, i want to bring up this article. Its is the average cost of childcare, and these are 2021 statistics, the average cost was 10,600 annually for a toddler in a centerbased care. There is also this map that shows in some places, including here in washington, d. C. , that average cost was 24,400. The lowest state was mississippi. 4000 24,400 a year for childcare. When you mention the costs being prohibitive, what does that mean for who is most affected by the lack of childcare access . Guest thank you for bringing up that data. It is an shorter cost on any Household Budget and has a tremendous impact on certain demographics, certainly low income parents are challenged to access care. Families of color, immigrant families, all of these communities, women accessing childcare, it is very expensive and often prohibitive. One of the data points we provide in databook at the National Level and by state is how many parents are not working or have declined jobs because they simply cannot find the care in order to go to work. When we talk about why this is an important issue, it is absolutely important for our economy. Without a strong childcare system, working parents are not able to enter the workforce or to have the stability they need to be as productive as possible. I will also note that infant care, childcare, and in some places it is more than instate college tuition. It really does put into perspective the effect that for our youngest children, we have made care and accessible care and accessible inaccessible. Host we are going to open up the performance. If you are in the eastern or social time zones, 2027488001. If you are in the mountain or eastern or central time zones, 2027488000. Mountain or pacific time zones, 2027488001. If you are a parent, call 2027488002. If you are a child care worker, call 2027488003. Our first caller is doug from las vegas. Caller i did a very confused on how this country gets so screwed up that when all of our politicians and everybody are talking about we have to find a way for somebody else to be paid to raise your children, i dont understand why people think it is all right for someone else to raise their child. People have got to get back to you get married, you stay married, you raise your child. You give up your life to raise your child. The government always was to find a way to pay somebody else to do what you should be doing yourself. Why do we need to pay people to stay home and take care of their child instead of someone else raising their child . That is silly. Host lisa, can you respond to that . That is a different way than a lot of families are set up. Caller guest childcare is important for parents who need to work to care for their families, to have their children cared for. While many families make lots of choices about how to manage childcare, there are parents who stay home today take care of children. Given the rising cost, is often that both parents need to work in order to provide financially for their children which is extremely important. To be able to go to work, we have an early chucker system that enables those parents to go to work and to get their children off on a good start. There are 23 million children in the country, half of them access the childcare system. We have families making a wide variety of choices. For us to have a strong economy, it is important to have a strong childcare system. That is why we need a publicpublic publicprivate chucker system. Childcare system. Host im next caller is mary, both a parent and a caregiver. Caller i would like to shout out grandparents because the childcare issue is not just on the young people. There are plenty of grandparents who have had to take in grandchildren and they are still working. Our parents are not able to give these kids and they have to move in with us and we have to work, have daycare, supply everything. There are services, but they do not cover even infraction of what grandparents have to pay. For all the older people who are out there listening thinking this is just a young kid thing, it is not. Their operative old people caring for their grandkids who have to accept the same burden. That is my comment. Host lisa, your response . Caller thank you for that comment about what we call family friend and neighbor care that children are in a wide variety of settings. There are many families who helped care for children. That is important for shift workers. Many workers are working nontraditional hours where centers are not open to provide that childcare. We know there are many family members or neighbors who are helping to provide care so those parents can go to work shift jobs that dont have consistent hours or 9 00 to 5 00 hours. Host lets go to washington, d. C. Em is a parent. Caller yes, good morning. I have an eightmonthold and when i was searching for childcare, the lowest was 360 three hunters exceed five dollars a week. I am at the middle at about 450 a week. It has not gone up to 520 a week. I only got to 450 because i got a discount because of my job. This is more than what i am paying in rent. It is very much unaffordable. I have to work a weekend job and Childcare Centers arent open so i depend on my family. It is unsustainable for individuals who dont have a skill set, really depending on an hourly wage job. You sometimes have to go on a and if you make a certain, that money a certain amount of money, you cant get that. It is hard out here for parents. Host go ahead, lisa. Caller thank you for that personal story. That is why we want to lift up this issue because there are so many parents struggling to live and eat. Infant care is the most expensive because of the caregiverchild ratio required in regulations. In terms of trying to get support to meet these rising costs, we list in the reported that at the child of element grant is the federal governments primary funding for childcare support for low income families. Only one out of six families eligible for this are able to access it. It is important our policymakers and sure there is Adequate Funding and appropriations some more parents can access those supports. We certainly know there are many families, just like the last caller, who are having a hard time making ends meet and being able to afford infant care. Host lets go to massachusetts. Carl is on the line. Caller good morning. Thank you so much for coming on. What i wanted to say is that i dont think people my age understand that most of these parents would love to stay home and raise their kids. Unfortunately, our whole system is upside down and we cannot do that. When i was raising our kids, my wife could stay home. I could pay the bills. Now, all the young people both have to work. Some people are working two and three jobs. If there is anything i want our society to do, it is to take care of each other. There is money for everything. It would be nice to see these millionaires and billionaires pay some taxes. Maybe these corporations stop getting money back. We could do some really beautiful things for each other. I do want to say it is a shame, ups, it would be nice if they took care of their workers and put some airconditioning in. Host any thoughts . Caller i appreciate that callers understanding of how important childcare is to the economy and the Financial Stability of the households. Parents are working and that is why we need this childcare. They need to provide for their families and childcare is the mechanism to enable them to do that. In this country, we invest 500 per child in early childcare compared to other wealthy nations that invest 14,000 per child. We are far behind what other countries are doing to support families, prepare children for the future. We cannot afford to not invest in our children getting a good start. Host our next caller is a parent calling from boston, massachusetts. Tracy is on the line. Caller i want to say thank you to the annie e. Casey foundation for highlighting this. Other colors have highlighted that childcare is company broken in our country. My husband and i were both workers. When we had our first child, we made the decision that we would continue to work. In essence, i had to work in order to pay for our child to be able to be in daycare because of infant care costing so high. I think that maybe that is what a lot of families face. In order for one parents to not lose complete traction in the workforce and to be able to stay in the workforce, one salary must go towards childcare. I dont think that is completely and a anomaly that completely an anomaly that is completely an anomaly. We need parents to stay in the workforce and in order to not lose traction i have to lose five years of my salary or any parents salary. We were a two working households but we only had to live on one income. It is a complete struggle in a metropolitan area or even a rule area. Thank you. I hope our lawmakers really understand that parents want to learn but we simply cannot afford it. Host lisa . Caller that is exactly right. Childcare is on average about 10,600 per child,. 1 of a merry couple 10 of a married couples income. These numbers are often unsustainable and contribute to one salary of a family going towards childcare. It is an expensive proposition for many families. Host lets go to detroit. Leanne is a teacher in detroit. Caller when i pull up around 6 30s in the morning, it is dark outside. I have to make a choice between my childs standing outside by themselves and having to go to work. We are on the cusp of being a title i school and we have different programs. My question for lisa is, how do you get parents to feel that the paperwork . We sent the paperwork home and we could be a prelunch school, but to get them to fill out the paperwork and say we have this program where they can stay after school with extra reading and things like that, but they want they want even wont even. We do have free afterschool programs, whether it is sports, academic. They want to come in and fill out the paperwork. What can i do as an educator . It only takes five minutes, but if this is what you need and we are offering it, why is it so hard for the parents to fill out the paperwork and sign them up . They dont even have to pay for the afterschool we have. Caller guest thank you for all you are doing to try to make services and support available for families. I cant answer why specific parents arent filling out the paperwork, but parents who are low income in particular are trying to beat a variety of different eligibility requirements for all kinds of programs, whether it is food, afterschool, or housing. Very often, those rules force them to cycle on and off of programs. They are often challenged to figure out what program i am trying to get eligibility for, how am i not eligible for something at this moment when i could have been other jubal a couple of months before i could have been eligible a couple of months before . I dont know the reason for specific parents. Overall, many low income parents are really trying to care for their families while also trying to figure out what paperwork and rules they need to comply with to access the various support for need which were not all the same and have different income and eligibility requirements. That can be challenging for them. Host lets hear from sylvia, she is a caregiver. Caller my grandchild is sleeping right now, that we take care of him between two grandmothers. I realize that is passe, but i called out for grandmothers and aunts to fill in, especially when parents cannot afford childcare places. They are safer with a family. In 1985, i used to take care of teachers children and only charged seven dollars a week. That is passe, but the government needs to step in and help with free childcare. Thank you. Caller thank you guest thank you. Much appreciation for the grandparents that are caring for children when their parents cannot. You are right that they provide so much love and care and support and fill an important gap. I appreciate your encouragement to our policymakers to do more to support families. Host that caller mentioned the government stepping in to lower the cost of childcare, the annie e. Casey foundation did have some recommendations. I will bring them up on my screen. One is that federal, state, and local governments should invest more money in childcare. The other is that public and private leaders should Work Together to improve infrastructure for homebased childcare and to help young parents, congress should expand legislation. Can you talk more about the second recommendation which the caller also referenced, homebased childcare . Why do you think it is important to improve infrastructure for homebased childcare . Caller guest that is a great question. Many students are in centerbased care but there are many childrens served in homes through homebased childcare. As a baby, i went to a homebased childcare center. My mother was a teacher and a lady named ms. Mckinley was the one who cared for me when my mother went to work. Homebased care is externally important for lots of families externally important for the families. Those caregivers dont always have the capital, the resources they need to expand their capacity or those might be interested in opening homebased