When daycare costs as much as college

Photo: Valérian Mazataud Le Devoir The parents of little Lily (on the module), aged 2, are currently paying the equivalent of 600 Canadian dollars per week to send their daughter to daycare in a residential area north of Washington.

Sandrine Vieira in Washington

Published at 12:00 a.m.

• United States

Young Americans from Generation Z who will vote for the first time in the presidential election are facing issues that affect them in a very specific way. Le Devoir met with them in several states to explore the issues that motivate them to go to the polls in November.

Situated in the middle of a row of narrow commercial spaces for rent in a residential neighborhood in northern Washington, the place offers only a small sign to give away its nature: it is a daycare. Inside, all the furniture is gathered in a single room, pretty but rather cramped; even the director is not allowed an office.

It is hard to believe that sending your child there costs the equivalent of 2,400 Canadian dollars a month.

Little Lily, 2, is playing in the outdoor courtyard as her mother, Danielle Geong, comes to the door with a beaming smile. Her straw hat, large glasses and cheerful face belie the worries she has been dealing with for the past two years.

She and her partner currently spend the equivalent of $600 Canadian a week to send their daughter to daycare. By the time Lily starts preschool next fall (a period of just over three years), Geong estimates they will have spent $87,000 U.S. on child care (the equivalent of $117,000 Canadian).

Photo: Valérian Mazataud Le Devoir Danielle Geong and her daughter Lily on the way home from Happy Feet daycare

“Daycare is our second biggest expense, after our mortgage,” reveals the 37-year-old mother. Le Devoir met her in a café a few steps from the private daycare, before it was time to pick up her daughter.

In the United States, child care services receive very little public funding from the state, unlike primary and secondary education, which forces families to assume the entire cost.

While the crisis is being felt across the country, it is particularly acute in Washington, D.C., where the average cost of daycare in 2023 was $23,432 (C$31,700) per year — double the national average of $11,582 (C$15,700) — according to a comprehensive analysis by Child Care Aware of America.

“Unfortunately, I don’t really see any other option than to pay the price. What are our options? ? One of us would have to leave the workforce or try to work part-time, which is not always easy,” laments Danielle Geong.

Especially since with their salaries, the couple does not qualify for the rare subsidized places, since they are reserved for families with an income of less than $90,000 for four people.

As she contemplates Lily’s future, her mother can’t help but imagine that $87,000 could have been spent on a college education or maintaining her old house.

Out of Options

Young children venture into the playground structures at Turkey Thicket Center in Northeast Washington. In the stifling heat, Daniel Querejazu watches his daughter in the sandbox through his sunglasses.

The 4-year-old now attends the free preschool in the public system—a relief, the young father admits to Devoir.

“Her daycare cost us about $2,000 a month. It was a significant part of our expenses, for sure. When we managed to send her to preschool, it was like getting a $20,000 raise!” he says with a laugh.

Right off the bat, he admits he’s lucky to have been able to afford such a rate.

“My wife and I both make above average incomes in Washington. It was a big expense, but we could afford it. Families that make, say, $100,000 a year here, I don’t know how they do it,” he admits.

Near a nearby play structure, Dwayne Guidey keeps an eye on his granddaughter. The outspoken grandfather explains that he kept her at his house before she started school.

“The cost of daycare here is the cost of rent. “That's bullshit“, he says, nodding. He then calls out to his daughter, who is also present at the park.

“You, how would you describe the daycare fees ??” he asks her, with a hint of irony.

“Astronomical,” she replies, laughing out loud.

The young mother quickly gave up on the idea of ​​sending her daughter to daycare when she received an estimate of 2,100 American dollars per month a few years ago.

“That's completely ridiculous. I would have had to work just to cover the daycare fees.” » She considers herself lucky to have been able to count on the help of her father, without whom her situation would have been much more difficult, she admits.

This is also what J.D. Vance, Donald Trump's running mate and senator from Ohio, recently suggested as a solution to the crisis.

“One way to take the pressure off people who are paying so much for child care is to have grandma or grandpa maybe want to help,” he said on tour in Arizona in early September.

That avenue, however, is out of reach for many parents, like Danielle Geong, whose parents and in-laws live in faraway states.

“And even if they did live here, they wouldn’t have time to do it full-time because they’re still in the workforce,” she said.

A topic struggling to gain traction

As the election approaches presidential election, Daniel Querejazu has a hard time understanding why the issue is not more at the forefront. “Whether it's the left or the right, we simply don't really talk about child care or the issues that concern parents. And yet we are a large part of the voters,” he emphasizes.

“I’m very liberal politically, so I wouldn’t vote Republican in every case. But it would certainly make me prefer a progressive candidate over another if they were more vocal about the issue, particularly for low-income families,” he adds.

While affordable child care has often been absent from political platforms, the issue has gained traction in the electoral arena in recent years, says Whitney Pesek, director of federal child care policy at the National Women’s Law Center.

The Washington-based organization fights public policy on issues that matter most to women’s lives in court.

Meeting in a Cuban café along the Potomac River, the director says that more and more bipartisan proposals are emerging.

“Already, in the 2020 presidential election, both candidates addressed the issue. This year, Vice President Kamala Harris has already proposed establishing paid parental leave. That gives us a lot of hope,” she says.

The United States is one of six countries in the world that does not have a national paid parental leave policy. While some employers offer good paid leave policies, most working parents don't have access to them, says Pesek.

That's what forced Geong to send her daughter Lily to daycare just 11 weeks after giving birth.

With the presidential election just two months away, former President Donald Trump has made no promises on child care, but has said his plan to tax imports from foreign countries at higher levels would “solve” the problem.

“Republicans don’t want to invest money. They think it can be done through tax credits for businesses to provide child care, or through tax credits for parents. Democrats, on the other hand, believe it will take public investment to solve the problem,” summarizes Whitney Pesek.

For Danielle Geong, the proposals will have to go well beyond a simple tax credit for parents. “It’s a good start, I guess. But in the context of an $87,000 bill and with a tax credit that would only cover a few months of daycare, it’s just a Band-Aid on a much larger problem.”

This story was funded with support from the Transat International Journalism Fund- Le Devoir .