|
Day Care |
|
In a 1997 Survey by the AFL-CIO entitle Ask A Working Woman, respondents ranked equal pay, health insurance, a safe workplace, job security, and paid sick leave as their top priorities. Childcare ranked second to last. 1
Why?
White women are more likely to enroll their children in institutional daycare centers than black workers of similar incomes.2 While many other cultures may have an increased reliance on extended family for childcare, the white collar employees see such daycare as an educational opportunity. Those with a stronger financial need often state a preference for increases in salary.
In addition, many working women simply do not have young children at home.
Yet one cannot blame the companies for being out of touch with such a large percentage of the workforce. Feminists “building the newest incarnation of their movement on their concern for working mothers” convinced corporate executives that on-site daycare was a means of “proving their commitment to women in a material fashion.” 3 They are simply responding to a powerful lobby, one whose agenda remains largely unquestioned.
The question remains why this push continues. When questioned, the head of the Working Woman’s department of the AFL-CIO responded that women’s priorities stem from their lack of awareness. She insists that these women “don’t know about the brain research” that indicates interactions with caregivers helps a child’s brain matures. 4
Whatever the cause, while blue-collar and low income women remain ambivalent about daycare, and are less likely to use it, it continues to be a benefit that inures primarily to the middle class office worker. So while the lobby uses the paradigmatic struggling working woman as the poster child for on-site day care, it is essentially a subsidy granted to those who least need subsidies.
If we want to fund the childcare of the middle and upper class at the expense of the childless, we should at least be aware, and honest, about what we are doing. American culture’s reluctance to question the benefit of anything termed ‘family friendly’ does us a disservice. We need to look honestly at what we are doing, who pays the cost, and who the beneficiaries actually are.
______________________ 1 Burkett, Elinor, The Baby Boon New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000) p 34 2 Burkett, p 33 3 Burkett, p 32 4 Burkett, p 34
|
|
Childfree Issues : Cafeteria Plans |
|
Equal Pay for Equal Work |