A Century of Working Women and the Future of Family Childcare
In June 2020, the Women’s Bureau in the US Department of Labor celebrated 100 years of its work to advance the well-being of working women. From its inception, a central focus of the agency’s work has been childcare. Family childcare — provided in homes rather than institutional settings — is the preferred choice of many working women. Running a home-based childcare business has also long been an important avenue for women’s entrepreneurship, especially in low-income communities. Yet since 2005, the licensed family childcare sector has lost almost 100,000 providers, declining by 44 percent.
For this centennial anniversary of the Women's Bureau, Katharine Stevens hosts a special webinar on family childcare. What is uniquely valuable about home-based childcare? What is causing its decline? What is needed now to restore this crucial sector — especially in a post-COVID-19 world?
This audio first appeared at an American Enterprise Institute event held on June 12, 2020.
See Also
Op-Ed ~ June 16, 2020
Event ~ July 29, 2020
Report ~ June 21, 2017