Global Daycare is Not the Answer

It could be argued that society is in pretty sad shape. Children, in particular, are suffering from a host of problems including anxiety, obesity, aggression, ADHD, and depression at the highest rates in history.

The new U.S. Strategy on Global Women’s Economic Security is not going to help matters much. In fact, it could make things a whole lot worse.

Jennifer Klein, director of the White House Gender Policy Council, said the goal of the initiative is to achieve “women's full and equitable participation in the global economy.” And Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the strategy prioritizes “creating a world in which all women and girls everywhere can contribute to…economic growth and global prosperity. That’s a world in which we will all be better off.”

It certainly sounds good, but will we all really be better off?

If you look under the hood of this strategy as I did, you find the secret to how the Biden administration thinks the economic security and prosperity of women—and the world—will be achieved. It says, “The U.S. government has partnered with the World Bank and is leading diplomatic engagements to encourage partnerships in the recently launched global Invest in Childcare initiative, housed at the World Bank, which will expand access to quality child care and early learning programs globally.”

The intent of the strategy is to incentivize governments to take on the responsibility of providing childcare for virtually all children so that all mothers can “contribute to economic growth” by joining the public workforce.

The World Bank’s initiative claims that childcare can “improve child outcomes” and that “quality childcare can provide the critical inputs needed during the early years to build the foundational skills that will help [children] succeed in school and throughout life.” This may be true for some children in some circumstances. But is it true for most children most the time? Is public care the ideal option for small children?

It remains to be seen what the results of this aggressive, global, government-led push to get children out of their homes and away from their parents at even earlier ages will be. But we can get a clue from Sweden and Canada.  

Sweden and Quebec

In Sweden, publicly funded, non-parental care has expanded since the 1970s and now “over 90 percent of all 18-month to 5-years-olds are in daycare.” A government inquiry in 2006 found:

[M]ental health among Swedish 15-year-olds declined faster from 1986 to 2002 than in eleven comparable European countries. For girls, rates of poor mental health tripled during this period, from nine to 30 percent . . . The increase happened in all groups of youth regardless of family situation, labor market situation or parental socioeconomic status.

Similarly, the Canadian province of Quebec introduced subsidized universal daycare in the late 1990s. Roughly a decade later, a study showed “striking evidence” that children in the program were “worse off in a variety of behavioral and health dimensions, ranging from aggression to motor-social skills to illness.” The analysis also indicated that participation in the program “led to more hostile, less consistent parenting, worse parental health, and lower-quality parental relationships.”

A follow-up study years later showed many problems were worsening over time and that “boys in day care showed more hyperactivity and aggression, while girls showed more separation anxiety.” There was also a sharp increase in criminal behavior among those who participated in the Quebec program.

While these troubling developments cannot be blamed solely on disassociation from parents, one is left to wonder what impact being removed from the care of their mothers in the early years of their lives has had on the population of Sweden and Quebec, and what impact it might have elsewhere.

Do Mothers Have Anything to do with Child Well-Being?

Jenet Jacob Erickson, a researcher specializing in maternal and child well-being says,

“It appears that through the uniquely attuned interactions of a mother, a child develops an ‘internal working model’ for understanding and experiencing all other relationships. When the attachment relationship is secure, the infant…develop(s) the capacity to appreciate, understand and empathize with the feelings of others.”

Conversely, when a child’s attachment to her mother is inconsistent or insecure, the infant can develop “a mistrusting orientation” which often “prevents the child from developing appropriate social regulatory mechanisms.” If not addressed, this “may develop into feelings of depression, anxiety, aggression” and other socially maladaptive behaviors.

In short, Erickson says that when children experience consistent, loving, reliable interactions with their mothers during their earliest years of life, this “enables children to develop the moral awareness and responsibility that forms the underpinnings of their moral behavior beyond infancy” and often for the balance of their lives.

While mothers need not be with their children constantly, it is difficult for little children to receive the emotional assurance they need if their mothers are consistently absent. Psychologist Erica Komisar says, “According to a Pew research study, working parents spend on average 1½ hours per day with their young children, which is not enough to provide them with a foundation of emotional security.”

While research does not show that spending time in daycare is a death sentence to a child’s development, is it possible that increased maternal absence may have something to do with the deteriorating state of our children and our society today?

Komisar thinks so. She says “the effects of maternal absence on children” are a “major social issue of our time.”  And is it possible that initiatives like the U.S. Strategy on Global Women’s Economic Security that prioritizes getting mothers away from their children might makes things worse?

Perhaps a world where women can prioritize time with their babies and contribute to economic growth is “a world in which we will all be better off.”

As we watch society careen toward self-destruction like a dumpster fire on wheels, it might make sense to consider whether prioritizing and facilitating a mother’s time with her young children just might be the best investment in the future of the world that can possibly be made.