WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden will defend a crucial part of his economic plan, funding for childcare that will free parents, mostly women, to work for pay, in a speech at a Connecticut childcare center Friday.
Biden will highlight the need for childcare and preschool investments which “provide a lifetime of benefits for children help parents work and support equitable economic growth,” White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said aboard Air Force One en route to the speech.
Biden originally pitched $200 billion in funding for universal pre-kindergarten and other childcare programs as part of a broader “Care Economy” policy aimed at boosting economic growth by paying child and home health care workers better, and freeing up unpaid caregivers to go to paying jobs.
The White House has touted outside estimates that U.S. gross domestic product would expand by 5% if women, who do most of the unpaid care work, participated in the workforce at the same rate as men.
A $3.5 trillion spending package Democrats presented in August included over $700 billion in funding for social programs, including pre-kindergarten and paid leave, community college and grants for low-income students. Democratic Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema want to trim the package significantly, and Republicans are universally expected to against it.
(Reporting by Heather Timmons; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
