[jacalata]

>For me, that makes it clear that, at current price level, daycare workers cannot have a middle class income. Also, if they had, lots of people couldn't afford child care.

You're assuming here that the payment all has to come from the parents disposable income. Other countries (try to) address this with government or employer subsidies for childcare, eg in Australia http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/services/centrelink...

[e12e]

Doesn't most countries finance school for older children partially or entirely through taxes as well (primary school)?

Obviously, education is seen as a necessity both for (semi)functioning democracy, but also for any modern society to work. It seems odd that we're happy to take care of kids for free (or highly subsidized cost) from the age from 6 to 16 -- but somehow the years 1-6 needs to be paid for by parents? Are those 4 years really so much more expensive, that it wouldn't make sense to just roll that all up into one budget?

I actually need to look at the arguments around this in Norway -- free school from the age of 6 to 18, along with a free college education isn't really an issue - and full coverage of child care services also have broad agreement -- but somehow simply making said childcare free seems to be much more contentious. Or perhaps just overlooked.

I suppose one could make up microeconomic arguments along the lines of a solid education for all benefits all, while allowing all parents those extra 3-4 per child in the job market might not benefit all. Perhaps more interesting is the general trend that there's less work -- so having people spend some time off from work (with eg: pay from the government) might simply be a more efficient model going forward.

But if we accept that free primary school is a good thing, I don't see how we can argue that free kinder garden isn't too.

[crpatino]

It does come out of parents disposable income, eventually.

If the government subsidizes it, taxes will go up and disposable income goes down (though part of the cost gets externalized to childless taxpayers).

If most employers pays for it, cost of living will go down, and salaries will also go down (for everyone, so your childless coworker's salary will also go down and the difference will either go to the shareholders, or maybe the CEO will just pat himself in the back for his brilliant cost cutting ideas and give himself a big Christmas bonus).

All in all, it sounds like the only cases where it makes sense to subsidize is in countries with an aging population. Otherwise, it's fairer to pay living wages to workers and have each parent pay out of pocket.