A policy change being pursued by the Trump administration would redirect federal childcare funds from low-income, working parents to married couples with a stay-at-home parent.
The proposal would take money from the Health and Human Services Department's $12 billion Child Care and Development Fund to provide married, at-home parents with a subsidy of about $9,000 per year, or about $700 per month.
The proposal has its critics.
"That's not enough to offset the cost of labor for one person working outside the home," said Washington University sociologist Caitlyn Collins. "If a family has already decided to have a parent stay home, $9,000 is much better than $0. But to me, pulling this money from the pockets of [working] low-income parents simply is not the solution to our problems as a country."
Collins, who authored the book "Making Motherhood Work: How Women Manage Careers and Caregiving," has spent the past 15 years interviewing working parents to understand their experiences. She said the subsidy proposal does not reflect the will or needs of parents.
"Most mothers with a child under the age of 5 report that staying at home is not their preference," she said. "They want to work outside the home."
By making marriage a prerequisite for receiving benefits, Collins added, the policy also has troubling racial implications. She noted that 63% of Black children lived in a single-parent family in 2024, versus 23% of white children. "It would benefit white families and harm Black families," she said.
Instead of reallocating subsidies to stay-at-home parents, Collins would like to see support extended to all families in the U.S. — many of whom struggle to pay for childcare.
"Childcare is one of the primary sources of stress for the women and men I've spoken to," she said.
Molly Gingrich Kuehling's daughter will begin daycare in October at 3½ months old. The St. Louis parent said the cost is nearly equal to the mortgage.
"If the government is so concerned about plummeting birth rates, they need to make being a working parent more affordable," Gingrich Kuehling said. "Not only do I value my own career, I also can't afford to not go back to work."
If the federal government is serious about providing parents with more time with their children, Collins said, it should implement a nationwide paid family leave policy.
"We have paid family leave policies at the municipal level and at the state level [in] other places across the country. Research out of those places shows that it has had either a neutral or a positive effect reported by businesses on worker turnover, profitability and morale," she said. "It's a win for employers, for our national economy, and for families when parents get to be home with their new little, precious baby in those early months of a baby's life, when we also know that care outside the home is the most expensive."
To learn more about public policies that support both working parents and stay-at-home parents and Caitlyn Collins' latest research on how families in the St. Louis area navigate the childcare market, listen to "St. Louis on the Air" on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube or click the play button below.
"St. Louis on the Air" brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha, Darrious Varner and Alex Heuer. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr.
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