Public subsidies for child care are fundamentally designed to increase access to and affordability of child care for families who would otherwise be unable to avail themselves of this service. That these aims are being served by the current array of subsidies went largely unquestioned at the workshops. And families who receive subsidies appear to be in a better position to select from a broader array of providers than equally poor, unsubsidized families. Questions of the adequacy with which these aims are being served, however, and for whom, were actively discussed at the workshops.
Public funds fall far short of meeting the needs of all eligible low-income and poor families.
Workshop participants identified a series of detrimental consequences that flow from this confusing mix of policies and from shortages of funds relative to the eligible population. Foremost among the concerns noted by state and local child care administrators was the zero-sum decision making that necessarily characterizes the allocation of limited funds between the working and nonworking poor. Although federal child care subsidies have been greatly expanded in the past five years, overall levels of public assistance at the state level still leave a sizable proportion of the eligible population unserved. For example, Bruce Liggett from Arizona stated that he is serving 30 percent of the families eligible for Transitional Child Care assistance. Trade-offs are particularly acute between serving AFDC families who are making efforts to obtain job skills or enroll in school and serving families with employed parents who are living in or near poverty.