I'm somewhat prepared for this question, because I do honestly battle with it in my own head. As I tweeted the other night, I spend over $10,000 a year for one child. Part of the reason why we've waited so long—not so long, but long enough—to have another child is that I could not pay for two children in day care.
I think a national child care strategy addresses many access barriers. It would allow people to access child care. My fear with a national child care strategy, or the piece I would like us to add to it, is exactly what you're saying. Our experiments are addressing unique needs. People living in poverty are going to have different child care needs than other populations do. We are going to need to respond responsibly to their needs.
I have many conversations with families who quite honestly ask me—and I've thought about it with this project I'm pitching—why they would send their child to day care. They say they're home and they can take care of their child. Part of it this is about communicating the importance not only of child care—and we can even think about that in the title, “national child care”—but of early learning. It's about family development, both pre- and post-natal.