As you've said really well, early childhood educators are professional educators. They have a body of knowledge that they get through post-secondary education. They have expertise in pedagogy, in child development, in creating safe and inclusive learning environments, in documentation, in assessing progress and in working with children and families.
One of the unique things about this profession is that it is relationship-based. The reason that educators are the greatest single contributor to the quality of the program is that the relationship the children have with the educators they spend their day with has the greatest impact on the outcomes for them. The concern is that there is a clear link between the well-being of those educators and the well-being of the children in their care, because what the research also shows across professions is that the quality of the working environment and the supports available to professionals in their practice directly impact the quality of the services they're able to provide. They also impact the length of time people stay in a given profession.