Trump Officials Draft Plan to Pay At-Home Parents, Using Funds for Working Ones
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The Trump administration is moving to allow married couples with a stay-at-home spouse to collect child care subsidies, a policy championed by Vice President JD Vance, using funds from a federal program intended to assist working parents, according to people familiar with the discussions.
The change would create the only federal subsidy to pay parents to stay home and raise their children, one of the most significant efforts to date by the Trump administration to harness federal funds to promote a traditional view of families.
To do so, officials are seeking to use a Health and Human Services Department fund that was created in the 1990s to help low-income and working-class parents afford child care so they could work or go to school.
Under the draft new rule, parents who stay home with their children could benefit from the program, which typically provides about $9,000 per child each year, potentially reshaping which families get federal child care money.
The move could end up redirecting money away from working parents and their child care providers, causing some to raise their rates or even close, critics said, potentially worsening what many experts say is a child care crisis in the country.
About 80 percent of the 870,000 families who currently get the child care subsidies have single working parents, most of them mothers, according to Health Department data.
The policy change would effectively create a government incentive for parents to stay home with their children, an idea embraced as part of a broader conservative effort to advance policies that promote more mothers staying at home.
The new rule being drafted would allow married couples with one stay-at-home parent in certain income brackets to collect a subsidy, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the plan before it is finalized. The change could be made without approval from Congress.
More than 80 percent of stay-at-home parents are mothers, according to the Pew Research Center.
The plan is being pushed by the White House and is seen as a top priority of Mr. Vance, according to several people familiar with the discussions. The draft rule also incorporates policies in legislation written by Secretary of State Marco Rubio when he was a senator from Florida.
Representatives for the White House, Mr. Vance and the Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to requests for comment.
Mr. Vance, whose wife Usha , a former corporate lawyer, gave birth to their fourth child in July, has long advocated for more mothers to stay at home with young children and called for efforts to open up child care subsidy program s to those providing “kinship care.”
In 2021, Mr. Vance co-wrote an opinion essay in The Wall Street Journal contending that day care can harm children and declaring, “Young children are clearly happier and healthier when they spend the day at home with a parent.”
He also wrote then on Twitter that “normal Americans” want a “family policy that doesn’t shunt their kids into crap day care so they can enjoy more ‘freedom’ in the paid labor force.”
“I am a big proponent of more support for stay-at-home parents. But this is not how I would choose to do it,” said Joshua McCabe, director of social policy at the Niskanen Center, a centrist think tank.
“Expanding the eligibility without increasing funding would mean more parents competing for the same dollars, and leaving more parents — particularly single working parents — worse off,” he said.
The $12 billion Child Care and Development Fund, which is run by the Health Department’s Administration for Children and Families, was created during the Clinton administration to support the employment of low to moderate-income parents. It subsidizes the care of children up to age 13 and currently offsets the costs for caring for about 1.3 million children .
Under the current rules, most of the money is distributed to states, which in turn distribute it to parents, usually in the form of vouchers or direct deposits to child care providers.
To qualify, parents must prove that their income is lower than 85 percent of their state’s median income and that they are working, in school or receiving job training. Some states set a lower threshold of 60 percent of the state’s median income.
Under the proposed rule changes, the same pot of money would also be used to pay married parents who meet the income requirements when one parent works and the other cares for the child. The money would be intended to help offset the lost income of the stay-at-home parent.
The proposal “creates the option for a new category of care, parent-based child care, that will allow one married parent to receive C.C.D.F. assistance to care for their own child, while a spouse works at least 35 hours per week,” according to a draft document viewed by The Times.
Unmarried couples in which one parent stays at home would not qualify under the draft. Single parents who do not work are currently not eligible for the subsidy, nor would they be under the new proposal for married couples.
The rule, which could still changed before publication, would need to be approved by the White House and then would be posted online for public comment. If it is finalized, it could go into effect as soon as next year.
The idea of paying parents to stay home was outlined in Project 2025, the conservative blueprint published by the Heritage Foundation ahead of Mr. Trump’s return to office, much of which overlaps with the administration’s policy agenda.
“Instead of providing universal day care, funding should go to parents either to offset the cost of staying home with a child or to pay for familial, in-home child care,” it says, although it does not specify how or which fund to use.
“You don’t need statutes to do it, and with existing programs we can end discrimination against stay-at-home parents,” said Roger Severino, a vice president at the Heritage Foundation who wrote the Project 2025 section on child care policy.
“It would be a welcome change to see equal treatment between commercial day care and the contribution stay-at-home parents provide in caring for and raising the next generation,” he said in an interview. “It doesn’t get more pro-family than that.”
In a letter to governors on Mother’s Day, Alex Adams, the head of the Administration for Children and Families, previewed that policy changes were coming and urged states to “use every available” flexibility to distribute federal money in ways that “support married two-parent families,” and particularly “families who choose to have a parent remain at home with young children.”
Child care policy experts said they anticipate that in some states, the rule change could lead to much of the money going to stay-at-home parents. States have some flexibility in determining how their subsidies from the Child Care and Development Fund are allocated, and lawmakers in some red states, including Idaho, Wyoming and Utah, have pushed for new policies for the states to support stay-at-home parents.
That outcome could in turn shutter some of the roughly 225,000 child care providers that rely on the subsidies for tuition payments.
Krystal Gastineau, the owner of Cribs 2 Crayons, a child-care center in Aurora, Colo., said that about half the children she cares for receive the subsidies, which are paid directly to Ms. Gastineau’s business via direct deposit. “If they could, I think parents would choose to take the money and stay home,” she said. “That would take away a major source of income.”
Lezlie Cranston, in Auburn, Wash., uses the subsidy program to pay for care for her 4-year-old son, Ricky, and her 2-year-old daughter, Samantha, while she pursues a certification at Skagit Valley College. The subsidies have “helped tremendously with allowing me to do my coursework,” said Ms. Cranston, a single parent.
“But changing it to let the money go to stay-at-home parents is going to create conflict between parents,” she said. “That’s a bad situation. We’re already trying to figure out how more working parents can get the subsidies. This could lead to single parents not being able to afford child care again.”
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sounds like a real bonus for the keep'em barefoot and pregnant crowd that likes to dress up every sunday morning ...
Morning... Oi...nothing wrong with our platypus.. don't go picking on him..
bloody hell, the nights in the bush must really get cold on that sandbar. best keep the beavers and ducks separated ...
Too late. The damage is done. Evolution has been turned on its head. And it's all Australia's fault.
luckily the salt water crocks and great white sharks surrounding that sandbar make most escapes impossible ...
It keeps all the undesirables out.. even Trump is not game to set foot here..
And yes platypus can give you a very painful and intense sting with its spur...and resists normal pain killers..even better..
Just the way we like it...
Why is this a bad idea?
You have rarely been at a loss before, did something change?
The article spells out the proposal pretty well. What's wrong with the proposal?
here's a better idea, make employers pay a living wage for a full time job to employees that have a family ...
What is a living wage? Does that demand for a living wage extend to daycare workers?
The usual suspects place more importance on work than family. That's a very anti-humanist philosophy.
a living wage is what disappeared with the graduated tax schedule. if you want a subsidy for those that want to live out the values and lifestyles of a specific demographic, tax their fucking churches and make those proceeds pay for it, instead of laundering their money to meddle in politics ...
Might be more worthwhile to tax their fucking universities: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, etc. While we're at it we can tax their fucking sports. And their fucking political parties shouldn't be allowed to dodge taxes, either.
So, who deserves a living wage? Are parents going to pony up for daycare workers' living wage?
Because it is a waste of tax money
How is this different than tax money used to subsidize daycare? The first drafts of the proposal redirects funds currently being spent so it's not intended to spend more tax money. The usual suspects are griping that the proposal does not increase spending.
Daycare at least spreads the cost and benefit over a larger group.
Again, overpopulation is the real problem
So providing each child minimal care at a profit is preferable to a parent's care? Indoctrinating children into the culture of corporate conformity is critical for the profitability of the future.
It used to be 'God, family, country'. Now it's 'Greed, profit, money'. The United States doesn't need families any longer; they cost too much. What the country needs are more financial planners and CPAs. Marriage vows are replaced with corporate non-compete agreements and NDAs.
Overpopulation or underfunded? If the United States was a productive nation then that overpopulation would be a customer base -- a source of profit. Since the US abandoned a productive economy for get-rich quick scams, we're forced to compete with all the other consumers around the world.
Maybe we've become the excess population not carrying our weight?
Kids cost money and your time, who should pay?
Parents have no control over devaluation of our money. As time goes on, everything will cost a lot more.
If the economy was working as it should then this wouldn't be an issue. But that's not what happened. The Federal government is responsible for screwing up the economy and the value of our money. So, why shouldn't the Federal government be liable for the costs incurred by its policies?
Private organizations are held financially responsible for damage they cause. Why should public institutions be exempt?
"Why should public institutions be exempt?'
Who would the real payer be? With a private organization the owners would pay or lose value. With public it is the taxpayer.
Well...
and the left are being accused of being socialists or communists.
I have no problem discussing adjusting the current per child tax credit and think families raising kids should get to keep more of the money they've earned, but I don't think we need to create a new federal subsidy to have to apply for, qualify for and, sadly, like every other federal subsidy, have a percentage of Americans abuse. Also, this, coupled with the anti-immigrant push and the obvious attempted whitening of America just reeks of white nationalist dystopian baby factory. And I'm sure all of them will be taught to praise their dear Leader from the moment they can talk.
it's another step in the direction of eliminating basic services to the disadvantaged and to trap non-working women in a bad marriage.
Remember those old Socialist and Communist propaganda posters celebrating the common laborer, the factory worker? The rally cry is "workers unite" -- not parents unite.
How is parental care different than daycare in your tax subsidized worldview? Why is it necessary to buy a substitute for parental care? The Federal government already subsidizes daycare. Democrats are demanding we spend more public money subsidizing daycare. Well, a parent is a daycare worker, too, in that tax subsidy context. The proposal does not create another subsidy; it is expanding the types of daycare being subsidized.
I realize the elite want to ensure their 'brown' housekeepers remain divorced, dependent, and deprived. I realize that the elite applaud the Communist ideal of wage slavery in service to their collective. I realize that the elite have been pursuing ghettoization of the United States for their own self interest.
This right here. They don't plan to pay enough for the stay-at-home parent to actually live. Just enough to supplement the working parent's income. That will leave the SAHP, which is almost always going to be a woman, financially dependent on her husband. Many women have found out the hard way that this can be a recipe for disaster. And since the program only applies to married couples, she won't even be able to get the pittance this program offers, if she leaves.
This is also aimed at decreasing the number of daycares available to two-income families and single mothers, and the services provided at those daycares. For example, many of the daycares here also function as pre-schools, so kids get a bit of a head start before kindergarten. The county also provides speech therapy at many of them for children who have speech impediments, free of charge, and I know several families whose children benefitted from the early intervention.
If this program is so great, I'm sure we'll see a lot of dads volunteering to be SAHPs while their wives bring home the bacon s/
it's a maga variation of the nazi lebensborn concept to produce more obedient white evangelical thumper scum, since both bait and switch ideologies are in a terminal swan dive of decline ...
Excellent comparison.
the list of parallels between maga and nazis grows daily ...
Couldn't have said it better myself.
Why do they want to pay moms who are already at home, money? NO! goddamit NO!. Get a job or go back to school!
I thought the same thing
When actual teachers suck at their job, they get fired. When parents think they have what it takes to be a teacher with no training, they naturally suck at it and can’t be fired.
Isn't that a backhanded argument that all children should become wards of the state? Following that logic would lead to eliminating the need for maternity leave, doing away with leave to care for a sick child, and avoiding family encroaching upon work? Logically family obligations are an encumbrance on institutional priorities.
Apparently the only role for a parent is to warehouse children at no cost to collective society. Parents are too stupid to teach or make decisions about a child's wellbeing. Parents are only supposed to be a source of revenue without interfering with institutional imperatives.
I didn’t say every parent is incapable of home schooling, I just mentioned the obvious fact that some will suck at it and unfortunately for those kids their lives will suffer for it. Have you never met a parent that would obviously suck at home schooling a child? Do we really need to monetarily encourage them to do so?
several churches run a daycare as a membership perk, or as a money laundering operation. some get federal money for it.
I see a lot of tax exempt business going into bankruptcy, prime real estate going into foreclosure, and a lot of new life insurance salesmen entering the workforce in the next 3 years.
a lot of well behind the curve homeschool rejects are what compelled my sister to get her masters and leave grade school teaching. she become a IT media specialist in a school district where most teacher interaction with parental morons was when their mouth breather kids didn't play in the big game, as opposed to why they can't make the grades and are 2 years behind and holding the rest of the class back.
lots of money to be made with some laptop schools that are short on the basics and long on thumper indoctrination.
I have mixed feelings about homeschooling. My cousin homeschooled his daughters, along with his wife, and they did great. She's a teacher by profession, and he's an engineer, so they had the tools to do a good job. She covered most subjects, and he covered science and math, as those were obviously his strengths. She was able to stay home with them, as he made decent money, but as soon as they were high school age, she went back to work as a teacher.
Every homeschooling family does not have that advantage. Frequently, homeschooling parents are not especially educated, themselves. They might be able to handle the elementary grades - reading, writing, simple math, and so forth. I have definitely met in person and encountered online parents who either homeschooled, or were considering it, whose own grasp of grammar, math, civics, etc., was lacking.
Too often, homeschooling is just a way of avoiding information parents don't want their children accessing, like evolution, sex education, or balanced instruction regarding history and civics. Many homeschoolers are also convinced that their kids are being indoctrinated by public schools (which is ironic, considering their own motivations), and object to that. I couldn't tell you the political leanings of any of my teachers growing up, or of any of my son's teachers.
totally qualified, unlike the majority of those more inclined to base their child's education decisions on religious inclinations.
my sister's experience was from decades ago in fracking territory, in a very blue collar community, lacking the proliferation of online products available now that are directed towards those that want to see their children become vulnerable by restricting information available to them with a religious mental governor in the development of critical thinking.
I have those in my extended family that have negatively altered their children's lives by over-protection with a religious theme. I cannot tell you the number of times that each of my children have confided to me their thanks for not forcing any type of religion on them. more like common sense human values was what I taught. believe it or not, I was the family favorite to have my own dysfunctional family with all the perks that come with it, but we are extremely close, to the pissed off envy of other extended family members, and all 3 of my kids are way ahead of me professionally back when I was their age.
I had one who was blatant about discussing his personal politics. And the school my kids went to had a Bible blatantly displayed in a large showcase next to the office
I had a social studies teacher that was anti-democrat in jr. high school. he coerced me and a few other classmates into thinking we were in danger of failing his class, unless we could do some "extra credit" work the following saturday. the work involved going door to door for nixon and handing out pamphlets while he monitored us from inside his car. I had just gotten started and knocked on a door where the male resident was obviously not a nixon supporter and while he was yelling at me, he opened his screen door and set his beagle on me. this was witnessed by my teacher who came to my rescue. I was then sworn to secrecy, relieved of further extra credit work, taken home, and finished his class with an A or B average for the year.
Teachers got away with murder back in our day
Sounds like welfare to me...
a financial reward for being a traditional and devoted xtian american family ...
consult the disqualification book before filling out the 1/2 page application ...
ie: how long have you been a reliable member of your home church? how many underage females are in your family?
It takes money away from working people and gives it to idlers. Sounds a lot like socialism or the White House renovation.
Maybe in order to qualify for this subsidy these people should also take care of a neighbor's children so that she can work.
Back in eht 50s and 60s when stay at home parents were the norm workers were paid enough to support the whole family. No subsidies required.
trump has accomplished relieving the ultra wealthy of their fair tax burden, now it's time to reward the thumper morons that put him into office.
Why is commercial daycare work while private daycare considered idling? it's the same child being provided similar care.
The only readily apparent distinction is taxable income. Those with taxable income are working. Those without taxable income are idlers.
What does childcare have to do with the means of production? Or public/private ownership? Collectivizing childcare would seem to be more Socialist than subsidizing parental care.
Again, this seems to be an argument over taxable income. The government loses income taxes from the working mother and business taxes from the daycare. Why is it necessary to make money more important than children?
The dollar has lost over 90% of its buying power since the 1950s. A living wage in 1955 was $1.00 per hour which would be $12.50 per hour today. So, what do you mean by living wage? The math shows that a minimum wage of $15.00 per hour would exceed the living wage of 1955.
The problem is that the Federal government deliberately gifted the economy to the financial sector. We are living in a financialized economy instead of a 1950s industrial economy. Today's economy produces credit and debt. Subscribing to services cannot provide a materially betting lifestyle. And much of our labor today is engaged in provided services rather than provide material improvements to lifestyles.
People spending beyond their means to buy consumable services doesn't support the arguments about a living wage.
Bingo...
Because I am already paying for schools
They want me to pay for people to stay home and not work? I'm already doing enough of that!
Amen!
Just what we need is a bunch of stay at home types with time on their hands and getting money for nothing!
Well, I would suggest staying at home for a week with my grandchildren. It's effing exhausting. Feed me, Get this, please, get that, change the babies diaper, baths, do a load of laundry, pick up the living room, try to clean the bathroom while the baby naps, break up the fight over a book. and on and on 24/7, 365.
I raised my 2nd son while working swing shift. I was exhausted after 3 years and impregnated the mrs again just to get out of doing it.
I would rather go to work
People are saying that Trump's a Socialist!
Not sure why this is a big deal for the left. They have been demanding working taxpayers pay for illegals and moochers on welfare.
More than likely, the only reason they are against it is because Trump proposes it.
It it were ANYBODY with a (D), it would be met with them saying this person is a hero and forward thinking.
this benefit will go only to married couples even though-
Approximately 40% of all births in the U.S. occur to unmarried women, highlighting that a significant portion of children are born outside of marriage.
copilot
So?
It is odd.. Giving stay at home mothers the same subsidized childcare benefits parents who put their kids in day care enjoy is the one type of welfare they find objectionable. They fight like hell to ensure taxpayers get ripped off by the billions in fraud welfare scams that benefit illegals (look at Minnesota), but giving working class stay at home mom's the same benefits they give to those who put their kids in daycare is apparently a bridge too far.
Very odd.
It's not odd. It's politics. I don't give a shit about this policy change per se, helping families is a good thing. I oppose that they are doing it by rule change and not by law and it will take money from those who the law was meant to get the money.
What I find odd are those that opposed Biden's school loan write off as unfair to those who paid are now okay with this. Is this also not fair to those who made their child care needs work? Or to those that must have two working incomes to afford their lives? Help me with the logic.
g. I oppose that they are doing it by rule change
Which is fair but certainly not the basis most people have given.
it will take money from those who the law was meant to get the money.
So... this about welfare for small businesses? Does a family not deserve to keep their own money at least as much a small business deserves welfare?
It is, of course, extremely bizarre that people who supported Biden's school loan write off oppose this. Though I think the difference between voiding a whole class of contracts (but not mortgages, car loans etc) is much different than simply allowing everyone to enjoy a benefit and fixing a policy that discriminates against stay at home parents is pretty obvious.
The law for funding a specific program was passed by Congress and now one department is going to change it by rule change. Personally I'd rather see my tax money support small businesses like child care and not big business like ExxonMoble in tax breaks, deductions and regulatory preferences.
Building strawmen already? It ridiculous.
Does the child tax credit discriminate against couple who can't get pregnant? Does farmers relief policies discriminate against feed stores? Our representatives target a group and draft laws.
If the people behind this change wanted to fix the policy then they should go back to Congress to amend the law and appropriate additional funding.
the simple disqualification of contributions to any religious entity as a charitable tax credit would offset the cost of daycare.
So would not giving tax breaks to corporations that make billions in profits.There are a lot of ways to fund and support children and families without increasing the national debt. Unfortunately we have oligarchs running the country and taking trust fund money way from trust fund kids just won't stand.
As Big Corporations' (say like BIG OIL) make record profits thanx to some embarrassed pedo protector, adjudicated sexual assaulter, found guilty of sexual asssault/RAPIST started an illegal FCKN WAR to avoid his tremendous participation in avoiding and distracting from his 37,000 plus times mentioned in the
TrumpMaxnotwellEpsteinDefiles, where his private DOJ (Dickhead Offensive Jerkoffs) totally botched the release of an almost completely unanimous that was supposed to be for victims, anonymous, release of ALL documents with only redactions for the victims, while purposely instead, divulging victims names, info, and even pictures, while redacting the pedo criminals including 47 who via four separate credible interviews was declared, along with his scumbag buds, to be plaintiffs in child RAPE accusations that were buried like the ranch in New Mexico, all as protected remain the pedo rapist and crimes even worst, accused powerful people who should be hung by the Steeple they often try to climb and hide behind, and are again, often, suck cesspool at it !
This STUPID idea to attempt to help force people to get married and or make it easier to cheat an already inadequate program, already cheated, to be further dependent on a corrupted beyond belief GOP, as they distract with a stupid harmful act, such asz this, while Big Corporations and Crypto scams are void of oversight and robbing US All blind, the Trump fam makes Billions. Billions from an illegal distractful WAR he swore would not happen under his fake watch, while time and time again, he kicks US after grabbing the women(children( buy and in the collective crotch all as his sycophantic LOSERS destroy our entire country under his watch, that has been stuffed up his asz liek Bruce Williss' old mans,for too long, like with Butch of actual Pulp Fiction, cause when Christopher ain't runnin, Christopher Walken, unlike the pseudo pulp fiction that Trump cuts down Washington Cherry Trees on OUR grounds to produce this wasted space of pulp, and tries to get US to drink a big ole NOT Kool Aid gulp, on the Golf of America, Lake America, Lunacy America, and as big biz and Oligarchy jiz suck up their record profits, y the GOP pushes table scraps not fit to feed the Dogs of WAR costing Billions each day and SO MUVH MORE, all while they try and ad Vance to their list of whore(S) violating and distracting from the PEOPLE, the PEOPLE this totally fckn CORRUPTED collection of social infections is robbing, and continues to trick and distract, from just another of soo damn MANY, a CORRUPTED ACT!
Dr Laura has infected Newstalkers....
for her audience, I'm sure her journalistic integrity matches her morality ...