Wednesday, June 14, 2006

NYTimes | The Price of Day Care Can Be High

The Price of Day Care Can Be High
By David Leonhardt

[...]
Starting in 1997, the Quebec Family Policy subsidized day care for 4-year-olds at government-approved centers around the province. By 2000, the program had expanded to cover any child not old enough for kindergarten, all the way down to infants. This is universal day care, an audacious idea that recognizes the revolution in women's work over the last 30 years.
Judging by the response of parents, the program has been a hit.

[...]
Almost a decade after the family policy started, however, there was still a big mystery about it. Nobody had done the work to find out how it had affected children. The province was spending $1.4 billion a year on a grand social experiment, yet no one had bothered to look at the results.
NYTimes Business June 14, 2006

Related More on Quebec The Quebec research paper (pdf) Other research on children