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FEMINISTS’ FAVOURITE CHILD CARE MYTHS

Over the years, feminists have come up with their favourite myths on child care in order to support and promote one of their major fantasies ­ a national day care program to operate similar to our national health care program. That is to say, all paid for by the taxpayers. This program would provide permanent employment for unionized day care workers, secure on the public payroll with benefits, and would lead, according to feminists, to greater independence for women since it would free them from home and family and especially from men, as they could then enter into paid work force. Feminists never mention that a national day program back in 1986 was estimated to cost the taxpayer $11.3 billion annually, and a leaked document from the Department of Health in 1999 estimated the cost to the taxpayer of $12 - $15 billion annually for a national day care program.

Instead, feminists have honed their arguments in support of such a national child program by creating myths and misrepresentations of the true facts surrounding the child care issue in order to influence a supposedly gullible public to support their fantasy and turn it into reality. The feminists’ favourite myths on child care follow:

Long Waiting Lists for Child Care Spaces

Feminists try to argue that there is a huge demand for child care spaces. They back this by releasing figures of hundreds of parents supposedly on waiting lists for spaces for their children. These figures, however, are absolutely fraudulent. They represent only the figures of parents who at some time put their names on a number of lists. They may have subsequently found a child care space elsewhere or changed their minds about needing child care, or found private care or other arrangements. But the waiting lists are never reduced, they only, relentlessly, receive additions. The lists represent only figures to trot out for propaganda purposes.

Parental Preferences

The false statistics on waiting lists for child care spaces also serve to cover up the fact that the majority of parents do not wish to use government operated child care services.

Parental preferences in child care were made public in the February 2005 study by the Vanier Institute (Reality March/April 2005) in which it was disclosed that daycare centres rank a distant fifth when Canadians are asked whom they would prefer to care for pre-school children. Having a parent provide the care came first, a grandparent second, another relative third, and home daycare fourth, followed by day care centres as the fifth choice.

Even Statistics Canada’s information entitled “Child Care in Canada” 2006, Table 1b, page 45, on child care centres is misleading on this point. Statistics Canada states in its report that 66.1% of children were in child care in 1993, more than 50% in 2005, and 54% in 2006. These amazing statistics are understandable only when one reads Statistics Canada’s spin on the definition of child care, which includes parental care, self-care, kindergartens, grandparents, babysitters, preschool child care facilities! This definition puts a remarkably different complexion on the statistics on the number of children in so called “child care”.

Further, Statistics Canada has buried the breakdown of the percentage of children in day care centres on page 97 of the 99 pages, among dozens of un-explained charts. There we find:

2002- 2003 STATISTICS FOR CHILDREN IN DAY CARE CENTRES
BY PROVINCE IN %

It is obvious that only a relatively small number of children are placed in day care centres in Canada ­ because that is not the parents’ preference: they much prefer other alternatives of care for their children.

The Effect of Child Care on Children

The media and other child care supporters doggedly deny that day care has a detrimental effect on children despite peer-reviewed studies that indicate otherwise.

Little media coverage is given to studies that do not support this modern myth such as the study commissioned by the C.D. Howe Institute released in July 2005. This study of Quebec’s $7 per day child care program found that there is “robust” evidence of negative effects on children placed in child care (See Reality March/April 2006, p.10).

Study by US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

A relatively new study published in 2006 by the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) further disproves the myth about the so-called beneficial effects of child care. This is the only peer-reviewed longitudinal study of its kind in the world. The study was commenced in 1991 and continued up to 2004. It found that putting a child in day care for a year or more increases the chances that the child will have behavioral problems such as becoming disruptive in class ­ a trend that persists through the sixth grade. This tendency is evident despite the child’s sex, family income, and even the quality of the day care centre. This latter finding is particularly disappointing for day care advocates who insist any negative effects are entirely contingent on the “quality” of the child care provided. Although the authors point out that these behavioral problems by no means reach pathological levels, it is nonetheless disturbing. Yet another significant finding of the NICHD study is that effects of all outside learning and care, whether good, bad or otherwise, consistently pale in comparison to the impact of parenting on the child. That is, the influence of outside experts can never be greater than the impact the parent has on a child. The home life of the child does matter. This contradicts the Canadian report “Early Years Study 2: Putting Science into Action”, by Dr. Fraser Mustard, Norrie McCain and Stuart Shanker who argue that children should be placed in child care centres where government licensed “experts,” who allegedly know what is best for children, can take charge of the children. It apparently has not occurred to Dr. Mustard et al that those few parents who are inadequate in their parenting skills should be encouraged in their natural abilities and interests in bettering the lives of their children by the “expert” help rather than employing the “experts” to take over control of the children.

Yet, the myth that institutional child care has no detrimental effects on children continues in order to support the drive for the establishment of a national child care plan.

70% of Mothers Are Employed and Need Child Care Spaces

This is the most frequent myth used by feminists to promote a national day care program. They argue that 70% of women are in the labour force in Canada and, therefore, are desperately seeking child care spaces. This is nonsense.

There are two sources of information to dispute this myth.

The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)

Although this organization fully supports a centralized government day care system on the basis that it would encourage more mothers to enter the work force which would “broaden the tax base” and “expand the labour force,” its own studies, nonetheless, expose the feminist myth of 70% of women supposedly in the work force.

According to the OECD publication, “Babies and Bosses”, Volume 4, 2005, it flatly states that the 70% figure does not refer to Canadian mothers who would actually use day care, that is, mothers of babies and young children who go to work every day, but rather refers to mothers with children between the ages of 0 ­ 16 years. When part-time working mothers (27.4%) and mothers on maternity leave (5.4%) in this age group are factored in, this 70% decreases to a 47.4% full time employment rate for mothers with children 0 ­ 16 years of age. Part-time work could be for as little as a few hours a week.

For mothers with children between 0 ­ 3 years of age, the 70% is even less representative. The OECD cites an employment rate of 57.8% for mothers with children 0 to 3 years of age, the group whose mothers would put their children in day care if they wanted. But when mothers working part-time (30.4%) and mothers on maternity leave for this age group (22%) are factored in, this 57.8% deceases to a full-time employment rate of 28.0% for mothers with children 0 ­ 3 years of age.

Statistics Canada

Statistics Canada uses a very flexible definition of women “in the labour force.” That is, employed persons are those who:

did any work at all at a job or business, that is, paid work in the context of an employer-employee relationship, or self-employed. It also includes unpaid family work, which is defined as unpaid work contributing directly to the operation of a farm, business or professional practice owned and operated by a related member of the same household;

had a job but were not at work due to factors such as own illness or disability, personal or family responsibilities, vacation, labour dispute or other reason (excluding persons on layoff, between casual jobs, and those with a job to start at a future date.” (Report from the Ministerial Advisory Committee, 2007, footnote # 10)

Therefore, when day care advocates claim that 70% of women are “in the labour force” and need day care spaces, it does not mean that 70% of women are working and looking for substitute care for their children, or even want substitute care for their children. In fact, quite the opposite is true.

Canadian Women Know What They Want

Mothers with young children want to care for their children themselves at home and this is reflected in the employment choices they make ­ part-time work, long maternity leaves and fewer hours of work.

“In 2004, 27% of the total female work force were part-time employees, more than double the proportion of just 11% among employed men. Women currently account for about 70% of all part-time employees, a figure which has not changed appreciably since the mid-1970’s” according to Statscan’s The Daily, March 7, 2006.

Thus, even after millions of tax dollars have gone into day care lobbying, the numbers support parental choice for home care over institutional care. Upon careful analysis it is evident that Canadian mothers are independent and want to care for their own children at home, especially in the early years of development.

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