Child care in crisis? What's the real motivation behind Travis County Prop. A?

"One lunch per month," proponents of Travis County's Proposition A claim the final cost will be to taxpayers.

Prop. A, a property tax rate increase of 2.5 cents per $100 valuation to fund child care services and related contractors in the county, would come out to about $10 per month for the average Travis County resident.

This begs the question of why lunch is now $10 to begin with, when you used to get back to the office with a five dollar bill and some change.

We all know the familiar refrain by now: rising taxes and unrestrained spending in Austin and Travis County has led to, among other factors, a decimation of small business vitality and an exodus of working families from the urban core. Will, then, heaping on another small tax increase keep families in the middle from leaving, or bring them back? 

Proposition A, many sources are claiming, is an attempt to make up for COVID-19 era child care funding going away. It aims to "increas[e] access to affordable and high-quality child care and afterschool/summer programming and related services for low-income families and developing and administering related workforce and economic development programs." According to a description provided by supporters to the League of Women Voters (an organization which supports Prop. A, by the way), "The childcare situation in Travis County is dire."

"The average annual cost of childcare is $13,000, the highest in the state. 2,000 children under the age of three in low-income families need child care right now. People wait approximately two years to access affordable child care. Options available to parents whose schedules are outside of the 9-to-5 workday are extremely limited," the Vote For side claimed. "... The money raised would go toward increasing the number and quality of childcare providers, providing scholarships to families in need of assistance and incentivizing businesses to offer child care stipends to their workforce. It would also help current childcare providers survive the loss of federal pandemic funds in 2026. The program will be overseen by a contractor(s) that would procure more childcare providers. The majority of eligible children are residents of the City of Austin. Equitable distribution of funds throughout the County will be determined before the program is launched."

No Vote Against perspective was made available, so in the interest of balance, here's the Tracker's.

Contractor pork. First, let's consider the growing number of virtually un-auditable contractors that have taken over an internecine web of social services in Austin and Travis County. This only adds to the "third sector" gravy train that is not accountable to any one agency of government or the basic free market, in a city that refuses to allow for an actual audit. For example, the city of Austin contracted with a beloved local nonprofit to run a homeless shelter in a converted hotel -- 78 beds for a total of $17 million and counting. That's roughly $218,000 per sheltered person ... so far. It's this kind of runaway spending we can expect to see if Prop. A passes, with plenty of middle-men profiting off of the contracts.

Rising costs. Secondly, such spending distorts the marketplace of child care services. If county-funded contractors are able to spend more for basic supplies, employee wages, and other expenses, will that drive prices down for 100% private day cares? Anyone with a basic understanding of economics knows the answer there (no, it will cause the prices to increase). This would be unfortunate as only recently has Austin launched a program to allow home-based child care businesses in just about any neighborhood in the city. Will Prop. A actually kill home-based day cares and other entrepreneurial endeavors?

False motivation. Thirdly, there is a "doomerism" driving the moral rationale for this bond. You read the word earlier: "dire." The thought was that after COVID-era funding for child care dried up, that the industry would teeter off a fiscal cliff, waiting for state and local governments to rush in and rescue them. That has hardly been the case, as earlier this year, "Total employment in the child care sector had made back its pandemic-era losses ... and continues to trend upwards despite hitting the 'child care cliff' last summer ..," wrote Patrick T. Brown on Twitter/X.

Leftist ideology. And finally, this is radical feminism-fueled social engineering at its slyest. While it's true there is growing demand and low supply for child care services, the approach toward fixing this will not keep traditional families in mind. "Equitable distribution" of the dollars will be overseen by county czars, which means more DEI-type interference. By contrast, Republicans such as U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio have advocated using federal funds to support parents who opt to raise their children at home and issue funds via a parent-controlled voucher system -- ideas that would be anathema to the average liberal working in a Democratic county administration. And forget about loosening regulatory burdens on the small business owners who often run child care centers. The money would very likely go toward one goal, and that is to avert a feared "she-cession" of women in the workplace (that never really panned out -- click the link). And you better believe preference will be given to POCs and LGBTQI.

Playing devil's advocate here for one paragraph: perhaps we're being overly cynical. Maybe $120 a year isn't too much for us all to pay to finance a wide network of child care businesses throughout the county. Who cares about the method of delivery?

Back to economic reality: If the recent past has shown us anything about social services contracting, inflation, doomsday thinking (from climate change to she-cession), and government "solutions" driven by sheer idealism, it's that we're right to be skeptical. 

For those points of justified doubt, we support the Travis County GOP in opposing Travis County Proposition A on the 2024 general election ballot. Vote Against it, and don't feel guilty for doing it. There are other ways to drive down costs for all small businesses.