News Release: Family and Home Network Asks Government to Adopt Wholehearted Family Policy Non-Profit Organization Marks National Work and Family Month by Offering Parents Resources October 2003

For more information, contact: Susan DeRitis 703-866-4164 media@FamilyAndHome.org

FAIRFAX, VA – Family Home Network is calling on lawmakers to end decades of economic discrimination against families who provide care to their children by having one or both parents cut back on paid employment, and is offering free resources to parents concerned about family/work balance.

“Research confirms how crucial it is for parents to spend generous amounts of time with children from infancy through the teen years,” said Cathy Myers, executive director of Family and Home Network.

“Well-regarded professionals, such as pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton, M.D. and child psychiatrist Stanley I. Greenspan, M.D., have suggested that farming out the care of children to others is a 30 years experiment that must be reassessed in light of what children require. However, federal, state and local governments continue to promote the status quo, through a tax code that discriminates against at-home parents, and an infrastructure that provides extensive information on paid child care, without offering adequate resources on at-home options,” said Myers.

FAHN contends that whether a family has an at-home parent, tag-team parents, family care, paid child care, or other arrangements, the government should be equally supportive of all child care choices, and not favor one form of child care over another. “Current government policies are not best for parents, nor are they best for children. From the national to the local level they do a woefully inadequate job of supporting families who choose – or would like to choose – to care for their own children,” said Myers. “This National Work and Family Month, FAHN calls on lawmakers to provide more than lip-service to family values during election time, and start ensuring that our nation’s laws reflect our society’s value of family by adopting the FAHN Principles of Wholehearted Family Policy.”

Family and Home Network offers free information to parents on its website, www.FamilyAndHome.org. The Principles of Wholehearted Family Policy follow.

FAHN Principles of Wholehearted Family Policy

• Meeting children’s needs for consistent nurturing care must be the basis of all family support policies. We must develop flexible public policies that encourage and support parents’ initiative and ingenuity in caring for their children.

• Tax policies should not favor paid child care over parental care of children.

• Government information and services must accurately acknowledge the following facts: 1) children have an irreducible need for nurturing care; 2) in most cases, parents are best suited to meet their children’s needs; 3) many parents provide care for their own children in lieu of purchased child care.

• When a married couple splits the caregiving/income-earning work, the work of both spouses should be valued equally. In the case of divorce, all material assets, including retirement assets, should be equally shared. If the children have been receiving care from an at-home parent, all efforts should be made to continue that care.

• The U.S. Department of Labor statistic on “mothers in the workforce” simply divides mothers into two categories: employed and not employed. It does not take into account parents that telecommute, work in staggered shifts, work in home-based businesses, and therefore does not accurately reflect how parents care for their children and should not be used in policy debates, media reports or public discussions about the care of children.

About Family Home Network

Over twenty years, Family and Home Network has communicated with tens of thousands of families, from a wide range of socio-economic levels and educational backgrounds. These parents make creative and courageous choices in their lives, enabling them to provide consistent nurturing care for their children. They share their stories, their insights and feelings in the pages of Welcome Home, FAHN’s award-winning monthly journal. Welcome Home helps parents inspire each other and affirm the hard work and sacrifices they make in order to ensure their children have the best care -- their own parents’ consistent, nurturing care.