Family & Home Network

Inclusive Family Policies

Family and Home Network is a nonprofit organization, founded in 1984 and committed to supporting and advocating for parents who forgo or cut back on paid employment to nurture their children. Our public policy activities include writing informational articles and editorials, participating in policy symposiums, and educating public officials. We call on policymakers to establish principles of inclusive policymaking. Public policies (including tax laws, child care subsidies and information services) must support all quality care for children, which includes at-home parenting, tag-team parenting, kinship care and parent babysitting co-ops. The ways in which parents meet their income-earning and caregiving responsibilities should not determine their eligibility for government provided or government mandated support and services.

Working for Inclusive Family Policies

Current government policies are not best for parents, nor are they best for children. They’re not fair, and they need to change.

Whether a family has an at-home parent, tag-team parents, family care, paid child care, or other arrangements, the government should not be supporting one choice over another. Yet this is exactly what federal, state and local governments are doing in many ways. Here are two examples:

Federal tax credits: the federal Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit is available only to some families with children. Many families who purchase child care and document their expenses are eligible for this credit. Other families, many with modest incomes, care for their children in other ways, and they are not eligible for the credit.

Government information: The government supports the use of purchased child care over care provided by parents by producing and distributing incomplete and biased information. Governments spend many millions of dollars every year producing brochures, printing posters, and maintaining websites about child care. There is no information supporting parents who want to care for their own children. Public opinion polls show that most parents think at-home care by a parent is best for children. Our leading doctors say full-time (30-40 hours or more per week) day care is not advisable for infants and toddlers. Yet government information minimizes children’s needs for nurturing care, marginalizes the quantity and quality of care provided by parents and is narrowly focused on full-time paid child care.

Please join us in working to establish better public policies for all families by becoming a Member of Family and Home Network (A basic Membership is just $15.00).