Our government has been trying to bring in a national daycare program, and I've been feeling like there's something wrong with me, because I've had a really strong gut reaction against it. I haven't been able to really put my finger on why. Then I read a post by Drublood, and realized what's been bugging me.
My objection to it, is that it is being set up so that we can have more taxpayers, not to help people. The right wingers have a point on this one. By setting it up to expressly not give support to stay at home mothers, it is taking away a choice rather than giving women an option. Right now, women are being put in the impossible position of having to work twice as hard so that they can afford daycare, and rent. The Liberal plan doesn't allow them to choose to work less, and look after their children more.*
What the daycare program being introduced doesn't do is provide women the option of choosing to stay home. I'm not advocating that women should have to stay home and raise children, but I don't like a system that forces women into the workforce at the expense of raising their own children.
We need to figure out a system that allows parents a means to raise their own children in the way that they see fit, without penalizing them for choosing to focus on their career, and without penalizing them for making their family their priority. I'm not sure what that system would look like, but I know that the system currently being set up isn't it.
When you add in that our governments constitution expressly says that this is outside the federal governments purview, this looks more and more like social engineering to force more people into the workforce to pay taxes to the federal government rather than an altruistic endeavour to help women.
1:I know that I'm being sexist by not including the possibility of men staying at home, or talking about single parent households headed by men. Statistically, they are a very small minority, and don't face the same problem of being paid less for the same wage, or having just taken a year off due to pregnancy.. etc. Women ARE in a different position than men, and it is overwhelmingly women who face the difficult choice between prioritizing their work or their families.
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