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**APRIL 28, 2021**

Kuttner on TAP

Universal Pre-K: Will Biden Do It Right?

****

There is a great deal in Biden's American Families Plan to be thankful
for. In a stroke, his administration has expanded the bounds of what is
politically mainstream.  Assuming it can get through Congress, which is
by no means certain, the devil will be in the details.

For instance, Biden proposes to spend $200 billion over a decade, or $20
billion a year, for what the White House fact sheet describes

as free, universal pre-kindergarten for all three and four year olds,
through "partnerships" with the states.

Ideally, these should be true public institutions-an expansion of
public school kindergartens downward to younger kids, with teachers
compensated accordingly, and the federal government paying the increased
cost.

The details are not spelled out in the materials released so far. But
reading between the lines, it looks like something more incremental and
fragmented.

For instance, the administration says that pre-school teachers are
required to be paid at least $15 an hour. That equals $30,000 a year for
a full-time teacher. It's certainly an improvement over what many
pre-k teachers currently make, and it sounds good-until you appreciate
that the median salary for kindergarten teachers is over $59,000 a year.

This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to rebuild and expand true
public institutions. Too many of our human services, from the Affordable
Care Act, to for-profit nursing homes, to day care chains, are
public-private Frankensteins. Taxpayers pay the costs, but providers
operate as proprietary institutions that profit-maximize by squeezing
actual care and caregivers.

That, in turn, requires government to play whack-a-mole to enforce
complex rules and limit the games entrepreneurs play-and government
often gets outplayed.  True public institutions are more transparent,
more accountable, and fairer to both caregivers and clients.

Do we really want to spend another $200 billion to expand Kentucky Fried
child care? Or shouldn't we seize the moment to reclaim the public
realm?

This plan does give progressives the chance to push to have this
expansion done via public schools, but the result on the ground is
likely to be a crazy quilt. The legislation itself should specify that
these must be public institutions attached to local public school
systems if the Feds are to pay the costs.

It feels almost churlish to raise any questions about Biden's bold
plans. But, in their efforts to expand human services, Democrats over
the years have made too many fatal compromises that come back to haunt
them. This time, dammit, if we are going to go big and bold, let's
also do it right.

~ ROBERT KUTTNER

Follow Robert Kuttner on Twitter

Robert Kuttner's latest book is
The Stakes: 2020 and the Survival of American Democracy
.

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A majority-vote resolution would overturn a Trump-era rule that
facilitates the evasion of state interest-rate caps. BY DAVID DAYEN

Biden Needs to Fire the FBI Director

Trump-appointed FBI director Chris Wray cannot be trusted to handle the
continued surge in white supremacist violence and terror. BY MARIAMA
SOJOURNER EVERSLEY

First 100: The American Families Plan

Biden moves health care improvements out of the infrastructure package.
BY DAVID DAYEN

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