Will the future lead to smaller and more individualized childcare?

I have seen a lot of discussions on how the future of work will be some sort of Hybrid where a few days a week we might be at home and a few days a week we might be in the office. That’s all well and good when we have a handle on Covid-19, and I mean a vaccine or something close to that, but till that happens, what do we do about childcare?

I am not sure I want to send my kids to a daycare center, I am sure they are doing everything they can to keep kids safe, but the more kids in the center, the higher the chances of infection spreading (I think?)

Would day care centers go into smaller classrooms? Instead of 10 babies, maybe 5 in the same space? Does that mean more teachers? Does that mean higher costs?

Does that mean → Wait for it → Subsidised Daycare? Yessss, . of course, why not?

We are already spending a lot of our tax dollars on Covid-19. Lets portion some of that to the wonderful institutions that help the future of our nation. Or make it even easier, increase the Dependent Care Tax Credit so people can afford safe child care of their choice and concentrate on what’s important, bringing our economy back up and running.

In the U.S., if you are paying someone to take care of your children while you work, you can be eligible for a “child and dependent care credit” which I think can give you back up to $6k as tax credit, as in your tax bill goes down by that amount. There’s caveats to the amount, depending on your income and the number of children and other factors, but the point is the government already has a program to help.

Double this credit, make it 12K to start out with and let’s encourage the day care centers to not only cut the number of kids by half, but also look into a other options like offering an inhome childcare option where a daycare teacher/nanny comes to your house and takes care of your kids there for perhaps a higher price (and you could use that same option when your kids are sick, OMG!!!).

Maybe, just maybe, go a step further and offer a hybrid option where a few families get together and hire a daycare teacher (from the same daycare) to take care of a small group of kids in one house. (Would the cost be lower than the at day care cost because you don’t have to worry about facilities?)

You want to take it a step further, benchmark the cost of childcare in the country to some average, I am going to go with 1K per month for ease, and let’s say you are doubling the costs to accommodate Covid related expenses, so 2K per month, well, increase the dependent care account to 24K per year and let’s really invest in our people and our future.

What, a person can dream can’t they?