Childcare is desperately needed in much of the U.S. and especially for lower income people but while the First Daughter Ivanka probably hears from lots of her friends that they wish child care were cheaper, the proposals from the Trump campaign are meaningless to the vast majority of people who really need help.
Tax credits and other dumb ideas
Funding childcare centers with free or inexpensive childcare like lower cost housing for those with low incomes, would be a wonderful benefit for all those single mothers and working families who have to hold down two or even three jobs just to feed their families.
It wouldn't be difficult to implement, just make it a part of the public school system, but the Trump proposals would do absolutely nothing for them - the people who need help most.
It would also benefit the entire country by reducing major causes of crime and Poverty - Children left to raise themselves.
Tax credits, tax deductions, or dedicated savings accounts are great if you have an income of $50,000 or more because you pay taxes, but are meaningless to the millions of families who struggle from paycheck to paycheck just to feed their kids - what money do they have left over to fund a childcare saving account, or medical savings account, or retirement fund, or any thing except the month’s food and rent envelopes.
Many working poor don’t even have bank accounts since the working poor need those few extra dollars that banks charge.
What all these Republican policies which involve saving for retirement or paying for childcare through tax deductions ignore is that those who really need childcare help don’t pay taxes in the first place so they get zero benefit from any childcare benefit tied to reduced taxes which they don't pay anyway.
Of course President-elect Trump didn't pay taxes for years either but that was because in one year he lost nearly $1 billion.
Real world families
In the U.S. a family of two earning well above the poverty level which is about $12,000 per person, pay no federal income taxes today - in fact, given a reasonable number of deductions and a couple of children, a couple earning double the poverty level income pay no Federal taxes at all.
Given even a $10/hour minimum wage, which is considerably more than the Federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour (the Obama white House wanted to raise it to $10.10 per hour), a 40 hour full time job would pay only $15,080. The Federal poverty level for a family of two is $16,020 so when you hear employment numbers for the U.S. bear in mind that one full-time job for a family of two can still leave them officially poor.
Since many people work less than the old 40 hour/week, the average work week in the U.S. is only 37 hours now, they earn even less.
Worse than useless?
So, while the proposed Trump policy to help families with child care expenses sounds great, in reality it only provides help for the rich or middle class, a family earning more than about $50,000 per year, arguably a family which doesn't really need help.
That makes the Trump policy worse than useless for two reasons. First, tax credits for the wealthy reduces the money available to reduce the deficit or fund poverty programs and second, the policy makes it appear that help is getting to the poor while in reality it is just another welfare for the wealthy program.
