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New Hampshire
Editor’s Notebook: Child care is a pillar – and it’s buckling under the weight • New Hampshire Bulletin
A reader with a Danish relative emailed last week to point out how differently Denmark and the United States view taxation, specifically when it comes to investments in people and families.
Despite the high individual tax rate in the Scandinavian nation, the reader wrote, there is an understanding that the contribution is not only immediately and personally beneficial but nourishing for communities over the long term. It funds health care, child care, elder care, education, and so many other services that make living in society infinitely better than the cold and lonely alternative. Isn’t that something – a nation of people who gratefully pay taxes because they see, every day, the better place the money builds.
There’s a bit of a “scale” difference, sure: Denmark has a population that is roughly equal to that of Wisconsin. Also, I’ll bet there are plenty of those 5.9 million Danes who aren’t exactly “grateful” to pay taxes – and Denmark has its own domestic problems. There is no nation-state paradise on Earth, nor is there a perfect system for funding and delivering services. And the fact is that even in these divided times America still has an awful lot going for it. That doesn’t mean, though, that we shouldn’t be looking around for better ways. And one of the things Denmark does better than us is child care.
Let’s start with a snapshot here in New Hampshire. Last week, the Carsey School of Public Policy at UNH released an analysis with a stark headline that still managed to be a bit of an understatement: “High Child Care Costs Strain NH Family Budgets.” The assessment from researchers Tyrus Parker and Jess Carson is worth your time, and it pulls you in right off the bat with this sentence: “In 2023, the average price of full-time, center-based care for an infant and a 4-year-old in New Hampshire was nearly $32,000 a year.”
That’s just the beginning of the financial nightmare for young families here, as Nicole Heller of the New Hampshire Fiscal Policy Institute outlined in a recent commentary for the Bulletin. Add in the cost of housing and other expenses, and the idea of remaining or becoming a Granite Stater starts to feel like a pipe dream, especially for the fresh adults of Gen Z.
The broad stroke is this: If you have a baby and a toddler, you’re looking at more than $2,600 a month for someone to watch your kids so you can work enough to pay for child care. Alternatively, in a two-parent household, one parent stays home with the kids and the family tries to make a go of it on one salary. Either way, it’s not a great system – in fact it’s the kind of structural problem that ripples out and blows up lives and local economies.
We all know how important the 0 to 6 developmental years are for our kids – we know it experientially and through reams upon reams of data. So to make something as crucial as child care unattainable or unavailable for most young families is the kind of shortsightedness that helps sink nations.
And that takes us to Denmark.
In 2022, Scandinavia Standard published a piece titled “Outside In: Exploring Childcare in Denmark” that invited two women – one Danish and the other an American expat – to compare how each perceived the Dutch child care system. Among the American mother’s biggest gripes was this: “We had a situation where the teachers were complaining because our daughter didn’t want to take her food out of her lunchbox. All the kids were supposed to take it out and put it on the plate and then eat off the plate, but Rainey was just eating it straight out of the lunchbox.”
If that sounds like a ridiculous cultural thing to complain about, that’s because it is. And the American mom was well aware of that. She was invited to go negative, for the sake of the comparison article, and that’s the best she could come up with. The Danish mom, for her part, offered that she’d like to see a smaller ratio between adults and the kids they watch.
Cost, believe it or not, wasn’t on either list of grievances. That’s because Denmark subsidizes child care at about 75 percent, meaning the Danish government contributes roughly $23,000 annually per child in early childhood care. The U.S. government spends about $500 per child each year.
Republicans like things to be left to the states, as we know, and that includes dealing with the runaway costs of child care, addressing the shortage of child care slots, and guaranteeing child care workers a living wage. As that $32,000 figure from the Carsey School suggests, it’s not going all that well.
New Hampshire has tried to chip away at the problem, especially for low- and moderate-income families, by expanding eligibility for the NH Child Care Scholarship program. But as NHFPI noted in January, the program is helpful only if those who qualify know it exists. “The New Hampshire Child Care Scholarship program,” the brief stated, “has been historically underutilized, with nearly half of families surveyed reporting they never heard of the program.” (If you’re one of those families, or if you know one of those families, please visit NH Connections.)
Lawmakers did pass the modest Senate Bill 404 this past session, which expanded child care professionals’ eligibility for the scholarship program. And House Bill 1056 created “exceptions in which a child may remain in day care for more than 13 hours.” Another made a tweak that would not have sat well with our Danish mom: HB 1407, signed by the governor, created “a waiver for larger ratios in licensed child care facilities for infants and toddlers.” There were a few other small changes that passed into law, including adjustments to certifications and licensing.
Other measures, like HB 1611, to establish a “child care workforce fund” for retention and recruitment, hit the party-line wall: That one died by a single vote in the Republican-majority House.
House Republicans were much bigger fans of HB 1213, to remove “the immunization requirements for child care agencies.” That bill is a lot of things, but “a step forward” on child care is not one of them. The Senate sent it to interim study.
Child care should be one of a handful of issues – along with housing and funding for public education – that annually dominates legislative debate because every single one of us, whether we have children or not, is affected and harmed by inaction. Instead, I fully expect State House Republicans to give most of that energy and urgency to their push for “parental rights.” Alleviating any piece of a family’s child care burden – and thus helping to boost a strained New Hampshire workforce – will probably have to wait until we’re certain that parents are empowered to keep Howard Zinn off a class syllabus.
I’m not sure what a real child care solution looks like within the political reality of 21st-century America. We seem light years away from the Denmark model, despite the occasional moonshot proposal. U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna, for example, has a pitch to cap child care costs at 10 bucks a day for the majority of American families.
The California Democrat estimates the annual cost of such a program at $100 billion, and so you’ll likely hear that we can’t afford it. In fact, any plan that doesn’t ultimately deliver piles of cash to boardrooms and shareholders would be, I’m sure, deemed unaffordable. This rich nation of ours, this nation that spends nearly a trillion dollars a year on the military (No. 1 on the list and more than the next nine nations combined), will say it doesn’t have adequate funds to invest in the very people it exists to serve.
Meanwhile, the burden created by our collective failure to build a truly supportive and community-nurturing child care system will grow heavier. And that is how and why pillars crumble.
Crime
Elijah Allman’s arrest on March 1 was his second in New Hampshire in a matter of days.
A court hearing for Cher’s son Wednesday over allegations he broke into a New Hampshire home this month has been canceled.
Elijah Allman’s arrest on March 1 was his second in New Hampshire in a matter of days. Allman, the 49-year-old son of the iconic singer and actress, was also detained Feb. 27, accused of acting belligerently at a prestigious prep school in Concord.
It is unclear if Allman, of Malibu, California, has any connection to the home in Windham, New Hampshire. He is being held in the Rockingham County Department of Corrections, Superintendent Jonathan Banville said.
The hearing Wednesday was continued until an undetermined date after Allman got an attorney Wednesday morning. The attorney, Sarah Landres, did not respond to a request for comment.
Allman, whose father was the late singer Gregg Allman, is charged with two counts of criminal mischief, one count of burglary and a count of breach of bail for breaking into the home on March 1. Police said in a report that Allman did not have permission to be at the home and forcibly entered it.
Officials at St. Paul’s School said Allman last month identified himself as the parent of a prospective student and slipped into the dining hall as some students were leaving the building. Police responded to reports that he was disturbing people in the building.
He was charged with four misdemeanors in the school incident: two counts of simple assault, criminal trespass and criminal threatening. Allman was also charged with a violation of disorderly conduct, which is illegal in the state but not considered a crime. He was released on bail.
Allman did not respond to an email requesting comment, and a phone number for him was not working.
In December 2023, Cher filed a petition to become a temporary conservator overseeing her son’s money, saying Allman’s struggles with his mental health and addiction have left him unable to manage his assets and potentially put his life in danger.
The petition says the superstar performer’s son is entitled to regular payments from a trust fund. But “given his ongoing mental health and substance abuse issues,” she is “concerned that any funds distributed to Elijah will be immediately spent on drugs, leaving Elijah with no assets to provide for himself and putting Elijah’s life at risk,” the petition says.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Jessica Uzcategui denied the request, saying she was not convinced that a conservatorship was urgently needed. Allman was in the courtroom with his attorneys, who acknowledged his previous struggles but argued that he was in a good place, was attending meetings, getting treatment and reconciling with his estranged wife.
The son of Cher is scheduled to be in court Wednesday for a hearing over allegations he broke into a New Hampshire home earlier this month.
It was the second arrest in a matter of days for Elijah Allman, 49, of Malibu, California, who was detained Feb. 27 after allegedly acting belligerently at a prestigious prep school in New Hampshire. It was unclear if Allman had any connection to either St. Paul’s School or the home in Windham, New Hampshire.
Allman remains in the Rockingham County Department of Corrections in what is called preventive detention, Superintendent Jonathan Banville said.
Allman, whose father was the late singer Gregg Allman, faces two counts of criminal mischief, one count of burglary and a count of breach of bail for breaking into the home on March 1. Police said in a report that Allman did not have permission to be at the home and forcibly entered it .
In the incident at the prep school, Allman was charged with four misdemeanors: two counts of simple assault, criminal trespass and criminal threatening. Allman was also charged with a violation of disorderly conduct, which is illegal in the state but not considered a crime.
At about 7 p.m. that day, Concord police responded to reports that Allman was disturbing people in the dining hall of St. Paul’s School. After charging Allman, police said he was released on bail as his case works through the court system.
Allman did not respond to an email requesting comment, and a phone number for him was not working. It was unclear from the court records if Allman has an attorney.
In December 2023, Cher filed a petition to become a temporary conservator overseeing her son’s money, saying Allman struggles with mental health issues and addiction have left him unable to manage his assets and potentially put his life in danger.
The petition from the singer and actress said Elijah Allman is entitled to regular payments from a trust fund. But “given his ongoing mental health and substance abuse issues,” she is “concerned that any funds distributed to Elijah will be immediately spent on drugs, leaving Elijah with no assets to provide for himself and putting Elijah’s life at risk,” the petition says.
A few weeks later, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Jessica Uzcategui denied the request, saying she was not convinced that a conservatorship was urgently needed. Allman was in the courtroom with his his attorneys, who acknowledged his previous struggles but argued that he is in a good place now, attending meetings, getting treatment and reconciling with his previously estranged wife.
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