“Universal child care is incredibly popular, being able to access affordable child care that works for your child and your family is not a ‘red’ or ‘blue’ issue, it’s something that people across parties experience every single day,” - @kashenj.bsky.social 19thnews.org/2026/02/aoc-...

After Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl performance at #SuperBowlLX, everyone’s talking about #PuertoRico. But here’s what many might not know about how federal policy affects the territory 🧵👇

As @kashenj.bsky.social tells @ehaspel.bsky.social in the @us.theguardian.com, “Ultimately, having universal childcare as the goal is something that not only serves the families directly who will benefit from it, but it really serves everyone.”

Today, we are launching the U.S. Democracy Meter, a new tool that deploys a 100-point scale across twenty-three subquestions to evaluate the quality of American democracy: go.tcf.org/DemocracyMeter

The unemployment rate for Black workers soared to 8.3% in November. That's more than double the rate for white workers.

NEW: The average cost of child care is $13,000/year nationwide. Costs are rising in all but five states, and rising faster than inflation in 39 states and Washington, D.C. @lfevalle.bsky.social and @kashenj.bsky.social explore the state of the care economy and its workforce: go.tcf.org/carecrisis

NEW: Popular holiday gifts are up 26% since last year—nearly nine times the overall inflation rate. 40% of families are buying fewer gifts, nearly one-third are giving presents to fewer people, and more than one in ten are tapping into savings. 🔗 go.tcf.org/holidayprices

Americans spent more this year on Halloween - & Trump’s tariffs are hitting Thanksgiving too. Expect to spend 10% more thanks to economic chaos. That’s 3x the rate of overall inflation! Our new analysis w/ @tcfdotorg.bsky.social & @aft.org shows how Trump's policies are ruining Thanksgiving.

🦃 NEW: Thanksgiving dinner is up 10% this year — more than 3x overall inflation. Families are cutting back or skipping the holiday entirely. Why? Trump’s policies keep driving prices up. Read my latest with @groundwork.bsky.social, @tcfdotorg.bsky.social & @aft.org tcf.org/content/comm...

We finally got jobs data from September, and there are some warning signs for the women in the economy. Black women’s unemployment has reached 7.5 percent. Black women’s unemployment is the canary in the coal mine, currently sitting 4 percentage points higher than white men’s unemployment. 1/

Native women are paid 41 cents for each dollar that white men are paid, one of the starkest gender pay gaps in the U.S.

An American economy that prioritizes care gives workers the time they need to care for themselves and their families without risking their job or their paycheck. Read @tcfdotorg.bsky.social and @caringacross.org’s new report to learn more: go.tcf.org/TheCareImperative #PaidLeaveForAll

Investments in care policies, including those that support child care, paid leave, aging and disability care, and good jobs for care workers ensure that the government is responsive to people’s basic needs. New from TCF and @caringacross.org: go.tcf.org/TheCareImperative

A better, more affordable country for all of us is possible and within reach. My new report for @tcfdotorg.bsky.social with @caringacross.org details how substantive investments in the care economy support families and catalyze economic growth. #CareCantWait go.tcf.org/TheCareImper...

The Trump administration made it possible for ICE to terrorize children and educators. As @jackiemader.bsky.social reported for @hechingerreport.org earlier this year, ICE was banned from entering child care programs and schools until DHS issued a new directive hechingerreport.org/child-care-c...

Making AI slop videos and making "your mom" jokes isn't going to lower the cost of child care for millions of parents trying to make ends meet. But free child care would—read more about it from TCF's @kashenj.bsky.social here: tcf.org/content/comm...

I want more people to care that SNAP benefits are being cut off on November 1. 40% of SNAP beneficiaries are children. This is callous and vile.

America’s child care crisis isn’t a problem that will go away on its own. Instead of solutions, Trump and Congressional Republicans passed a megabill with child care tax updates too small to fundamentally change how families are experiencing the child care crisis. Learn more: go.tcf.org/crisis

Join us for an evening with award-winning researcher and writer Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman as she launches her new book, The Double Tax: How Women of Color Are Overcharged and Underpaid. 📍 MLK Library Auditorium, Washington, DC 📅 Thursday, Sept. 18 | 6 PM 🎟️ Complimentary books + signing to follow

State and local policymakers looking to increase child care affordability, supply, and compensation must continue expanding public funding. Tri-Share does not build supply or substantively improve wages and benefits, making it a poor solution to the child care crisis. tcf.org/content/comm...

Job losses were particularly acute in professional/business services, the federal govt, and wholesale trade, but there have also been sustained losses over recent months in manufacturing, construction, and mining, an indication that Trump's blue-collar renaissance is clearly not happening. #EconSky

Happening Now! Tune in

This morning, we released an alarming new report detailing the depths of Americans’ financial distress, based on a June survey of 2,000 voters with Morning Consult. TCF President Julie Margetta Morgan (@jmargetta.bsky.social) explains in a new op-ed in @rollingstone.com.

“Child care’s been rising for about 30 years faster than inflation. The reality is the price of providing good child care is more than a lot of parents can pay. We've solved this in other sectors, like in education. That's what we need to be doing for child care, too.” – @kashenj.bsky.social

Child care is too expensive. It doesn’t have to be. The child care for working families act was introduced today. It lowers costs for families, ensures early educators are paid a living wage, and builds up the childcare sector. Read @kashenj.bsky.social latest to lesrn more tcf.org/content/comm...

HHS announced today they will consider Head Start a welfare program, not an education program, and will subject it to new citizenship requirements. This goes against decades of legal precedence that all children in America have a right to education. Announcement here. www.hhs.gov/press-room/p...

Being a mom has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life, in part because I have had resources and support systems to manage the work. We can pass public policies to make motherhood a more affordable and enjoyable option for all women who want kids. We just have to decide to do it!

My annotation of the new distributional analysis from the Congressional Budget Office of the One Big Beautiful Bill. www.cbo.gov/publication/...

BREAKING: CBO has released its final numbers on the plan House Republicans are pushing through Congress. If this passes: —$3.7 trillion in revenue LOST —$2.4 trillion added to the debt —10.9 million people will lose insurance by 2034 All to give tax breaks to the rich.

CBO is out with its final cost estimate of the tax-and-spending bill passed by the House. - Revenue ⬇️ by $3.7 trillion over 10 years - Spending ⬇️ by $1.3 trillion - Debt ⬆️ by $2.4 trillion over 10 years - Uninsured pop. ⬆️ by 10.9 million in 2034 Full analysis: www.cbo.gov/publication/...

Families know what they need! PBS spoke to more than 1,000 readers about what would encourage them to have more babies. Readers want affordable child care, a lower cost of living, and access to reproductive health care. www.pbs.org/newshour/nat...

Women are out here doing $1 TRILLION in unpaid caregiving annually and Republicans are like....get to work. But also have babies. The cognitive dissonance is WILD. nationalpartnership.org/americans-un...

This is a very helpful chart 👇 Congressional Republicans are hellbent on taking away health care and food assistance from poor and desperate families in order to give tax cuts to their rich friends and donors who don't need it. Tell Congress to put families over billionaires here: bit.ly/3MOBGyT

A testament to how horrible this bill was. A huge tax giveaway to billionaires paid for by cuts to health care and food assistance to kids and low-income families, that would also balloon the deficit.

New report from @childcareaware.bsky.social shows #childcare prices up by 29% since 2020. Response from R's: Corporate tax breaks! Motherhood Medals! What families really need: 👉reliable, stable child care options that meet their needs --convenient options, with no commute, no wait list.

None of these 17 million kids from low-income families will get a dime of the Republicans’ proposed increase in the #CTC as Kris Cox explains here ⬇️ bsky.app/profile/kris...

The New York Times recently reported on Trump admin efforts to boost the U.S. birth rate—from a $5,000 “baby bonus” to a “National Medal of Motherhood.” In her latest piece, TCF Senior Fellow Gayle Goldin (@gaylegoldin.bsky.social) explains what we need instead: go.tcf.org/profamily

Babies, not billionaires! 🤝💖 Today is Day Without Childcare, and we're joining partners, providers and parents to highlight the true cost of care and demand funding for a 21st-century #childcare system that works for working families. Join us and learn more www.DayWithoutChildcare.org

Yes to all of this. "Republicans have finally noticed that American motherhood is in crisis. But they still don’t understand — or don’t want to admit — that their policy choices have hurt moms." -- @whipkclark.bsky.social www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

My new piece with @kashenj.bsky.social: President Trump's cuts to child care departments, staff, and budgets will make it more challenging for parents to find and afford child care, make children less safe, and threaten providers’ ability to continue operating their programs. tcf.org/content/comm...

As Mother's Day approaches, I’m thinking about the things that would truly celebrate moms: paid leave, higher minimum wage, child care for all. Grateful to @gaylegoldin.bsky.social at @tcfdotorg.bsky.social for laying this out in her piece.

New from Ruth Friedman: "A robustly funded and supported Head Start program benefits communities across the country. [Cutting Head Start] would setback families, spur job loss, make child care and pre-K less available, and strain state budgets." tcf.org/content/comm...

“Instead of focusing federal policy on procreation, we should be focusing on family-sustaining policies that create meaningful change in people’s lives, no matter what that family looks like.” TCF’s @gaylegoldin.bsky.social on why coercive pronatalist incentives fail women and families.

I shared with @salonnewsroom.bsky.social “The fact that the [Trump] administration jumped straight to motherhood medals & not something like paid leave or child care solutions shows just how out of touch they are w/what parents in America are experiencing right now.” www.salon.com/2025/05/04/w...

Trump's budget cuts programs that help student parents afford child care & help families pay heating bills, while funneling billions more to mass deportations that send people to gulags without due process. Trump doesn't care about improving the lives of US families www.politico.com/news/2025/05...

As federal dollars for Head Start slow, rural parents left without other options hechingerreport.org/as-federal-d...

New indicators of a slowing economy with GDP contracting by 0.3 percent in Q1 according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. This is just the latest of many warning signs showing the damage that Trump has done to the U.S. economy in just 100 days tcf.org/content/comm...

I just said government should prevent crises, not just respond to them. It sure as hell shouldn’t create them as this admin has done. From Laura Valle-Gutierrez @lfevalle.bsky.social & Andrew Stettner @aimstettner.bsky.social

States are leading the way on paid leave. My new commentary with @rwest817.bsky.social explores how Pennsylvanians can expand coverage to millions of workers this year by voting to invest in a public paid leave program (instead of the so-called “benefits savings accounts” tech companies love)