Universal Childcare: Lessons from the State Level

States are leading the way on childcare, but we still need federal action 

Recent state-level policy innovations are showing that it’s possible to do it all: pay childcare workers thriving wages and provide high-quality and affordable services to families. A new report from Roosevelt’s Lena Bilik shares successes from Connecticut, New Mexico, and Vermont—and explains why truly universal childcare will require federal action.

Policymakers have a wide variety of tools available to them to expand childcare. States have been successful supporting the childcare workforce with higher wages and career pipelines, partnering with community groups to conduct hyper-local needs assessments, and more. 

Still, the tension between ensuring thriving wages and keeping childcare affordable for families cannot be resolved without the coordination and funding of the federal government.

“The US needs a childcare system that is universally guaranteed through stable investment, rather than an inequitable patchwork of local programs that depend on volatile state budgets and unequal access to resources,” Bilik writes. 

• Read the report → Where States Are Innovating on Childcare: Lessons for a National Universal Childcare Policy
• And dig further into the nitty-gritty of administering public childcare in our Q&A series →  How Childcare Happens: Lessons from Frontline Implementers 

What else we’re up to

• Gen Z men aren’t the worst off in the labor market right now, it turns out. Men ages 35–64 have seen the highest rate of job loss since January 2025, while men 20–24 have actually gained employment, Roosevelt’s Michael Madowitz writes in a new blog post. The youngest women, on the other hand, have seen a sizable increase in unemployment.  
• Don’t believe the fearmongering about the rich fleeing New York. Progressive taxes will make New York a better place to live for everybody, Roosevelt’s Noa Rosinplotz argues in the New York Daily News.
  • “As any New Yorker knows, there are countless reasons to live and work here: excellent public transportation, Broadway, bagels, world-class museums, something new around every corner,” Rosinplotz writes. “Those amenities come from a city government that invests in making this a good place to live, not from low taxes.”
  • As Fellow Zorka Milin echoes in a recent report about global corporate taxes, “tax is just one factor among many others that are much more important” for driving business decisions—like access to capital, a skilled workforce, strong public infrastructure, and political stability.
• “I think we’ve neglected that the public [sector] should be working on behalf of the people.” Fellow Anisha Steephen spoke to The Indypendent about how the Mamdani administration is reimagining the Economic Development Corporation:
  • “What we have learned over time is that when public investment just focuses on growth and jobs, the distribution of that public investment does not lead to material, economic gains for most people,” Steephen said. 

What we’re talking about