Transcript of Who Cares Today? A Reflection on Where We Are As a Country With Respect to Work, Family, and Care, by Vicki Shabo. Vicki, is Senior Fellow for Gender Equity, Paid Leave and Care Policy & Strategy, New America and Founder and Director of the Entertainment Initiative at New America, Re-Scripting Gender, Work, Family, and Care. This lecture is the first in the WMC Progressive Women's Voices IMPACT lecture series and will be followed by a conversation with Maya Raghu, the National Director of the Protecting and Advancing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Initiative at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
Perhaps you’ve seen the trailer or watched the series, All Her Fault, on Peacock. The incredible actress Sarah Snook stars as a mother whose son has gone missing from what was to have been a playdate, but was instead a planned kidnapping.
Through Snook’s character and her friend, played by Dakota Fanning, we see up close the ways in which mothers in many families in the United States bear a disproportionate mental and practical load of parenting—where fathers are helpers or supporters, but ultimately clueless about their children’s clothing, whereabouts, or habits, and where mothers are primary caregivers while dads are babysitters at best and pursue leisure time in ways that harm their partners instead. The show provides some commentary that is hopefully sparking conversations in households across America about the division of labor, mental load, and the importance of shared care work in families.
Interestingly, though, even within this show, there’s another model: a family where both parents—in this case, a mom and a dad to a young teenage son who is mostly non-verbal and autistic—parent equally. In this family, which has fewer economic resources than the other two, the father, a detective investigating the kidnapping, played by actor Michael Peña, is a responsible, competent caregiver who is his wife’s counterpart in making decisions, providing care, and managing work and family demands.
In my work as a policy expert, strategist, and advocate, and a connector between real-world data and Hollywood storytelling, I celebrate this second model and hope to see the day where all parents—regardless of their gender—are perceived as equally capable, resourced, and valued for their contributions at home and at work. And where the unpaid care we all provide—to children, to older adults, to loved ones with disabilities, and to ourselves—is honored, no matter the gender of the person doing that care.
Another integral part of this equation is paid caregivers. Paid care workers are essential to the health, well-being, and even the ability of our loved ones to stay alive, but their work is often invisible, devalued, poorly compensated, and construed by powerful forces as “less than” other kinds of work. Caring and providing for their own families is often quite difficult because of the wages and working conditions they endure.
This must change. This is professional work that encompasses dressing, feeding, bathing, providing companionship, teaching (in the case of children) and ensuring the safety and well-being of people who need care, whether children or adults.
In this talk, we’ll cover the state of work and care in America today, some of the cultural pitfalls we face as a result of our lack of care infrastructure and economic realities, and the path forward that I hope is before us.
But first, it’s important to say at the outset that this tension between work and family and the undervaluing of care work, is not new or modern. These realities have endured for decades and, in some cases, centuries—and that’s been particularly true for women of color and immigrants who have almost always worked, whether as enslaved or for pay, and tended to their own loved ones. In most cases, this was not a choice but a necessity for survival.
It’s also important to recognize the particular challenges for women parenting alone, whose lives are too often an ironic political battleground, where the same people who argue that motherhood is sacred and that women should focus on raising children, simultaneously want to condition public investments in women’s parenting on “deservingness”—that is, on providing government resources only so those in the paid labor force—but without policies that actually make it possible to manage work and family. This has much more to do with sexism, racism, and the devaluation of care than anything else. It’s about who is entitled to have the freedom to parent without the heavy hand of the state, but also without the public support and care investments that families most need.
The tension between work and family has also been true for historical figures that we revere, and who did have choices sometimes choosing not to have children at all. Allow me one more popular culture example: The suffragist Alice Paul is a main character in the incredible Shaina Taub musical, Suffs. She sings an entire song called “Worth It,” about the tradeoff between fighting for equal rights for women and having a marriage and a family. The song opens by asking:
What would my life look like if I wasn't so consumed by this?
I see women with their children in the park and I feel a little ache
Is knowing that kind of love really something I'm willing to miss?
And will I feel like a failure no matter what choice I make?
Is it worth it? Is it worth it? Is it worth it?
How would it feel if I could really rely on someone
Who would brew me up a cup of tea to calm my worried head?
Part of me thinks I don't deserve a family 'til my work gets done
Can you really lead a revolution and still be home in time
To put your baby to bed?
She asks again: Is it worth it? Is it worth it? Is it worth it?
So, whether for economic reasons or the freedom to choose a path that marries work and family, these tensions around work and care are enduring, and they are rooted in culture, gender biases, financial realities, and a lack of supportive policies. They inform choices about whether, when, and under what conditions to start or grow a family, and how to care and provide for the people we love in a system that makes it impossible for most people to make decisions that are truly unconstrained by economic realities.
A Snapshot of Work, Family, and Care in the United States Today
In the United States today, an estimated 130 million people provide care for loved ones, whether children, older loved ones, or family members with disabilities, or multiple of these. At the same time…
130 million graphic, here
Women’s Work
In the U.S. today, most adults work – but there’s a sizable gap between men’s and women’s labor force participation: 67 percent of men but just 57 percent of women were in the labor force as of September 2025. Among people of prime working age (25-54), labor force participation rates are higher—above 80 percent, but women’s labor force participation still trails men’s for people 25 and older, and this is especially true among people with lower levels of education, where fewer than half of women were in the workforce in March of this year.
Among parents, mothers’ labor force participation trails fathers, particular for women with children under 6. Two-thirds of women, but more than 90 percent of men with children under 6, work in the paid workforce; this rises to more than three quarters of women with children 6–17 and still more than 90 percent of men.
You could look at this data and think—ah, women are choosing their “natural” roles as caregivers and opting out of paid work. But that’s not what’s happening, in most cases. Rather, it’s just too hard to manage work and care, or to afford paid care for loved ones.
In 2025, when nearly two-thirds of Americans believe in gender equity as a value, women still bear more responsibilities for caring for children. And we can see this even further in 2025 data, where one headline declared, “Women leaving US workforce at alarming rate.” An estimated 455,000 women—disproportionately more educated women and Black women—left the workforce between January and August 2025. Men did not.
Some headlines from a recent study chalk this up to a so-called ambition gap, but economists cite child care and early education as a major reason. Difficulties finding high-quality, affordable care for children is difficult; care is notoriously expensive, more than rent and mortgage in all or nearly every state if you thing of the cost for two children and more than the cost of a public university in 38 states. Child care prices are estimated to have increased by 29 percent, well over increases in rising costs—or inflation—overall. In addition, for workers with irregular schedules, people who work part-time on a variable part-time, or on nonstandard hours, finding child care that meets parents’ needs is very difficult. To the extent that “choice” in involved at all - for those with economic means to choose - leaving paid employment that corporations control may be an act of exasperation of resistance. But for the vast majority it is not a choice.
Women are also disproportionately those who care for older adults and people with disabilities. In the most recent Caregiving in the United States report, released in July 2025, 63 million Americans identified as family caregivers, nearly a 50 percent increase since 2015 and 10 million more people than in 2020. More than 60 percent are women.
The value of unpaid care work in the United States is estimated to be $1 trillion, and more than 64 billion of that is done by women.
Family members care for loved ones—generally managing paid jobs and this volume of unpaid care work—in large part, because paid elder and disability care is also hard to find.
Finding paid care has been even more difficult as restrictive immigration policies take hold. Most care workers in the U.S. are paid poorly, are women, and are from immigrant backgrounds.
There’s already new data showing that ICE crackdowns are driving foreign-born child care workers out of the center- and home-based child care workforce. There is also likely an effect on an already stark shortage of home- and community-based direct care workers and workers in assisted living facilities as a result of poor job quality and low wages combined with federal budget cuts, facilities closures, and immigration crackdowns.
The current system supports neither people who need paid care to be able to continue in their own jobs and careers, nor the paid caregivers whose presence and competence creates the possibility of jobs and careers for others while providing life-sustaining support to loved ones.
Women’s Wages
The need that families have for care—and the difficulties of finding paid care—surface the economic reason that it is usually women providing unpaid care.
Another factor in women’s labor force participation and how families manage work and care is money. Women’s workforce participation and women’s wages are closely related. Women typically earn less pay than men. In 2024, which is the most recent year for which wage data is available, women who work full-time were typically paid 81 cents for every dollar paid to men. For all workers, including both full- and part-time workers, women’s earnings dropped to 76 percent of men’s. For Black women, Latine women, women from various Asian and Pacific Islander, and Native women backgrounds, the wage gap is much larger, compared to both the men of their same background and to white men.
Images from this IWPR report.
The gender wage gap is both a cause of the gender gap in caregiving and work and a consequence: women are paid less, so when two people of different genders have to choose who will provide unpaid care, the decision can often be driven by economics. The family will lose less income if the woman provides in-home care to a child or loved one; and then, because the woman has less work history, less job tenure, and may be perceived as less committed to paid work, she loses promotions or job opportunities and may continue to be paid less. This also affects earnings history for Social Security. At age 65, women’s Social Security payments are 80% of men’s – an average of just under $1,550 for men but just $1,250 for women.
Women are also less likely to have private pensions and have lower pension amounts. And as you would expect, there’s a huge racial wealth gap and a retirement savings gap, which means that for women of color, the wage gap, the income gap, the care gap, and the saving gap all add up to huge retirement savings gaps.
Figure 2 here (Treasury)
What About Men?
It is tempting—and, in my opinion, too common—to talk only about the challenges women face. But the status quo is also hurting men. Men feel strong pressure to be providers, and the “crisis of male loneliness” we’re hearing so much about—and the turning of men toward media sources that perpetuate misogyny and violence—are deeply related to this.
This is especially true for men with lower levels of education, and younger men, who are struggling in the labor force and in the economy. Men without college degrees are struggling to keep up with their more educated peers in holding jobs, and this translates into multiple challenges. Unemployment for young people is very high.
As I wrote in a recent issue brief based on new research studies from Equimundo and qualitative research from the firm Perry Undem:
- “Economic anxiety is…tied to definitions of masculinity that are becoming more constrained and traditional, particularly among black and Latino men who face more economic exclusion,” and
- “Gen Z men feel social pressure to be providers and protectors who are strong, wealthy, uncomplaining, unemotional, and self-reliant. A focus on what others think of them translates into feelings of failure, overextension, and exhaustion.”
So I would offer that perhaps a greater emphasis on equal care is an antidote:
According to the Pew Research Center, 77 percent of adults in the U.S. say they believe that women and men should be equally involved at work and at home when they are raising children. Well over half say that their peers do not place enough value on men who are caring, open about emotions, soft-spoken, or affectionate.
Where Does This Leave Us?
It’s clear that things are not alright, and that federal funding cutbacks, restrictions on access to food and health care, major barriers to and bans on reproductive health care are all making it worse, at least at the national level. In some states, things are better, and we’ll get to that in a moment.
But there are pernicious cultural forces that are sowing division that we must reckon with. Economic challenges for families, challenges facing both paid and unpaid caregivers, and the complexities of managing work and family and of trying to do it all make things hard, complicated, and exhausting. It’s no wonder that this is fertile ground for narratives that would relegate women back to the sphere of home with images put forward on social media of living softer, gentler lives.
The rise of the so called “trad wife”—an internet-fueled phenomenon where mostly wealthy women show the virtues of having many children, while baking bread and tending to their homes—may be easy for progressives to dismiss, but underneath the surface, there’s an appeal to living a simpler, more beautiful life. Even if this isn’t attainable for many people, the aspiration holds appeal in much the same way as Trump held appeal for blue-collar men.
So how do we tap into the broad desire for a simpler time in the context of a complex reality?
We Change Policy and We Change Culture
Here are five suggestions:
First, I believe that we need to acknowledge that the status quo is not workable, no matter what one believes about gender roles. We need to put policies in place that stem the tide of income inequality, which has been rising over many decades. This means reorienting our tax system and putting limits in place on corporate power. For too long, gender equity advocates and care economy advocates spent too little time on this broader context. Fortunately, that’s beginning to change.
Second, we need to break out of zero sum thinking about gender, and acknowledge that people of all genders are equally capable of contributing to workplaces and homes—and that it is time to put aside cultural biases that are used to box people into gender roles and that constrain our own notions of what is acceptable and appropriate in the realms of work, family, and care. Let’s keep the gendered parts of ourselves that are personally important, but shed outdated stereotypes about work and care that hold us back at a societal level.
Third, we need to celebrate examples where policies that encourage equitable caregiving are working and where care is invested in, for example:
- 13 states and the District of Columbia have passed paid family and medical leave programs that apply equally to women and men who are caring for a child, a loved one, or themselves. In states where programs are operational, and especially in most newer programs, men are taking more leave to care for newborn or newly adopted children. In Washington state, men are 55 percent of parental leave-takers!
- In New Mexico and Vermont, and in many local jurisdictions, public funding for child care is creating greater and more affordable access, reinforcing the notion that child care is a public good. Access to child care supports women’s labor force participation. And affordable care supports families’ economic security, while also raising wages for early childhood educators, whose jobs are being professionalized.
- In Washington state, there’s a new long term care insurance program called Washington Cares, that will start to shift the needle on affordability and planning—and culture change—around care for older adults.
Fourth, consistent with the link between policy and culture shift, we need to value care, no matter who is doing it. That means changing workplace norms and public culture to support caregiving—so family members can work and care with pride, rather than apology or hiding family responsibilities in the workplace. It means changing workplace practices and policies so that workers of all kinds have the flexibility, predictability, and control they need to manage their work and home lives. It also means valuing professional caregivers more, with public investments that boost wages and professional training and workplace protections that mitigate tendencies toward overwork, abuse, safety concerns, and harassment.
Fifth, it will help to see all of this reflected in popular culture. Television, movies, journalism, social media, games, music, and sports are all places where people see and absorb messaging about norms, standards, and expectations. Better reflecting what people are actually experiencing, actually desiring, and should actually be able to access in a more equitable and supported society is key.
So what can you and all of us do to help achieve these outcomes? Here are five ideas:
- Talk with friends, family, and neighbors about the challenges you face managing work, family, and care—and navigating gender roles that are unnecessarily constrained by biases and expectations that are no longer serving you or are unaligned with your desires and realities, whatever those are. And I know this will be different for different people. But we need to socialize these challenges as something ripe for discussion, not relegated to the privacy of our homes, our guilt, and our doubts.
- Encourage people to share experiences and notice if common pain points and aspirations emerge across people who you might think of as different from yourself, in addition to those who are similar.
- If your desires are different from your reality, dream out loud about what would make your aspirations attainable. Imagine that you are unconstrained by the status quo. Name the supports or interventions that would help.
- Watch what people seeking or holding office are saying—or not saying—and ask them questions about policies that support paid and unpaid caregiving, affordability and wages, and policies that create the foundations for freedom by offering support for families.
- Watch and praise shows, films, and other creative content that represents the challenges, struggles, joys and aspirations of daily life so that Hollywood and other media makers replicate and build on them—so that popular culture better reflects the nuance and complexities of modern life and offers people solutions they can envision, desire, and advocate for.
Thanks so much for spending time here today. And, in the words of Shaina Taub, once again from fabulous musical, Suffs:
Yes, the world can be changed, we've done it before
So keep marching, keep marching…
The future demands that we fight for it now
It will only be ours if we keep marching
Keep marching on…
Watch the video here.
Lightly edited conversation between Vicki Shabo and Maya Raghu.
Maya
Hi, I'm Maya Raghu, and I'm here with Vicky Shabo, though, who just delivered a very interesting lecture about care work in the United States. I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to sit down with her today, to dig in deeper to some of the issues she brought up in her lecture.
Vicki
I am so excited to be doing this with you.
Maya
I am to, one of the overarching themes of your talk was the way in which care work is undervalued. Care work has long been thought of in American culture and in American law as not being labor that is worthy of fair compensation, or even really being compensated at all, fair working conditions and of protections in the law.
Maya
And you said that this is a function of racism and sexism. So can you dig into that a little bit and explain that?
Vicki
Yeah. And it's complicated and layered. Right. So for one thing, as I talked about a lot in the lecture, care work is often unseen. It's usually associated with women. Women's work is devalued, women's time is devalued, and long has been. And when you when you layer on to that, racism, the history of slavery and enslaved people doing the care work for other people's children, immigrant workers caring for other people's children, you have this history that then was carried forward into the Fair Labor Standards Act, into your specialty, which is civil rights law, and you just don't see the kinds of protections that we give to many other categories of workers, not all, obviously, agricultural workers. And others. We're also left behind with a history of nativism and racism. But the gender piece is really unique to care work and its devaluation.
Maya
What is it about women and so-called women's work in particular that you think has led to this persistence in undervaluing it or not really seeing it as work?
Vicki
I think a couple of things. And I'm curious for your thoughts too. I think part of it is this - we get messages, we are told that this is about love, and that love and work are different things. And so you have a responsibility to care for the people that you love. You want to care for the people that you love. So it isn't just that somebody else is telling you that this is the work you have to do for free. But we have implicit as well as explicit messages, that we've internalized, that are about the intersection of care work which is unpaid, with doing the things for the people that we love, and going the extra mile. And when that gets translated into societal wide messages, you have this idea that this is traditionally women's work because, at least in some communities, men are the ones who are out doing paid work, and that has just gotten perpetuated even as our economy, our standards, our education system and everything else has, has changed.
And where people of all genders really should have equal opportunities to do both paid work in workplaces, in their home or wherever, and unpaid care work that should be thought of as work, in their homes.
Maya
I think that's right. For so long, work that was happy labor that was happening in the sphere of the home or the domestic sphere was seen as the responsibility of women because, as you said, some of it is care work that is seen as an act of love. But then there's also domestic work as well, like cooking, cleaning and everything else. What I think is interesting about the way that this notion of women's work still persists is, I've heard this and I'm sure you have too, that women don't want to do the higher paid, physical work, the jobs that involve physical labor, or that women don't want to do dirty work. And I think in people's minds they're thinking of things like construction or work in the trades. And there are a lot of women who would love to be able to do those jobs. They just need the training or to be made to feel welcome in those workplaces. But I think the other part of it is that women are already doing a lot of jobs that are physical, that involve labor, that are, quote, dirty. And care work is an example of that. You mentioned in your lecture that care work involves physically lifting and moving people and bathing people and running around after children like, that's hard work. That's physical work.
Vicki
It is exhausting, yeah. Any parent, who has had to chase toddlers around a park in the cold or in the heat knows that it's physically exerting. People who are caring for a loved one, taking them out of bed, taking them to the bathroom, helping them change clothes like that is physical labor, too. It's just in a different sphere. And that has been devalued.
Maya
Right, but people don't think of that in similar terms to construction or trades, because it is work that is largely done by women, by women of color, as you point out, and and immigrant women as well, which I think feeds into the narratives of why this isn't work, that just that it's acknowledged as labor and paid wages.
Vicki
You know, something that strikes me as we're talking is that it's also not, constructing, building a new thing, building a physical manifestation of somebody's labor in the same way that investing in the development of a child or the care of a person. You can't see that in the same way because it's internal. And I wonder if that has something to do with it, too.
Maya
I'm sure it is, because it brings up a really interesting sort of tie back.
Vicki
Yeah. It just strikes me that what you're talking about with construction is people making things. It's like a goods economy where you can see the unseen very physically, the manifestation of somebody's labor, whereas somebody caring for a child or contributing to their development or caring for a loved one, you're investing in people. And we so often are devaluing human capital in this country in different ways. That it strikes me that maybe part of the issue is the difference between labor that is seen as creating something and labor that's investing in people. And then that explains why, for example teaching is devalued and nursing is devalued. And service economy jobs, particularly those where people are paid lower wages or work hourly, often are seen as less than or less valuable.
Maya
Yes. Also jobs where the majority of people working in those jobs are.
Vicki
Women are women and women of color. Yeah.
Maya
Not an accident. No. But I think one of the things that you've brought up is this idea of care, work and care as a public good and an infrastructure, really, but not acknowledged as such or hasn't been that often. Yeah. I think especially during the pandemic, there was this brief moment when schools were closed, where daycare centers were closed and other care wasn't available, when people realized how important the availability of paid care is to their own ability to do their job. Like care work. Yeah, the work that makes other work possible as infrastructure. Yeah. There was an acknowledgment for a moment, but it seems to have disappeared. Do you agree with that? Or do you think that that moment did drive some cultural and policy change around recognizing that care work is infrastructure, necessary infrastructure?
Vicki
Yeah, I think it's such a good question. And it's so interesting how many people in the country have been so quick to put the pandemic in the rearview mirror. I do think there have been lasting changes. People are much more aware of the personal responsibilities and the family responsibilities that people, others in their workplace, might have How that manifests in a workplace, I would imagine, is very different depending on the culture of that workplace. One place where I've noticed that change has been enduring is in public opinion polling around childcare. Iit used to be, and I've worked on paid leave policy for a long time, I started working on paid leave policy in 2010, and even before that, the data was pretty consistent, where people traditionally 75, 80% of people in the country across party lines, believe that we should have a national paid leave program on childcare. The data was really different. People who had kids, prioritize childcare investments, but other people didn't. And I think we've seen the data stay pretty consistent and elevated in terms of levels of support for public investments in childcare since the pandemic. I don't know about other kinds. I mean, other kinds of caregiving are also seen as very important by people across party lines to invest in. As we see baby boomers aging and the sandwich generation, people who are caring both for children and for adults, being squeezed, we see really high public opinion numbers on investments in elder care and home and community based care and care for people with disabilities, too. But those child care numbers really, I think, have been elevated and have stuck since the pandemic.
Maya
So there's a lot in that that I want to unpack. One of them is that you have these high polling numbers that people are dealing with issues both as caregivers for children and of older family members or loved ones who have disabilities and need access to paid care. On the one hand, the need is older, you know, generation, baby boomer generation that's aging and creates this huge cohort. So on the one hand, you have this increased need, the polling data shows that people are acknowledging this need and want investments. On the other hand, the cost is very high. Why is it so hard to make those investments, make the policy changes to drive those changes that even politicians are acknowledging that we need?
Vicki
So there's a lot in that question. I guess I want to start with the costs. So often we talk about costs in a couple of different ways. There's the cost of providing care, which, you know, for children, child care for children, as I chatted about in my talk can be as much as college tuition can be, as much as rent and mortgage, the costs of elder care, particularly for people who are sort of middle income and don't qualify for public assistance, can be astronomically exorbitantly high, and you kind of don't know how long those costs will go on as opposed to children who eventually age into school. So there's costs right now, like there's the costs that we're paying for. There's the costs of inaction, which we see in women's unpaid/people's unpaid labor, disproportionately women that we see in lost job opportunities for folks, that we see in losses to the economy where people aren't working and then aren't spending. And then we often juxtapose that against the cost of public investments, which opponents of these investments like to talk about as being in the, you know, billions, trillions of dollars. And that's really a question of priorities, because as a country, we spend that kind of money on many, many, many other things. We don't spend it on care. And I think that leads into the why why don't we spend it on care that comes back to like, care being invisible and devalued. I think it also really comes back to what we imagine to be in the realm of public policy. And because homes are private, because care has been something that people have done out of love or obligation that is unpaid. There's this in virtuous cycle where we've devalued these things as being in the public sphere. And that means that because of the way that politics happens or the ways that policies get made, because we have money and politics in this country and interest groups with money have outsize influence. You end up in this cycle where, as we saw in 2021, when we had this amazing moment where we could have passed a national paid leave program, we could have passed major new investments in child care and home and community based care. Those policies got deprioritized, in part because they're thought of not in the same realm as energy investments or business investments or health care investments. And in part because we think of those as costs that families just naturally should absorb, and not something that has broad ripple effects through society.
Maya
So a couple of follow up questions. One, let's let's focus on this issue of cost. On the one hand, it's incredibly it's carrot is incredibly expensive. On the other, the care workers themselves are being paid these very low wages. So do we know what accounts for that disconnect? It's like where is that money going.
Vicki
A couple thing. Again, I feel like every answer has a couple of things! So again, care work is devalued. We don't think of human capital investments as the same as other kinds of jobs. So that somewhat explains why the wages are low. Again, people of color are doing those jobs, immigrants are doing those jobs and we don't pay these communities as much in general. And where the money is going is part of this broader question of how the budget is allocated, how discretionary spending in the budget is allocated and how permanent spending is allocated. Right. So we have major bedrock investments like Social Security and Medicare, and we have decided mostly as a society, that those are things worth investing in, people's retirement security, people's health care, particularly as they age. These are social insurance programs. We have a social contract, that may or may not be contested in this time, but that's a thing that we've established. And then we have discretionary spending, which goes to defense.
It goes to corporate tax breaks. It goes to low tax rates for wealthy people. And that's money that's not coming into the public treasury that could be spent on other things. And then honestly, some of that money is going to corporations that are hiring care workers or companies that are hiring care workers and taking profit. And that's largely venture capital and private equity. Which is a newer thing. Traditionally, the companies that have employed home care workers, for example, or child care workers, have been mom and pop businesses, small businesses. And, as you know, people like to talk a lot about how small businesses are the engine of the American economy. But, as you know, your former colleagues at the National Women's Law Center and my colleagues at New America have done a lot of work on the role of private equity in care. And so we're seeing, foreign investors and large companies kind of buying up these smaller businesses or making investments that have commodified, for profit, these care industries.
Maya
So it's interesting because they do, at least in the private space, they do see it as a business worth investing in. But in order to extract profit and not necessarily create a private good. But at the same time, our policy makers are not seeing it as something worth investing in to create this public infrastructure that would benefit us all.
Vicki
The care community, the gender equity community, has done so much work over the last ten years showing the economic value of care, showing the losses, you know, $27 trillion lost to families because of a lack of child care/unpaid leave is a statistic that the Center for American Progress has come up with. $1 trillion in unpaid care work is a number that the National Partnership for Women and Families has come up with. And yet, those losses and those costs are not really taken into account for policymakers. And so we often hear, oh, you just need to show the economic value of these things, but I don't think that cuts it when, as a society, we have this idea that that what families do and how people manage work, paid work and care responsibilities, paid work and care responsibilities, and their family systems are like their own private realm. And this idea that free enterprise is what's going to make the economy go, which means deregulation and trying to stay out of the way, that workers will have protections and benefits. And I think that's really to the detriment of our society in so many ways.
Maya
So how do we move policymakers to shift their thinking about this, to see it recognize the impact it's having on the economy and individual families, and why it is a public good worthy of major investments? So you mentioned in your talk that there are some states and local jurisdictions that have shifted their thinking, that have made these investments, whether in care or in paid leave. Are there things that stand out to you that have been particularly effective as strategies or drawing on your own work, for years, and paid family and medical leave? Are there things that you think are particularly helpful for getting policymakers to the place where they think, I get it, this is really important.
Vicki
It's such a good question. I think there's a few ingredients that I've seen run throughout. One is electing political leaders who have personal experience and have a personal connection to the issue. So that's about electing more women, electing younger people, electing people of color. But it can also be a man like Tim Walz in Minnesota, who was deeply, personally connected to this because of his own family history and what he's seen. But in general, it's the personal connection between politicians and the issues. It's also building power. So we talk a lot. I spoke in my talk about storytelling and sharing stories, and that is critically, critically important, like having constituents who are showing up, talking about what it's meant to them, either to have access to a policy or the harm and the anguish and the emotional toll of not having access to that policy and what it's meant to their families, economic or health situation.
But the stories aren't enough. They have to be in combination with political power building and the ability to compete for attention on a public agenda. And then I would say the last thing is we often hear arguments that have been disproven time and again, concerns from the business community and larger businesses and smaller businesses, that really come from an ideological perspective in most cases, about deregulation and free enterprise and government. But have translated into falsehoods about the cost of policies or the disruption to businesses. And so having spokespeople from the business community, from businesses of all sizes, in all industries, actually sharing real data, about what investments in paid leave policies or giving employees access to childcare or being part of a state or a city program where these policies are in place, part of a state or a city where these policies are in place has made a real difference in at least creating headlines that say the business community is divided. If not in carrying the positive messages about the return on investment, greater employee loyalty, employee satisfaction, employee engagement, reduced costs of turnover, increased institutional knowledge and history in a particular workplace or industry because of retention rates. And that has been super important to get into the public dialog and to give policymakers the assurances that they're not going to crash the economy, by investing in these policies. And in fact, quite the opposite is true. They're going to create magnets for workers and families who want to move states. They are going to create healthier communities, communities where the economy is better and more vibrant and where small businesses can thrive.
Maya
So I did want to talk a little bit about the role that business has to play in this, especially because so much of this is about shifting workplace culture, but also, as you said, showing up as an ally in these policy fights. On the one hand, a lot of in policy discussions, at least, you hear a lot from the perspective of big business, the Chamber of Commerce, but less from the small businesses that policymakers and businesses purport to speak for or about or center policies around. Oh, you know, our Main Street businesses and small towns, but you don't hear their voices as often, and sometimes they are the ones that are more progressive on these policies, more trying to work with their employees to be aware of their needs, in their family life. Again, drawing on your experience working on paid family leave campaigns. I know you work closely with a lot of businesses and large corporations on this. What are some of the things that brought them to the realization that, this is important for our business if we want to attract employees who see this as a fair and inclusive place, that they want to work and be invested in because they feel supported by their employers, you know, what was it that brought those employers to becoming advocates in this way, and what changes did they make in workplace culture to help drive?
Vicki
Yeah. Well, being in conversation with other businesses about what the common challenges that they're facing. So groups like Main Street Alliance who have done a great job of bringing small businesses together, creating a space for conversation about the challenges that small businesses face, providing a blueprint for how it could look different and getting input from business owners about what would work for them. Some organizations have used the businesses own costs and payroll ledgers and other data to show the value of what these investments could look like. And in particular, what for example, a paid leave policy at the state level could look like and what those small contributions would mean, versus the return that they get when a worker is out and, needs to be able to take time that's paid but not necessarily paid by the employer, which is how pay leave systems function in most in states. So I think that's been really important. Knowing that there's a community of others who are there to have your back, I think is really important. It's scary to be the one business that's standing up to the National Federation of Independent Business, which purports to speak for small businesses but really is bankrolled by other sort of ideological interests. Yeah, that's what's been effective. And then those business voices help to assure others that they can come forward. And also helping both policymakers and other businesses to think about the trade offs between the status quo versus a vision of what could look different.
Maya
And for those that made these changes several years ago, have they been tracking through data, sort of the impact of these policies? And is that something that they've been able to share with advocates or with policymakers?
Vicki
I think some of them have, and some of them have been very transparent about costs. There's a business owner in Minnesota who I've known for a long time who was very instrumental in getting the paid leave policy passed there, who talked a lot about how she had a spreadsheet, and she looked at what it would cost to buy commercial short term disability insurance for her employees. And it was just not a tenable thing to do. However, she also had an employee who had serious, serious health issues, and she herself ended up falling behind on her rent because she provided paid leave to that worker. And so, you know, I think they come with different experiences. There was a farmer from Oregon who testified in Congress a few years ago who talked about how businesses, like other farmers, think nothing about investing in tractors. And the cost of investing in a tractor is much higher than the cost of investing in a worker. But people think, again, back to the earlier part of the conversation about hard costs, about costs where you can see the thing that you're buying, versus costs that are investments in human capital and recognizing the value of people, as humans and their workers, as your most valuable resource.
Maya
So I think we have about time for two more questions. Okay, great. I'm going to ask you the one about the role of AI in technology. And then maybe we can end with, what's your advice for people? So speaking of human and investments in humans, there's a lot of conversation right now about the role of artificial intelligence, AI and its impact on really every aspect of our life. Several years ago, you, I, others were involved in a lot of discussions about the future of work and the impact of automation and technology, particularly on a lot of jobs that were dominated by women and people of color. And the sort of consensus was that a lot of the low paid jobs that women were working in were going to be replaced by automation or were going to be severely impacted by them. But care work was a little bit of an outlier, maybe because of the personal nature of the work, the human to human aspect of it. Now we're in a place where AI has developed much more rapidly and sort of infiltrated every aspect of our lives in ways that maybe we didn't anticipate. Do you think that previous conclusion about the impact of technology on care work is still true, or is it different because of a world that we're in now?
Vicki
It's a great question. Yeah, I think we don't know yet completely, but we have seen some things that are concerning, like hospitals that are using robots and using AI and using technology to watch patients in their hospital rooms, for example. So, I know a dementia patient who was in the hospital for a procedure, and instead of having an actual physical human with her in her room the first night she was there, they had robot eyes watching and then would alert a nurse if she needed help. But that's not good if you're the person in that hospital bed alone and confused, having a robot or artificial eyes watching you, and then some random person coming in to help you, is just not an effective or acceptable human solution, I would say. So I think there are some concerning trends. And in the day to day, human relationships between a care provider, a care worker and a person who needs care, particularly in the eldercare space, there are just some things you can't really replace, but certainly health care has become depersonalized in multiple ways, and I think that's really concerning.
Maya
You would think parents would be terrified at the thought of, you know, robots watching their children.
Vicki
Can you imagine.
Maya
Availing them in the daycare approach and being terrified? Well, maybe they would find it sort of exciting, but then.
Vicki
They wouldn't know. Yeah. You could have your teachers, your staffing ratio, covered by robots and then humans swooping in. But, hopefully we're not there yet. Hopefully we won't get there. And then I think there are other ways where AI and technology does make things easier, like helping people with logistics and doing research for them and setting up services where again, as a human, I might actually want another human helping me with these things.
Maya
Right. And trying to navigate systems and paperwork and so on. I've had this conversation with friends, partly because of the work I do, and in this moment where they feel like so many things are changing, so many things are scary, I feel overwhelmed, I want to be engaged. I want to do something, but I don't know what. And I don't feel like anything that I personally could do could make a difference, because the challenges we're facing are so enormous and so systemic. So sometimes I struggle to give my friends or family members an answer, but what do you tell people when they say these things to you, and particularly when it comes to changing culture or policy, just the way we look and think about care, work and caregivers. Is there anything small that people can do to take action, like on a daily basis in their day to day lives that could help sort of move the needle on these things?
Vicki
I think part of it is about visibility and gratitude. So if you have a care worker in your life, if you see a care worker walking down the street, if you see a babysitter or a nanny with a child, if you have a worker in your care, a person who's providing care in your home, thank them for the work. If you are employing that person, make sure you're paying them fairly and offering them fair working conditions. I think seeing the unpaid labor that our friends and our colleagues and our loved ones and our neighbors are doing and acknowledging that out loud can be very important, encouraging people to bring into the light the challenges that they're facing is super important. And then I think leveling up to the community level or the state level, not letting the chaos of this moment and all of the various priorities that need to be addressed, overshadow the longer term systemic needs that we had before and that we continue to have and will have more in the future. And not letting people off the hook. I've seen time and again politicians who are like, oh, if that bill comes to my desk, I'll sign it. They're like, sure, I support this, but I think really holding them accountable for not just offering support, but really offering championship for policies that are long overdue.
Maya
What does accountability look like in that situation where they say, sure, all supported and then they don't.
Vicki
Or I think they're.
Maya
Advocating for something the completely the opposite.
Vicki
I think it's being loud, like often we are, especially women's organizations, taught to be quiet and taught to behave. And that you catch more BS with honey. And I think sometimes that's true. And sometimes you really just have to call people to account. And so that's, speaking out loud about politicians who have an opportunity to do something and are not taking it. It's calling out de prioritization of paid leave and child care and elder care, and people with disabilities. It's like making the connections between, you say you're for affordability, you say you're for health care. While these other issues are tightly interconnected with that. And I think it's, you know, for those who are in positions of political power or in positions to influence politicians with campaign contributions and others in this money driven system that we're in, I think it's not being afraid to withhold contributions or to support other candidates if you're not seeing your priorities be met.
Maya
Right. Well, thank you so much for giving me such a great conversation.
Vicki
It's always great to see you.
Maya
You too. Thank you.
Vicki
Thank you.