Daycare workers' wages should be at the top of the agenda
Alex Van Tol
CBC Commentary
1 Nov 04

Canada's new minister of social development, Ken Dryden, begins two days of meetings with his provincial counterparts today. He wants a deal to create more daycare spaces across the country. Alex Van Tol is a teacher and mother in Victoria. On Commentary, she says daycare workers' wages should be at the top of the agenda.

Alex Van Tol:

I've spent most of my working life in the childcare field, getting paid badly for it: swim instructor, camp counsellor, youth outreach worker. Come to think of it, two of those jobs were volunteer positions. But no one would argue that they're all important -- I mean, they involve caring for children, right? Ask any good parent and they'll tell you that raising kids is their most critical task in this lifetime. I'd venture to say that rearing good citizens is at least as worthwhile as, say, remodelling kitchens or managing stock portfolios.

But here's the thing: although we value our kids and say that they're our greatest investment, we're downright cheap when it comes to childcare. It's not that working folks don't feel the pinch when shelling out for little Jesse's daycare. I mean that as a nation, we're not properly rewarding the people who spend their workdays raising our children. Our children are our greatest assets, to be managed with wisdom and foresight; society's future rides on their shoulders. Their proper development is a far more powerful investment than airlines and oilsands. So why isn't this reflected in the wages earned by their keepers?

Let's look at daycare workers, or babysitters, or stay-at-home parents. Charged with managing our nation's most valuable resource, none of these groups makes a salary that decently reflects the significance of their occupations. In fact, their earnings are among the lowest in the workforce, outstripped by auto mechanics, travel agents and grocery clerks. Do we really value our cars and carry-ons more than our kids?

Some might argue it doesn't take special training to look after children -- after all, humans have been doing it for millennia. But many childcare workers have completed years of post-secondary education. And so what if some haven't? A look inside any licensed day care, or well-balanced home where children are being raised, shows the importance of the work being done: teaching, loving, guiding, developing. How are these skills any less valuable than, say, managerial accounting? These skills are of utmost value: they're what make us human. But yet, in Canada, they're egregiously unrewarded.

I'm concerned that our kids are losing out because these low wages might be turning off well-qualified candidates who are ideal for childcare jobs.

Today marks the first day of Minister of Social Development Ken Dryden's meetings with the provinces to pursue the Liberal agenda on increasing the number of licensed childcare spaces nationwide. But I have to ask: what does it matter if government pours money into creating more spaces for kids, when the people who manage those kids are living on the poverty line?

Let's focus on quality before quantity. Government needs to ensure that childcare workers' wages are adequate BEFORE creating more spaces.

For Commentary, I'm Alex Van Tol in Victoria.