Moms First Convenes Business Leaders with Biden-Harris Administration Officials to Announce Bold Commitments to Expand Child Care

Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo addresses corporate leaders in fireside chat

White House hosts Moms First's National Business Coalition for Child Care executives, highlighting their corporate leadership on child care

WASHINGTON, July 20, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Moms First, a national non-profit fighting for the structural supports moms need to thrive, yesterday convened business leaders from across industries for a series of events in Washington with the Biden-Harris Administration to celebrate bold new commitments to expand child care for American workers. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo addressed corporate leaders at a luncheon event, which was followed by an intimate roundtable on child care with senior officials at the White House.

"As families across the country struggle to find quality, affordable child care, the private sector is emerging with innovative solutions to support their employees' child care needs, and in doing so demonstrating the business case for broader investments in child care," said Reshma Saujani, founder and CEO of Moms First. "The organizations here today are at the vanguard of that effort, and we are honored to recognize and uplift their contributions to addressing our country's child care crisis."

The luncheon event featuring Secretary Raimondo was co-hosted with Boston Consulting Group (BCG) at their Washington, DC office and included executives from more than 25 companies with industry-leading child care benefits offerings, including: Adecco Group, Athletes Unlimited, Chobani, Community Offshore Wind, Deloitte, Dollywood Parks & Resorts, DoorDash, Etsy, Fast Retailing US, Gap Inc, Hire Talent, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, Lyft, Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group, PayPal, Pinterest, Salesforce, Steamboat Ski & Resort Corporation, theSkimm and WeightWatchers. Innovative providers such as Care.com, Haven Collection, Mirza, Vivvi, and WeeCare were also in attendance.

In a fireside chat, Secretary Raimondo expressed her support for child care as essential to a healthy workforce and economy, and especially in ensuring that women are able to participate in the labor force to their full potential.

"Child care is an economic issue, not a women's issue or a social issue, but core economic infrastructure that allows for all other work to happen. Investing in child care and Pre-K is essential to our economic competitiveness—just as much as investments in roads, bridges, domestic manufacturing, and semiconductors," said Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo. "These investments – from the public and private sector – are essential to getting Americans, especially women, back to work and supporting continued economic growth for the U.S."

Following the luncheon event, Moms First and a cohort of business leaders participated in a roundtable at the White House with Jennifer Klein, Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Gender Policy Council and Carmel Martin, Domestic Policy Advisor to the Vice President. The conversation focused on how business leaders can drive economic prosperity through their innovative policies to support working families.

Though child care in the US has historically been viewed as an individual problem for every family to solve, research from ReadyNation shows that insufficient child care takes a severe economic toll, costing $122 billion in lost earnings, productivity, and revenue every year. Moreover, a new report from The Century Foundation indicates the crisis is poised to get significantly worse as pandemic funding to bolster the sector expires in September 2023, with 3.2 million children likely to lose child care spots.

Yesterday's events marked the anniversary of Moms First's National Business Coalition for Child Care, an initiative launched by the non-profit last year to galvanize the private sector to take action on child care. Now comprising 30 members, the Coalition partners with companies to expand their child care benefits and provides a community of practice, promoting cross-sector learning and collaboration. Additionally, the Coalition works to increase transparency around child care policies and amplify first-movers, including through its recently launched #ShowUsYourChildCare campaign in partnership with theSkimm.

The next phase of the Coalition's work will feature an independent assessment of its members that measures the value created through direct investment in child care benefits. BCG will conduct the assessment at the invitation of Moms First.

"Gaps in child care make up a staggering portion of the $290 billion in GDP the US could lose in 2030 if we do not take action now," said Emily Kos, Managing Director & Partner, BCG. "We're proud to support this conversation at the national level, and work with Moms First and members of the National Business Coalition for Child Care to articulate this urgent need through our research."

New and recently announced employer commitments to expanding child care benefits celebrated include:

• Athletes Unlimited: Athletes Unlimited, a professional women's sports organization comprising four leagues, announced for the first time plans to offer caregiving stipends for all employees whose job responsibilities require them to be away from home beyond a reasonable number of days. This builds on their long-standing policy of offering childcare stipends for in-season athletes.
• Chobani: Chobani recently announced a new partnership with WeeCare, in which all full-time Chobani employees throughout the U.S., including manufacturing, corporate, and remote workers, will have access to a network of childcare professionals; be eligible to receive backup care credits; and receive an annual cash stipend to put towards childcare or elder care costs.
• Community Offshore Wind: Community Offshore Wind announced they submitted a bid to the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) that included a $10 million commitment to supporting parents who are working in and training for offshore wind careers, in partnership with United Way of New York State and another $5 million commitment from New Jersey. They have also committed to including a child care commitment in all future bids.
• Dollywood Parks & Resorts: Dollywood Parks & Resorts offers childcare search assistance in partnership with WeeCare and provides employees with a monthly stipend toward the cost of care. This stipend covers approximately 15 to 25% of Dollywood employees' childcare costs.
• Fast Retailing US: Fast Retailing (parent company of Theory, Uniqlo, and Helmut Lang) implemented a child care stipend in 2021 that reimburses eligible US employees up to $1,000 per month for childcare expenses. The retailer announced it has significantly expanded its child care benefit by increasing the duration of the stipend from 24 to 36 months, increasing child age eligibility to 78 months and lowering tenure eligibility from 12 months to Month 1 of hire.
• P.F. Chang's: Starting July 2023, P.F. Chang's provides child care assistance through WeeCare's network to all 16,000 employees across the country, along with backup care credits to 6,000 employees who have been with the company for at least one year.
• Tenaris: Tenaris supports over 3,000 manufacturing employees by offering child care benefits through WeeCare and a child care stipend to reduce the cost of care.
• WeightWatchers: WeightWatchers recently announced that all employees will receive complimentary memberships to Care.com, including five days of Back-up Care, providing employees with access to the Care.com community of child, elder, and pet care providers, date night sitters, daycare discounts, tutoring, housekeeping and more.

About Moms First
Moms First is a national, non-profit organization transforming our workplaces, our government, and our culture to enable moms in America to thrive. Our grassroots movement of more than 750,000 moms and supporters is dedicated to advancing women's economic freedom, uplifting the vital work of moms in our society and building the power to win the public and private sector investments moms need and deserve, including child care, paid leave, and equal pay.

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SOURCE Moms First