Right in the centre - Chasing myths

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Published on Thursday, June 29, 2017

Ken Waddell
The Neepawa Banner

In my recent reading I have come across two very interesting columns. One is by a well known Manitoba columnist and he states that people waste a lot of time on their computers and he particularly targets Twitter. Probably the most famous Twitter user is U.S president Donald Trump. He often blurts out something on Twitter. I have never used Twitter. I think maybe this paper has a Twitter account. Younger smarter people than me can use it if they wish. I think it is largely a waste of time and energy. That’s my opinion.

I also read a column about the universal day care myth. Day care has been a huge topic for many years and there are those who would have us believe that all children should be in day care. All day care should be owned by the government and certainly all levels of day care should be supervised and regulated by the government. That of course is untrue but it doesn’t stop some folks from pushing the idea that we must have universal, government controlled day care. Day care is a highly valuable institution in a community. Some folks truly benefit from having a day care option. What I have always found very frustrating, annoying even, is that many people do not seriously evaluate the pros and cons of day care. There is a cost to day care that seriously erodes the financial viability of believing that every parent must be working outside the home.

A single parent has to have some day care options but it may not be a government run day care. Two parent families may also want or need day care for their kids and if it makes economic or career advancement sense, that’s all well and good. The only thing I ask people to consider is the affordability of day care for a family income.
Other aspects of day care are harder to measure but they should be considered. If a child loves being at day care and is doing well, that’s fantastic. But if a child isn’t doing well at day care, it can have some long term detrimental results.

The part that I object to is that governments, bureaucrats, academics and union leaders tend to want to put every kid in a government run, unionized, subsidized day care. The unions love growth in publicly funded operations, at any level, as it automatically swells union numbers. Union leaders are some of our best entrepreneurs, as they love to grow their influence and their numbers. The easiest way to do it is to swell the number of people in public service unions. 

I admire people who are truly innovative in the way they care for their kids. Sometimes, it’s sharing child care between families or between generations. Sometimes, it is juggling shifts so one parent can be always at home.  I have no problem if a single parent needs day care. What I object to is our society being told that we have to have day care, that it has to be government run, has to be government funded and that parents can’t raise their own kids, they have  to be raised by the state.

Having the government involved in every aspect of our life from day care to regulating how much sugar we eat is getting rather annoying. If I am really good, if I set down my computer, maybe my grand daughter will let me read a book to my great grandsons while we enjoy a candy bar without the government looking over our shoulders.