Taking baby steps toward help for working parents

BY CARA EISENPRESS

Child care in New York costs an average of $15,000 per child per year, according to the Economic Policy Institute, and the costs are only one stress to families. Finding the right fit, setting up backup care and coordinating drop-off and pickup times that do not match work hours puts a burden on parents—especially women.

“As someone who had to put their career on pause because of a lack of affordable child care options, I understand how important this lifeline is for families,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a speech about several proposed child care initiatives in this year’s budget.

Politicians and private companies are propping up the idea that more mothers in the workforce should be able to expect consistent help with their children, although it remains to be seen whether there is the will or the wallet to meet the full measure of their need.

Beyond parental leave

About 70% of working parents who took time out of the workforce did so from the child’s birth until age 5, according to a survey of 5,500 working parents, 90% of whom were mothers. Vivvi, a Hudson Square-based caregiving benefits company, conducted the survey.

The parents’ time out of the workforce dampens their lifetime earnings. As a result, “what employers and many people have been talking about is what happens beyond parental leave,” said Lauren Hobbs, chief marketing officer at Vivvi. The five-year-old firm sets up child care benefits, such as online tutoring and at-home backup care for other companies, and runs its own early-childhood centers.

“Generally,” Hobbs said, “the benefits drop off.”

In the private sector, companies that offer benefits have often included some child care help, including pre-tax flexible spending accounts that max out at $5,000 per family and backup child care.

Vivvi seeks to expand that, making various levels of financial and logistics help available as an employee benefit. The firm, founded in 2018, works with Horizon Media, theSkimm, Tend Dental, Avenues, Cerberus, Goodwin Procter and Barasch & McGarry, among other New York firms.

In Horizon’s New York office, 25 employees participate in Vivvi’s virtual tutoring offering and seven children of employees have received tuition subsidies to attend the Vivvi child care center in the company’s building, said Nancy Galanty, the firm’s vice president of community and talent.

The idea behind Vivvi is to help employers recruit and retain parents, but there’s a benefit for companies too. “If you’re draining your PTO bank” as an employee, Hobbs said, referring to paid time off, “you’re not at work, which is not good for you or your employer.”

Hobbs said firms that have brought Vivvi in generally belong to one of two categories: industries such as education or health care, where staffing levels are crucial, and creative firms committed to retaining a diverse workforce.

Vivvi offers a true full-time solution for child care, should a company want to spring for the whole cost, she said.

But the perk might not be a must in every industry. Software engineers put child care services or reimbursement as their ninth priority for benefits, after perks such as flexible work schedules, retirement benefits, paid parental leave and additional compensation. Just 2% of engineers surveyed by job site Hired.com picked the benefit, according to its 2023 report on employees in the sector.

Elected officials have their own

HOBBS

reasons for talking about child care costs and coverage.

Economics

It’s partly economic. New York’s recovery lags the nation’s, in part because there are fewer people in the workforce. The city is still 0.6% short of its February 2020 jobs numbers, and the state is 1.2% below its numbers from that time. Nationally, the number of private-sector jobs is 2.4% above prepandemic levels.

In 2022 Hochul dedicated $7 billion to improving access and lowering costs in the next four years; in this year’s budget she has proposed expanding eligibility for assistance to families of four with an income of up to $93,200, which would cover 113,000 more children by her count—but hardly all of them. One of the biggest problems, she said in a press release announcing this season’s objectives, is that uptake is low even among families that would qualify for help.

The city received $4 billion of the money Hochul budgeted. Mayor Eric Adams said the money will go toward increasing the number of childcare seats and offering tax abatements to property owners who retrofit spaces.

practices. Schonfeld’s “talent is our strategy” principle drives its cultural success and ability to retain female employees.

The company has implemented a suburban strategy, opening locations outside of city centers to further the work-life balance and provide easier access for working women and parents.

To combat women’s leadership challenges, such as continuing to develop their talent, the firm launched Sapphire, an internal platform that delivers programs to help employees hone the skills they need for a successful career.

Schonfeld’s pledge to be a supportive place to work for women, parents, diverse talent, those well into their careers and those just starting out is evident in its comprehensive benefits package, which includes an enhanced paid family leave policy, and its recent partnership with Progyny, an innovative provider of cost-effective fertility and family- building services. ■

In late February, President Joe Biden added a twist: His Commerce Department announced that any semiconductor company seeking some of the $39 billion in federal subsidies would need to guarantee affordable child care for workers who construct or work in their plants. In New York that could play out upstate, as Micron works on a new facility near Syracuse, but the connection between business success and child care benefits for workers could catch on downstate.

The president’s 2024 budget proposal also includes funding for childcare and early childhood education by billions of dollars, but Congress must still weigh in.

“I hope it catches on,” Vivvi’s Galanty said. “In order to be competitive from a talent acquisition standpoint, organizations are going to have to expand benefit packages in a variety of ways, and child care is one of them. You want to support as many workers as you can, so it’s about where can you have an impact to really benefit the population.” ■