Capital gains decision should invest $500 million in child care, early learning | Opinion

During the pandemic, when schools closed and businesses reduced hours, mine stayed open, serving dozens of families. As a home-based childcare provider, I kept my doors open so the parents of the children I care for could continue to show up as frontline workers: border control agents, healthcare workers, customs brokers and public school employees. That made those of us in the early learning industry essential workers, too.

We were necessary and extremely important to the myriad of families that count on us for childcare: low-income families, those who need subsidized assistance and my neighbors who are private pay. I believe all children should have access to quality childcare and a safe place to learn while their parents work or continue their own education. That’s why I refuse to turn children, including kids from low-income families, away from my program and why I participate in Early Achievers.

Now that schools are back to in-person learning and businesses are expanding their hours, we are still critical to economic recovery. More than ever, families count on Busy Bees Home Child Care for safe, affordable child development programs — especially since I am the last family child care provider in the city of Blaine.

The work I do in my family child care/preschool is often invisible — but you see the results of my work for years to come. The children in my care are nourished in this home-away-from-home, both with the nutritious food we make and by the care and support we give them. By the time they leave my program, my students are ready for kindergarten and have a solid start on the skills they need to succeed throughout their school years. After 19 years as a child care provider, I have seen my very first students graduate from high school and go on to college, become trusted employees and valued contributors to our community.

As an advocate for children and their families, I fought to pass the capital gains tax in Olympia. I knew it would mean a big investment in early learning and childcare: $500 million every year for the Education Legacy Trust Account. I also believed it would help fix our upside-down tax code. Washington is the worst in the nation when it comes to tax fairness. We ask those with the lowest income to pay the most in state and local taxes, while the richest get away with paying less than their share.

For too long, a few of the wealthiest individuals in our state have rigged the rules for their own financial interests. In addition to being unfair, our tax code has kept in place racist and classist systems that disproportionately impact Black and brown communities, making it harder for us to build and pass on wealth. The capital gains tax is a chance to start to fix that.

But now a very small number of the state’s wealthiest residents are fighting to keep the rules in their favor and keep their tax break in place — at the expense of kids and families. They sued to overturn the capital gains tax law. The case made it all the way to the Supreme Court, which will decide later this month whether to keep in place our regressive tax code or invest $500 million in childcare, early learning and K-12 education.

We can’t afford to go backwards. It’s time to make sure that our kids, who have already lived through a pandemic, have the educational supports they need. It’s time to make sure families, many of whom are still struggling to recover from the financial impacts of the pandemic, realize we finally have a tax code where the very rich pay their share in taxes, just like they do. My friends, neighbors and clients need more options in child care, not less. Our students and their teachers deserve investments, not cuts to schools and education programs.

Frankly, it’s about time for the wealthiest 0.2% of people who would be subject to this tax to start paying what they owe. This is a modest contribution — 7% of profits over $250,000 from the sale of stocks and bonds — so that our tax code is more fair and our communities have the investments they deserve. Let’s come together, as we have in the past, to insist that the wealthy pay what they really owe, like the rest of us!

This story was originally published February 3, 2023 at 5:00 AM.