House Democrats want to spend $450 billion to make child care more affordable and pre-kindergarten universal, as well as impose substantial employer penalties for labor law violations.
The package, proposed Wednesday, also includes tens of billions in new spending for free community college, school infrastructure, child nutrition, and worker training. The House Education and Labor Committee plans to begin marking up the more the $761 billion package Thursday.
The unprecedented proposal for early childhood makes up one of the largest pieces of a $3.5 trillion expansion of the social safety net President