Fox Panel Dismisses Clinton’s Early Childcare Plan As A “Slippery Slope” And “Goodies” For “Certain People”

Payne: “Are We Saying To Certain People, Hey, If You're In A Certain Income Bracket, Every Time You Have A Child, Society Will -- I.E., The Taxpayer, Will Take Care Of It?”

From the May 10 edition of Fox News' Your World with Neil Cavuto

Video file

NEIL CAVUTO (HOST): Hillary Clinton trying to get her mind off of alienating some coal miners by talking to women, and more particularly talking to containing the costs for child care to no more than 10 percent of your income. Who foots the bill for the remainder? Fox Business Network's Charles Payne has an idea, Republican strategist Mercedes Schlapp as well. Both parents, by the way. Mercedes, and let me begin with you and end with you, the 10 percent thing wasn't a number just picked out of a hat because the fact of the matter is it's well in excess of that nationally for average families in child care, so the government, presumably, would pick up the slack. What do you think? 

MERCEDES SCHLAPP: Well that's right -- well,  I think I start because I've got more children than Charles, I've got five girls -- so our child care costs are very, very high. So, here's the deal what we have going on here Neil, is the fact that for Hillary Clinton, she’s trying to come up with this idea of federal spending, mixing it up with tax credits. And so it's this ideal again of the federal government making this more federal government centric instead of parent-centric. This becomes problematic. While it's a smart political move, in terms that they're trying to court these suburban working moms, totally understand that, at the other side of this is the fact that you have over 45 programs that the federal government is already administering in terms of early learning and child care costs. Why take it and keep it in the federal government? We know that these programs are inefficient, they are duplicated. Why not take that back into where the states, where we have many Republicans -- and actually, if the Republican candidate Donald Trump would take this on, many Republican states that are basically pushing for it and pioneering state-wide preschool programs, early learning programs, many of these programs run by faith-based organizations, nonprofits it  that are very effective and out of the hands of federal government.

CAVUTO: Yeah, in other words, there are other options. 

SCHLAPP: Absolutely. 

CAVUTO: Alright Charles, what do you think of that? Because obviously the press will be on Donald Trump, what are you going to do? Now obviously he's saying the government, there's a limit to what it can do. But it is very good during a campaign year to dole out some goodies and ideas for college, et cetera, not so good to sort of talk about dialing that back. So, what does he do? 

CHARLES PAYNE: That's a tough one, you're absolutely right. Hillary has a big lead in the polls with women, this is for working class families, and also low-income. Mercedes talked about all the government programs, there's a lot of others incentives too on the tax side, right? Earned income tax credit, child tax credit. child dependent tax credit, and the list goes on and on, including some of the state and local programs. Here's the thing Neil, 1960, two percent of our income to raise our kids went for child care. Now it's 18 percent, so we all know that it's blossomed pretty big. But this is a slippery slope to go down. Are we saying to certain people, hey, if you're in a certain income bracket, every time you have a child, society will i.e., the taxpayer, will take care of it? It's a real tough one to sort of go at no matter who you are, To your point, whether Donald Trump how he counters this, but in the real scheme of things. When we start talking about 19 trillion in debt and also the obligations of the individual family and person, it's a tough one that I think at some point we need to start saying there are certain responsibilities that we have.  And by the way, Mercedes is right, society throughout the history of America has found a way to rally around their neighbors and their friends and families to make sure the kids make it ok. 

Related:

Clinton Releases Plan To Cap Child Care Costs

Previously:

Bill O'Reilly: Political Correctness Has Made “Solving Poverty” For African-Americans “Almost Impossible”

Marco Rubio's Poor Shaming Comments Come Straight From Fox News' Talking Points

Bill O'Reilly Blames Poor Americans' Choices For Their Poverty