Early Investments in Human Capital

08/09/2006

Early Investments in Human Capital

We 'invest in human capital' in order to increase our Gross Domestic Product (GDP). But the purpose of GDP, after all, is to make lives better now and for generations to come. Children look ahead. They tug us away from our immediate self-interest toward a longer run concern for the future of something bigger and more difficult to define.
Nancy Folb

How does the early care and education sector fit in the broader regional economy? How do we count the economic returns from care work as well as the long-term human development impact on children? Much of the debate thus far on economic links has focused on preschool. The true economic importance of child care for community development is much broader. A special issue of Community Development: Journal of Community Development Society, Articulating the Economic Importance of Child Care (Vol. 37, 2, June 2006), with Mildred Warner as Guest Editor, explores the economic significance of child care in three areas:

Investments in children and their long-term success
The contribution of parents as workers and consumers, and
Investments in child care businesses that contribute to regional economies.

It offers a new conceptual approach to measuring the economic importance of child care, and discusses practical ways that child care can become a core part of economic development policy, workforce policy, and early childhood policy at the state and local levels. Core principles for more comprehensive policy are outlined.

For more information, go to http://economicdevelopment.cce.cornell.edu. Copies of the Journal may be available from the Linking Economic Development and Child Care Project via e-mail at: [email protected] for copies.

Contributed by Michael Kalinowski

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