“This powerful book should be mandatory reading for anyone who cares about our nation. The authors provide compelling evidence that by neglecting what science shows our children and families really need, we are imperiling our future. Even more importantly, they offer a plan to support all our children and their parents, ensuring that each of our children has the opportunity to thrive.”

—David T. Ellwood, Isabelle and Scott Black Professor of Political Economy, and director, Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

Early care and education in the United States is in crisis. The period between birth and kindergarten is a crucial time for a child’s development. Yet vast racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities that begin early in children’s lives contribute to starkly different long-term outcomes for adults. Compared to other advanced economies, child care and preschool in the U.S. are scarce, prohibitively expensive, and inadequate in quality for most middle- and low-income families. To what extent can early-life opportunities provide these children with the same life chances of their affluent peers and contribute to reduced social inequality in the long term, and across generations? The updated second edition of Cradle to Kindergarten offers a comprehensive, evidence-based strategy that diagnoses the obstacles to accessible early education and charts a path to opportunity for all children.

The U.S. government invests less in children under the age of five than do most other developed nations. Most working families must seek private child care, but high-quality child care options are expensive relative to the means of most families. This means that children from lower-income households, who would benefit most from high-quality early education, are the least likely to attend them. Existing policies, such as pre-kindergarten in some states, are only partial solutions, and what exists varies tremendously in terms of access and quality.

To address these deficiencies, the authors propose to overhaul the early care and education system, beginning with a federal paid parental leave policy that provides both mothers and fathers with time and financial support after the birth of a child. They also advance an expansion of the child care tax credit, and a new child care assurance program that provides grant assistance towards the cost of high-quality early care for low- and moderate-income families. Their plan establishes universal, high-quality early education in the states starting by age three, and a reform of the Head Start program that would include more intensive services for families living in areas of concentrated poverty and experiencing multiple adversities from the earliest point in these most disadvantaged children’s lives. They conclude with an implementation plan and contend that these reforms are attainable well within a ten-year timeline.

Reducing educational and economic inequalities requires that all children have robust opportunities to learn and fully develop their capacities and have a fair shot at success. Cradle to Kindergarten presents a blueprint for fulfilling this promise by expanding access to educational and financial resources at a critical stage of child development.

Ajay Chaudry is a writer on social policy and research professor at New York University, and former Deputy Assistant Secretary for Human Services Policy at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in the administration of President Barack Obama.

Taryn Morrissey is Associate Professor of Public Administration and Policy at American University.

Christina Weiland is Associate Professor of Education at the University of Michigan.

Hirokazu Yoshikawa is the Courtney Sale Ross Professor of Globalization and Education at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, and Co-Director of the Global TIES for Children Center at New York University.

This book examines the Work Projects Administration, previously known as the Work Progress Administration, as well as other national relief policies. The WPA was the name applied to the federally operated and financed program inaugurated in the summer of 1935 in which as many as fifty federal agencies cooperated in providing jobs for workers meeting prescribed conditions of eligibility.

Donald S. Howard was assistant director of the Charity Organization Department of the Russell Sage Foundation.

This report is about the Community Law Offices (CLO), which operated two neighborhood law offices in Manhattan—in East and Central Harlem—that provided free legal services to individuals and groups who could not afford private attorneys. CLO relied primarily on attorneys in private practice who volunteered part of their time to handle the cases brought to the two offices. Formation and growth, an overview of its operations, and an evaluation of volunteer performance are discussed.

Douglas E. Rosenthal was chief of the Foreign Commerce Section of the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. Robert A. Kagan is professor of political science and law at the University of California, Berkeley.

With each depression emergency measures are embarked upon—and the results generally forgotten. This study recovers and records significant experience in previous depressions for its bearing upon present and future policies. Published in 1936.

Leah H. Feder was associate professor of applied sociology at Washington University.

This 1930 report of a statistical study of 10,000 small loans is part of the Small Loans Series, a general survey of small loans prepared for the Russell Sage Foundation by the Department of Remedial Loans. Topics include the development of the small loan business and the social, economic, and living conditions of borrowers.

Louis N. Robinson was professor of economics at Swarthmore College.

A survey of the role of company-sponsored foundations and the philanthropic contributions of American corporations. History and growth, financial operations, goals and objectives, and the causes company foundations support are discussed.

An analysis of the practice, scope, and methods of recording facts in the daily work of public employment in various countries and a plan for standard procedure in the United States made for the Committee on Governmental Labor Statistics of the American Statistical Association.

Anabel M. Stewart and Bryce M. Stewart, Committee on Governmental Labor Statistics

Part of a series documenting annual research and activity in the field of social work. It is a record of organized efforts in the United States to deal with social problems and social conditions. Topics include adult education, health, mental hygiene, crime and penal conditions, children, community organization, the disabled, and religious social work.

Fred S. Hall was joint author of American Marriage Laws.