By Paul Krugman, The New York Times, January 16, 2020
The other day a correspondent asked me a good question: What important issue aren’t we talking about? My answer, after some reflection, is the state of America’s children.
Now, it’s not entirely fair to say that we’re ignoring the plight of our children. Elizabeth Warren, characteristically, has laid out a comprehensive, fully financed plan for universal child care. Bernie Sanders, also characteristically, says he’s for it but hasn’t provided details. And as far as I can tell, all the other Democratic presidential candidates support doing more for children.
But policy toward children has attracted far less media attention than the debate over “Medicare for all,” which won’t become reality anytime soon — let alone the so-called Warren-Sanders “spat.” And my guess is that even well-informed voters have little sense of the grim exceptionalism of America’s child-oriented policies, which are Dickensian compared with those of every other advanced country.
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