Prevent Harmful Funding Cuts!

Congress and the White House are Negotiating Now About Potential Cuts on March 1 and Perhaps More Cuts on March 27– And it Matters to Child Care, Head Start, Early Intervention, Schools, Nutrition and other Basic Needs for Children and Families

A fair budget and a reduced deficit are important, but those goals should be met without making dramatic cuts to child care, Head Start, education, nutrition programs, or other basic needs of low- and moderate- income children and families. Right now, Congress and the White House are negotiating the second "Fiscal Cliff" – automatic cuts to programs on March 1. And there’s more – on March 27, funding for most of the government programs comes to an end and the government will shut down unless Congress and the White House finish the appropriations bill for Fiscal Year 2013 (October 1, 2012 through September 30, 2013). This holds a chance of further cuts, or hopefully some increases in programs helping children and families (including Head Start, child care, child nutrition, and many more services for children and families). Because roughly 75% of public funds for early childhood education come from federal funding, the federal spending cuts being discussed would have significant consequences.

Overview of Key Decisions in the Fiscal Debate

There are three components to the current budget negotiations:    

1. Sequestration: Congress and the White House agreed to delay sequestration until March 1. But that means the cuts could start March 1 instead of last January 2, and they would still be significant funding losses for child care, Head Start, education, job training and many, many other human services programs. And that’s just in the first year of a 10-year agreement to make cuts. 

2. Revenues and tax spending: While Congress and the White House agreed to some revenue raising on much wealthier taxpayers, it is not enough to deal with the deficit. Fairly raising revenues is necessary or all of the ways we bring down the deficit will be by cutting programs and Medicaid and other entitlements that help low- and moderate- income families and their children.

3. Entitlements: Yet another part of the debate is what to do about entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. 

Learn More

What Federal Funds Pay For in
Early Childhood Education

Glossary of Terms

State-by-State Cuts to Programs

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