Giving Compass' Take:

· Writing for the Cato Institute, Ryan Bourne discusses the limitations of federally-funded universal childcare programs and the negative effects it would have on youth development.

· How does research show universal programs affect society? Is universal childcare an effective way to boost cognitive skills? 

· Here's more about universal childcare programs.

Some Democratic presidential candidates want to introduce government-funded, universal childcare programs.

The stated rationale is usually the need for targeted financial help for families with children. But this reasoning is usually buttressed by a faith that government-funded care or preschool would improve the life chances of the children using it.

Such assertions are based on extrapolating research findings from more limited programs targeted at those on low incomes, such as Head Start, the Perry Preschool Project and the Carolina Abecedarian Project. But assuming these results apply to more universal programs is fraught with danger. Wise heads, such as Nobel Prize winning economist James Heckman, have previously warned that:

A much more careful analysis of the effects of scaling up the model programs to the target population, and its effects on costs, has to be undertaken before these estimates [of their impact] can be considered definitive.

A new paper on the effects of the universal childcare program in Quebec (by economists Michael Baker, Jonathan Gruber, and Kevin Milligan) shows why Heckman was right to be cautious. The results are devastating for the case for universal care.

On a sweep of evidence of universal programs around the world, the paper concludes that “there is a little clear evidence that these programs provide significant benefits more broadly,” than for some disadvantaged children.

Read the full article about universal childcare by Ryan Bourne at Cato Institute.