(Illustration by iStock/Vladimir Kononok)
The day after the Affordable Care Act was signed, I was at a forum with many of the nation’s leading children’s health experts. The vast majority applauded the measure but bemoaned the missed opportunity: If kids had been the top priority in the drafting of that bill, every child, including those with severe health issues, would have been guaranteed access to the top-flight medical care of their choosing. It was an especially aggravating oversight, given how inexpensive kids are relative to the federal government’s nearly $2 trillion (yes, trillion) health care budget. Comprehensive care for kids would have essentially been “budget dust”: a sprinkling on top of the cake, relatively speaking, but a game changer in absolute terms.
Other interests with better-funded government lobbyists got much of what they wanted from the bill: i.e., hospitals, providers, and insurance companies. Children’s advocacy groups were certainly paraded around to help win final passage (“It’s for the kids!”), but a dearth of advocacy dollars kept them from being at the negotiating table to truly prioritize kids.
Why did this happen? Why have there been so many missed opportunities to make public investments and reforms that would help children? It’s not because kids don’t vote. After all, "private equity" doesn’t have that many voters, per se. And billions are donated annually on behalf of kids. Why hasn’t it been enough?
The problem is that, for far too long, charitable support for kids has been disconnected from systemic change, being primarily geared, instead, toward direct service programs. That’s perfectly understandable. Donors like to quickly see, firsthand, the impact of their giving. But when that giving doesn’t scale, it only impacts hundreds or thousands of kids, not millions of kids, and doesn’t lead to shifts of billions of dollars.
This kind of massive missed opportunity simply doesn’t exist in the same way in other sectors, where it is more generally understood that government policy, regardless of which politicians are in power, is where the money is. Only when it comes to kids do we see this over-reliance on private donations for (what should be) a public good. I have never seen a city planning department, county DA’s office, state transportation agency, or the Pentagon have a fundraising drive to secure basic supplies and services like public schools regularly do.
Relying so heavily on private support is a losing strategy. If every available philanthropic dollar were donated to direct service supports for kids, right now, it would fund no more than a few days of what government programs provide. Think early childhood, education, health, social services: the pot of available dollars and the opportunity for impact is simply much greater in the public sector, providing a far higher return on investment than direct service giving.
Other sectors focus heavily on advocacy for this reason. For seniors, Social Security and Medicare have had monumental impacts on lessening poverty and ensuring access to medical care (and these programs have received consistent government funding for decades, thanks, in large part, to AARP’s advocacy). The business sector spends millions annually on top-notch government relations teams that lobby effectively for tax breaks and policy changes for their benefit. And at the state and local level, labor spends a significant amount of its members’ dues on advocacy efforts. Ironically, the opportunity for public funding for kids far exceeds these other interests, given the strong public and bipartisan support for the well-being of children.
Children’s well-being would be dramatically improved if philanthropic donors, specifically individual donors and small family foundations, dedicated at least 10 percent of their kids’ charitable giving to advocacy organizations with strong government relations teams. Imagine if a donor or foundation that wants to help foster children, in addition to giving directly to foster care agencies and other direct service programs, contributed 10 percent to advocacy organizations fighting on behalf of foster youth. In California, a recent $500,000 advocacy campaign led to a new, ongoing public investment of $30 million a year for a 24/7 statewide helpline dedicated to helping foster kids and families.
If your goal is to improve education, in addition to giving directly to schools, devote 10 percent to organizations advocating for needed reforms and increased funding. After all, also in California, a $3 million advocacy effort led to a more equitable school finance system that guaranteed billions of additional dollars annually for English Learners and kids in poverty. While philanthropic support for nonprofits that provide direct services is essential, this comprehensive approach of contributing to both direct service and advocacy organizations is critical to getting all kids the supports they need.
My organization, Children Now, has achieved huge victories for kids through advocacy by building two tandem pillars of strength: a strong government relations team with decades of combined experience in California government, and the Children’s Movement of California, a unique network of more than 6,200 diverse organizations that push for major reforms and funding for kids through collective action campaigns. After parents, communities, and even youth themselves set the agenda, our policy, communications, and government relations experts work to enact that agenda. A key ingredient is the power of the Children’s Movement, which brings hundreds of groups together to speak at the same time to push issues over the top. Our model has helped secure over $8.1 billion in new state childcare funding, health insurance for almost every child in California, landmark legislation to require age verification for social media and gaming sites, historic school funding reform, and universal preschool for 4-year-olds. And that’s with a fraction of the funding for advocacy that other sectors receive. So much more lasting support for kids is there for the taking.
Donors want kids prioritized. That’s been shown by the billions of dollars donated in support of kids each year. But if at least 10 percent of those donations were dedicated towards advocacy organizations with strong government relations teams, the return on that investment would be billions more, and the long-term impact would benefit millions more kids. That shift in philanthropic funding is how we ensure every kid has the opportunity to reach their full potential.
Read more stories by Ted Lempert.