Reason 4 to Vote Obama: He is Pro-Family

Pro-Family means different things to different people. To me, it means addressing the actual problems that families are facing — lack of time for raising children, trouble making ends meet despite being a two income family, wondering whether they’re able to take their children to the doctor, etc.

Barack Obama has a plan to promote families that addresses their problems instead of wedge issues. Some of the things he’d work for include:

Strengthen Fatherhood and Families: Since 1960, the number of American children without fathers in their lives has quadrupled, from 6 million to more than 24 million. Children without fathers in their lives are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime, nine times more likely to drop out of school, and 20 times more likely to end up in prison. Barack Obama has re-introduced the Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act to remove some of the government penalties on married families, crack down on men avoiding child support payments, ensure that support payments go to families instead of state bureaucracies, fund support services for fathers and their families, and support domestic violence prevention efforts. As president, Obama will sign this bill into law and continue to implement innovative measures to strengthen families.

Support Parents with Young Children: Barack Obama would expand programs like the successful Nurse-Family Partnership to all low-income, first-time mothers. The Nurse-Family Partnership provides home visits by trained registered nurses to low-income expectant mothers and their families. The trained nurses use proven methods to help improve the mental and physical health of the family by providing counseling on substance abuse, creating and achieving personal goals, and effective methods of nurturing children. Proven benefits of these types of programs include improved women’s prenatal health, a reduction in childhood injuries, fewer unintended pregnancies, increased father involvement and women’s employment, reduced use of welfare and food stamps, and increased children’s school readiness. Researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis concluded that these programs produced an average of five dollars in savings for every dollar invested and produced more than $28,000 in net savings for every high-risk family enrolled in the program. The Obama plan would assist approximately 570,000 first-time mothers each year.

Expand Flexible Work Arrangements: Barack Obama will address this concern by creating a program to inform businesses about the benefits of flexible work schedules for productivity and establishing positive workplaces; helping businesses create flexible work opportunities; and increasing federal incentives for telecommuting. Obama will also make the federal government a model employer in terms of adopting flexible work schedules and permitting employees to petition to request flexible arrangements.

Provide a “Making Work Pay Tax Cut” for America’s Working Families: American people work longer and harder than those in any other wealthy nation in the world. But their hours are getting longer and their wages aren’t getting any higher. In addition they are being squeezed by rising health care, education and energy costs. Rather than relieving the burden on working families, the current administration has provided tax cut after tax cut to the wealthiest Americans and enacted tax breaks for the most well-connected corporations. Barack Obama will restore fairness to the tax code and provide 150 million workers the tax relief they deserve. Obama will create a new “Making Work Pay” tax credit of up to $500 per person, or $1,000 per working family. This refundable income tax credit will provide direct relief to American families who face the regressive payroll tax system. It will offset the payroll tax on the first $8,100 of their earnings while still preserving the important principle of a dedicated revenue source for Social Security. The “Making Work Pay” tax credit will completely eliminate income taxes for 10 million Americans. The tax credit will also provide relief to self-employed small business owners who struggle to pay both the employee and employer portion of the payroll tax. The “Making Work Pay” tax credit offsets some of this self-employment tax as well.

Expand Paid Sick Days: Half of all private sector workers have no paid sick days and the problem is worse for employees in low-paying jobs, where less than a quarter receive any paid sick days. Barack Obama will require that employers provide seven paid sick days per year.

I think that people across the political spectrum can agree that families are hurting. This year we have a choice between tired, so-called “pro-family” rhetoric that is a cover for attacking others, or we can vote for Barack Obama, someone who knows of family hardships firsthand and whose plans are truly for the family.