时代周刊:新冠肺炎给托儿行业造成的困境(2)（在线收听）

The federal government has introduced a few stopgap measures, and they are making a difference—for some.

联邦政府推出了一些临时措施，也已经收到了一些成效——对一部分人来说。

On March 27, President Donald Trump signed legislation

3月27日，特朗普总统签署立法，

giving $600 a week in extra unemployment benefits to laid-off workers, but that cash is set to expire in July.

每周为下岗工人额外发放600美元的失业救济金，问题是，这笔救济金只会发到7月。

A week earlier, Congress passed temporary sick-and family-leave benefits,

一周前，国会通过了临时病假和探亲假福利，

providing some employees with as much as 12 weeks of paid time off at up to two-thirds of their salaries.

为部分员工提供长达12周的带薪假期，假期薪资最高可达工资的2/3。

But businesses with more than 500 employees are excluded from the mandate,

问题是，规模在500人以上的企业被排除在了这一硬性要求之外，

and firms with fewer than 50 can ask for an exemption.

人数少于50的公司又可申请豁免。

That’s left more than 59 million Americans, including Crouch, uncovered by those government leave provisions.

这样一来，就有5900多万人得不到上述政府休假条款的保护，克劳奇也不例外。

Cristina Guajardo, a 43-year-old single mom living in Austin, won’t get paid time off either.

家住奥斯汀，时年43岁的单身母亲克里斯蒂娜·瓜亚多也没有享受到带薪休假福利。

She was recently let go from her job at a company that runs study-abroad programs.

前不久，她刚被一家主营留学项目的公司解聘。

Expenses are piling up, but she can’t start a new job until her 2-year-old’s subsidized day care reopens.

开支的账单已经堆积如山，但她给2岁的孩子报的补贴托儿所迟迟不开业，她就迟迟不能开始重新找工作。

“I’ve heard of a few jobs that have come up that would pay really well,” she says.

“我打听到了几份薪水非常可观的工作，”她说。

“But there’s no way I can.”

“但我就是抽不开身。”

The stresses of the pandemic have only exposed the cracks in America’s unstructured childcare system, experts say.

专家表示，疫情带来的压力无疑也暴露了美国松散的托儿行业的问题。

Families pay an average of $9,167 a year per child for day care,

美国家庭平均每个孩子每年花费的日托费用就高达9167美元，

while the median pay for people working in those facilities is just $11.65 per hour.

日托行业的从业者的工资中值却只有11.65美元/小时。

The average cost of full-time care for infants outpaces college tuition in 33 states,

左倾智库新美国调查显示，

according to the left-leaning think tank New America.

有33个州全日制的托儿费比大学学费都贵。

By comparison, Sweden subsidizes day care so parents never pay over $150 per month,

相比之下，瑞典推出了日托补贴政策，将家长支付的费用控制在了150美元/月之内

and France operates government-run day cares priced on a sliding scale.

法国则有政府运营，价格按比例浮动的日托机构。

“I think that the crisis calls for a complete re-envisioning of the American childcare system,”

“我个人觉得，经过这场疫情危机，彻底反思美国托儿行业的需要已经不容忽视了，”

says Elliot Haspel, author of Crawling Behind: America’s Child Care Crisis and How to Fix It.

《日渐落后：美国托儿行业的危机及出路》作者埃利奥特·哈斯佩尔说道。

Before COVID-19, he says, the system was “so fragile that a stiff wind could have blown it over.

他表示，新冠肺炎爆发之前，该系统就已经“脆弱到了风一吹就倒的地步。

Now we’ve got this hurricane that has completely shattered it.”

现在我们又遇到了龙卷风，这一系统就彻底不行了。”