Iowa’s Third Congressional District Representative Cindy Axne says two million women have left the workforce because of the lack of child care availability.

In a discussion with Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, Axne says that compared to other advanced economies, the United States falls woefully behind when it comes to child care, and it costs the economy over $50 billion per year. She adds opening up child care access could make a huge impact on the national economy as well as the state of Iowa.

“When women can’t stay in the workforce and Iowa has one of the highest rates of two working parent families, it means that family’s income has been drastically cut. Allowing women the choice to work or not rather than forcing them to take care of their kids because there isn’t an affordable option could literally put billions of dollars back into our economy, millions back into the Iowa economy and help our families succeed. I call child care infrastructure. If you can’t get to work because a bridge is out, I don’t see a difference between that and not getting to work because nobody can take care of your child.”

Axne says the House’s COVID-19 stimulus package sent to the Senate last week included a boost to child care provisions.