When the government in the 1990s decided to cut support for nurseries, one of the main arguments was that it is easier to pay parental leaves than to pay for places in nurseries. Such arguments, however, are only true in the case in which one only makes superficial calculationsthat only take into account the short-term costs of daycare and parental leaves and do not take into account longer-term benefits, such as increases in income tax collection or investments in human capital.