A Few Good Men (but it’s literally just Nannies)

This thought didn’t start as a policy idea.

It started as a conversation with my sister-in-law. We were chatting about military life- work, kids, stability. About how people make things function when the stakes are high.

I’ve never been particularly pro-military. I don’t like violence. I don’t like war. It’s not how I understand safety or care.

But I also come from a family where military service exists.

So when I speak of the military here, I’m not talking about ideology. I’m talking about structure.

What the Military Gets Right

The military does not rely on guesswork when it comes to people’s lives.

Housing is planned for.

Pay is standardized.

Healthcare is guaranteed.

Families are accounted for.

Relocation is structured.

Not because anyone believes soldiers are morally superior.

Because instability would break the system.

There’s an understanding baked in that you cannot ask people to perform demanding, high-responsibility work while leaving the rest of their lives to chance.

That’s not politics.

That’s logistics.

And I Can Only Speak Directly About Nannies (Women in care work)

I work(ed) in the nanny industry, so that’s where I see this most clearly.

Families are often genuinely confused about contracts; what to include, what’s standard, what protects them versus what protects the person caring for their child day after day.

Some families are well-intentioned and overwhelmed.

Some are disorganized.

Some quietly believe nannies don’t deserve what they ask for.

So care labor gets built on improvisation.

Hours stretch.

Pay gets fuzzy.

Housing becomes leverage.

Boundaries are treated like personality traits instead of labor conditions.

And when harm happens, it’s framed as interpersonal conflict instead of structural failure.

Care Is Treated as Personal, Not Essential

Care is still treated as something private; something families should figure out on their own.

But care is not a hobby.

It’s not informal labor.

It’s not something goodwill can replace.

The military doesn’t leave readiness to chance.

It builds systems that assume people need stability to function.

Care deserves the same seriousness.

And I’m not arguing that the military should have less.

Not the soldiers. Not their families. Not the people whose lives are bound up in it.

They deserve to be taken care of.

I’m arguing that if the country can build this kind of infrastructure for violence, it can build it for care.