If we want upward mobility for the poor, they need transportation and childcare

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Paying single, jobless (likely skill less) mothers a living wage to watch other single mother's kids while they go off to work seems like the exact kind of thing we should be spending money on.  Something like Head Start, but with much lower goals and costs.

Ugh.  That sounds like a recipe to disaster myself.  Why is it people tend to think child care is an instinctual skill females have in great gobs without needing to be trained?  Doesn't sound like such a program would deliver even average quality child care, much less good child care.  And with it being practically a guaranteed job, I suspect that a number of them will be less than motivated to provide even average quality child care.  I suppose that we could hope that such a system would be able to at least provide adequate physical care so that the kids subjected to it wouldn't spend hours in crap-filled diapers and would get fed in a timely manner, but without a heavy leavening of professional trained child care providers, I wouldn't count on it.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Baby sitting is fine when you occasionally need someone to take care of their physical needs while you go out, but it doesn't take the place of the sorts of enriching activities those young children need if they aren't going to end right back in the same trap as their parents.  They need more than someone who will change their diapers, give them a drink and a snack, and plop them down in front of the boob tube to keep them pacified.  They need to be active, both mentally and physically.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

If we only had the resources to do what you propose, then yes, it's better than nothing.  But we can and should do more than the minimum necessary to get our serfs working in low wage low skill jobs.  Targeting the kids so as to have a chance of breaking the cycle in the next generation, is the next step beyond that.  In an ideal world with unlimited resources, we'd target both kids and parents, but definitely the kids should get the priority.  That good child care would also enable their parents to work is an added benefit, not the primary goal as far as I am concerned.