This story, from Bloomberg’s William Selway, highlights a really important point about the cuts to Head Start caused by sequestration:

A U.S. preschool program for low-income families allowed single mother Kelly Burford to take a $7.25-an-hour job as a department store clerk in Maryland. Her son, Bradyn, 2, spent the day with friends listening to stories, singing and drawing pictures — at no cost to Burford.

That ended in June, when Bradyn’s school in Taneytown, seventy miles north of Washington, closed after losing $103,000 because of automatic government spending cuts. Without support from the federal Head Start program, Burford, 35, said she had to quit her job and has seen her son’s progress slip. (my emphasis)

I doubt this is the only low-income parent facing the same dilemma. The question is whether anyone is keeping track of this. It’s important that these “hidden” costs of sequestration are taken into account when assessing the impact.