The Changing Landscape of Early Care and Education: Trends in U.S. Child Care Supply, 1997-2023

• In Event: Lightning Session: Family and Child Policy & Population and Migration Issues

Abstract

High-quality ECE provides lasting benefits for children while bolstering parental employment, especially for mothers. Yet recent media coverage highlights the shortcomings of the current ECE infrastructure, referring to a "U.S. child care crisis" marked by exorbitant costs, long waitlists, quality concerns, and persistent workforce challenges. Efforts to mitigate this crisis gained bipartisan support during the COVID-19 pandemic, when public investments in families reached an all-time high. Today, however, many of these investments have expired, and sweeping federal budget cuts threaten the sustainability of remaining programs.

The structural limitations of the U.S. child care system produce disparities in ECE access across social groups. Considerable research demonstrates that low-income communities and communities of color have less access to high-quality ECE than their more privileged counterparts, thus perpetuating social inequality in child and family outcomes. However, few studies examine if and how these disparities in ECE access have evolved over space and time. Examining access trends in relation to other social, demographic, economic, and political factors would further illuminate how ECE access functions as both a predictor of child and family outcomes and a product of social and political constraints.

This study constructs a novel longitudinal dataset of U.S. child care supply disaggregated by provider type (employer business, non-employer business, public school program, private school program). I combine multiple secondary data sources to calculate a “child-provider ratio” (CPR)—the number of children under age 5 per child care worker—for every U.S. county from 1997 to 2023. Then, I examine CPR trends nationally and across geographic and socioeconomic subgroups, and I use regression models to predict CPRs by provider type based on county-level characteristics. I explore various model specifications, including those with county and year fixed effects, to assess how space and time influence the relationship between community characteristics and child care supply.

In sum, this study offers a detailed longitudinal examination of child care supply, revealing shifts in provider type and spatial disparities over time. The resulting dataset establishes a foundation for future research on how evolving social, demographic, economic, and political contexts shape and are shaped by access to ECE. A deepened understanding of these relationships can inform future policy efforts to reduce inequalities in access to high-quality care and ensure that all children and families have the resources they need to thrive.

Author

• Sarah Hodgman, Brown University
  Presenting Author