This report accompanies the first annual update of the Child Care and Early Learning in the United States data dashboard, an interactive tool from the Center for American Progress that allows users to explore state- and national-level data spanning from 2015 to 2024 on a range of child care and early learning topics, including the cost of child care, the child care workforce, and Head Start program access.
Introduction and summary
Nearly 70 percent of children in the United States under age 6—14.7 million children—have all available parents in the workforce,1 making child care and early learning programs essential not only for early learning and development, but also for family economic security, allowing caregivers to attend work, school, or job training.
Child care and early learning programs are foundational to any well-functioning society, providing large and lasting economic and societal returns and setting children up for success in school and beyond. However, families nationwide struggle to find and afford high-quality child care options that fit their needs. At the same time, early educators—who are disproportionately women of color—are vastly undercompensated, perpetuating high turnover and workforce shortages that limit children’s access to quality early learning opportunities and curtail the care options parents may want for their children.2 Structural inequities and vulnerabilities in the sector highlight a long history of policymaking that has undervalued children, families, and the critical work of early educators. Clear data on the landscape of young children, child care access and affordability, and the conditions of early educators illustrate the need for sustained public investment in the sector as well as in the children, families, and educators most affected by the crisis. Equipping advocates and policymakers with these data will help inform policymaking and funding decisions that equitably and effectively serve the needs of children and families.
This report provides updated data, visualizations, and analysis on key child care and early learning variables across the United States, including new data on the population of young children, early childhood poverty, the cost of child care, child care subsidy and public preschool access, Head Start program enrollment, and the early educator workforce. While most variables are now available up to 2023, national data release timelines vary. This resource includes the most recently available data for each variable and highlights several new variables that were added to the dashboard in 2024, which provide historic and current data on average hourly wages for Early Head Start and Head Start educators, young children experiencing homelessness, and Head Start program access for young children experiencing homelessness.
Child Care and Early Learning in the United States Data Dashboard
Additionally, the Center for American Progress recommends the following actions to expand access to high-quality, affordable early learning opportunities; support the critical work of early childhood educators; and protect early childhood health and well-being:
- Congress must secure robust, sustained public investments for a high-quality, mixed-delivery child care system that meets the needs of children, families, and educators.
- Child care policy solutions and investments must prioritize creating good jobs for early educators.
- State and federal policymakers must invest in proven strategies to reduce childhood poverty and support family financial security.
- Policymakers at the state and federal levels and federal agencies must ensure that child care and early learning programs prioritize children experiencing homelessness and ease the burden for families to access these critical services.
- Federal policymakers must protect Head Start and funding for other essential early learning programs.
- Federal and state agencies must improve early childhood data quality and transparency to help target funding and assess the impact of programs that serve young children.
The state of child care and early learning in 2024
The data highlighted in the Child Care and Early Learning in the United States data dashboard demonstrate that high-quality child care and early learning opportunities remain unaffordable and inaccessible for far too many families across the country.
Nearly five years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, the child care and early learning sector remains vulnerable. Stabilization dollars rolled out to states as part of the Biden-Harris administration’s 2021 American Rescue Plan Act provided a lifeline to the child care sector during the height of the pandemic, keeping hundreds of thousands of child care providers afloat and protecting child care for as many as 10 million children.3 While the sector has recovered to pre-pandemic employment levels,4 growth has been slow and inequitable nationwide, resulting in variabilities in child care cost and access that depend on where a family happens to live.5 The temporary nature of relief dollars was insufficient to address structural inequities, vulnerabilities, and unsustainable funding models that existed long before the pandemic. However, the effect of pandemic-era investments and the challenges many states have faced as these investments expired demonstrates just how necessary these public investments are and the wide-reaching benefits they stand to have for children, families, educators, and society overall.
See also
Executive actions reflect commitment to child care and early learning
The Biden-Harris administration demonstrated a commitment to children, families, and educators by uplifting child care and making early learning a priority issue. In April 2023, the administration released an executive order calling for executive departments and agencies to act within their authorities to improve access to high-quality, affordable child care and improve compensation for the child care workforce.6 Building on that executive order, two new federal rules were finalized in 2024 making regulatory changes and improvements to existing federal programs: the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) and Head Start.
On March 1, 2024, the Administration for Children and Families finalized a rule that made regulatory changes to the CCDF program to lower costs for families participating in the subsidy program, improve payment rates and practices for providers accepting subsidies, and streamline the enrollment process for families.7 On August 21, 2024, the Office of Head Start finalized a rule focused on supporting and stabilizing the teacher workforce through increased compensation, improved benefits, and mental health and wellness support.8 While both rules are not attached to additional funding, they represent a commitment from the administration and federal agencies to improve child care access and support the workforce. Congress must protect and expand funding for key early learning programs to build on this momentum and ensure equitable access for families across the country.
Population demographics and well-being of young children
In 2023, there were an estimated 22,098,708 children under the age of 6 living in the United States,9 accounting for approximately 6.6 percent of the total U.S. population.10 As was the case in 2022, the population of young children is more racially and ethnically diverse than the overall U.S. population. In 2023:
- 53.9 percent of young children were children of color, while people of color made up just 42.9 percent of the overall U.S. population.11
- 26.6 percent of young children were Hispanic, compared with 19.4 percent of the overall U.S. population.12
- 12.6 percent of young children were Black, non-Hispanic, compared with just 11.8 percent of the overall U.S. population.13
- 8.3 percent of young children were two or more races, non-Hispanic, while this group comprised just 4.5 percent of the overall U.S. population.14
Working parents
From 2015 to 2023, the percentage of children under age 6 with all available parents in the workforce increased by approximately four percentage points—from 65 percent in 2015 to 69 percent in 2023.15 This percentage is high across the country, but exceptionally high in states in the Midwest and Northeast.
The increase in children with all available parents in the workforce between 2015 and 2023 may be explained in part by rising maternal workforce participation, which also increased over this time period.16 While women with older children and women without children continue to have higher workforce participation rates than women with young children, women with young children have seen the most significant increase in labor force participation compared with their pre-pandemic level.17
Women with young children have seen the greatest increase in labor force participation compared with their pre-pandemic level.
Despite this growth, families with young children struggle with unaffordable and inaccessible child care options, and challenges finding and affording child care affect family financial security in the short and long term. In 2023, 2.2 million parents with children under age 6 reported needing to make job changes due to problems with child care, which included quitting a job, not taking a job, or significantly changing their job due to child care challenges.18 Due to several structural inequities and societal pressures, women disproportionately and overwhelmingly make career sacrifices and suffer pay cuts due to challenges with child care, resulting in more significant disparities in lifetime earnings—including savings and retirement benefits—for women who become mothers.19 Data from 2023 demonstrate that a greater percentage of mothers decreased hours or took time off work due to child care challenges than fathers.20 Additionally, child care as a reason for working part time has been on the rise, increasing more than 40 percent since the September 2019 average.21
Women disproportionately make career sacrifices and suffer pay cuts due to challenges with child care, resulting in more significant disparities in lifetime earnings for women who become mothers.
Child poverty
Across the country, young children continue to live in high rates of poverty. While children under the age of 18 already live in a higher rate of poverty than the overall U.S. population, young children under the age of 6 are especially likely to live in poverty and make up the poorest age group in the nation.22
Young children are especially likely to live in poverty and make up the poorest age group in the nation.
As detailed in Table 1, the U.S. Census Bureau currently measures poverty through two different methods: the official poverty measure (OPM) and the supplemental poverty measure (SPM). Both estimates can help illustrate the landscape of early childhood poverty across the United States and key trends over time. An estimated 5.3 million children under age 6—16.7 percent of U.S. children overall—lived in poverty in 2023 as measured by the OPM, a slight increase from 15.9 percent of children in 2022.23 In 2023, the federal poverty threshold for a family of four with two children was $30,900.24 As measured by the SPM, early childhood poverty also increased from 12.9 percent in 2022 to 15.3 percent in 2023, surpassing the 2019 pre-pandemic level and nearly tripling from a historic low of 5.3 percent in 2021.25 The lowered early childhood poverty rate in 2021 as measured by the SPM was largely driven by the American Rescue Plan Act’s expanded child tax credit (CTC), which helped families cover basic needs26 and protect millions of children from falling into poverty amid the widespread economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic.27 When the expanded CTC expired in December 2021, nearly 4 million children were plunged back into poverty.28
While the SPM provides a more comprehensive measure of young children experiencing poverty, the Current Population Survey’s Annual Social and Economic Supplement does not include a large enough sample size to estimate the SPM of young children in each state accurately. However, state-by-state estimates using the OPM can help illustrate the distribution of early childhood poverty rates across the country. In 2023, early childhood poverty measured by the official poverty measure ranged from 7.2 percent in New Hampshire to 26.9 percent in New Mexico, with the highest rates of early childhood poverty concentrated in the South.29
Nationwide, children of color experience a disproportionately high rate of poverty—an effect that is driven by a long history of systemic racism that perpetuates racial wealth gaps and cycles of generational poverty. In 2023, 29 percent of Black children, 27 percent of American Indian or Alaska Native children, 22 percent of Hispanic or Latino children, and 18 percent of children of two or more races under the age of 18 were living in poverty.30 This compares to 16 percent of all children under the age of 18 who were living in poverty.31
Family economic security is foundational for overall family health and well-being, and living in poverty has long been considered an adverse early childhood experience that places children at risk for long-term negative impacts on health and development.32 Decades of research demonstrate a range of harmful effects children may experience from living in poverty, ranging from lower birth weight, to reduced access to nutritious foods that support healthy growth and development, to chronic stress that affects physical and mental health, to barriers to key early learning opportunities that affect children’s success in schooling and beyond.33
The relatively higher rate of poverty for young children reflects both the high expenses associated with raising a young child—such as the high cost of child care—and lower earnings for families with young children because parents typically earn less early in their careers when children are younger.34
See also:
Children experiencing homelessness
This update to the child care and early learning data dashboard includes the addition of several new variables that help illustrate the prevalence of early childhood homelessness across the nation. While limited data exist on early childhood experiences of homelessness, it is clear that experiencing homelessness is harmful to young children’s health, learning, and development.35 Experiencing homelessness during infancy is a traumatic experience that is associated with delays in language, literacy, and social-emotional development—even after a child is stably housed.36 The length of time that children experience homelessness also corresponds with greater cumulative adverse effects on children’s health, well-being, and learning outcomes.37
In 2023, approximately 557,600 children under the age of 5 experienced homelessness, an increase of approximately 36,250 young children over the previous year.38 An average of 3 percent of all first graders across the United States were identified as homeless in 2023, an increase from 2.5 percent in 2022.39 These estimates are based on a methodology developed by SchoolHouse Connection in partnership with Poverty Solutions at the University of Michigan—a method that applies the percentage of first-grade students experiencing homelessness as reported by the U.S. Department of Education to the population of young children.40 It is important to note that this methodology yields a conservative estimate because K-12 school districts underidentify and underreport child homelessness.
The McKinney-Vento Act definition of homelessness
This analysis uses the definition of homelessness provided in the education subtitle of the McKinney-Vento Act, which Head Start programs, child care subsidy programs, and Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) Part C early intervention programs are required to use. The McKinney-Vento Act defines homelessness as “lacking a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence” and includes children who are living in shelters or transitional housing; staying in motels/hotels due to a lack of other accommodations; staying doubled up with other people due to loss of housing; and staying in cars, parks, abandoned buildings, or other substandard shelter.41
Evictions are one of the top reasons for increasing child homelessness,42 especially after the expiration of pandemic-era protections such as eviction moratoria and emergency rental assistance.43 Young children face the highest risk of eviction of any age group in the United States, with children under the age of 5 comprising the largest age group of people whose households have faced eviction.44 Eviction data also reveal striking racial disparities—approximately 1 in 4 Black babies and toddlers in rental housing experience the threat of eviction in an average year.45
Notably, access to high-quality early learning and child development programs has the potential to mitigate many of the negative impacts children face from experiencing homelessness. These programs provide children with essential early learning services and wraparound family supports that promote family and child health and well-being. Early learning programs have even helped families with young children who are experiencing homelessness secure access to housing. The Head Start on Housing program in Connecticut, for example, has housed 144 families (317 children total) as of December 2024.46
However, families experiencing homelessness face a unique set of challenges that constrain their access to essential early childhood services, including but not limited to high mobility, lack of reliable transportation, stigma and fear, lack of awareness of protections and services available, and lack of documentation required for enrollment.47 While children experiencing homelessness are eligible for most federally funded early childhood programs, programs designed to target low-income children and children in poverty do not always reach or meet the unique needs of children experiencing homelessness. A 2022 SchoolHouse Connection analysis found that just more than 11 percent of infants and toddlers experiencing homelessness in the 2021–2022 program year were served by an early childhood development program, including Early Head Start, home visiting, and programs administered by local education agencies.48
Cost of child care
Families nationwide struggle to find and afford early learning options that meet their needs, and child care prices continue to rise at an untenable rate, stretching family budgets and undermining family financial security. Even when adjusting for inflation, annual child care prices rose by $1,058 for two children in center-based care and $2,739 for two children in family-based care between 2016 and 2023.49 It would take 10 percent of median household income for two-parent households with children to afford the average national price of child care in 2023.50 It would take 32 percent of median household income for single parents, far exceeding the federal affordability benchmark of 7 percent.51
Bank of America analysis of customer data demonstrates that average annual child care payments continue to increase relative to 2021, and in 2024, payments were up 13 percent from the 2021 average.52 Additionally, recent analysis from the Center for American Progress illustrates the high financial burden of child care expenses on families with young children. Child care expenses push an estimated 134,000 families into poverty and an estimated 446,000 middle-income families into a lower- income quintile each year.53
Child care costs affect family financial security
134K
Number of families who are pushed into poverty by child care expenses each year
446K
Number of middle-income families who are pushed into a lower-income quintile by child care expenses each year
See also:
Child care subsidies
While child care subsidies help many low-income families offset the high cost of child care, unsustainable reimbursement rates and insufficient funding of the Child Care and Development Block Grant program results in the program falling short of serving all eligible children. As of 2021, the most recently available data for this variable, an estimated 13.8 percent of qualifying low-income children under age 6 received child care subsidies, a decrease from the previous year.54 The new CCDF rule finalized in 2024 presents an opportunity to lower costs for families participating in the subsidy program, improve payment rates and practices for providers accepting subsidies, and streamline the enrollment process for families.55
13.8%
Percentage of qualifying low-income children under age 6 receiving child care subsidies
Child care access and supply
While high child care costs are a major barrier to families’ access to high-quality child care options that meet their needs, low supply further affects the accessibility of these options.
Child care deserts
In 2016, CAP introduced a working definition of a child care desert: an area with an insufficient supply of licensed child care, measured as a census tract where there are at least 50 children under the age of 5 but either no child care options or more than three young children for every licensed child care spot.56 Amid the 2018 supply of licensed or registered child care programs across the country, CAP found that an estimated 51 percent of the U.S. population lived in a child care desert, with disproportionate impacts felt by low-income communities, rural communities, Hispanic or Latino communities, and other communities of color.57
While geographic proximity is not the only factor families weigh when considering child care options, finding a space to enroll their child in a program close to home or work often presents a significant challenge. These challenges may be even greater for families searching for child care for an infant or toddler or child with a disability,58 for whom child care deserts are particularly severe.
U.S. Child Care Deserts
Explore CAP’s research on child care deserts.
Public preschool
Public preschool programs—state-funded and -run early childhood education programs serving children ages 3 and 4—are essential to the child care supply landscape.59 In the past year, many states have made progress toward public preschool access, including new universal preschool initiatives in several states.60 However, six states still do not have state-funded public preschool programs, and enrollment numbers remain below pre-pandemic levels.61 The percentage of 3- and 4-year-olds enrolled in public preschool reached an all-time high in the 2022–2023 program year, with 7 percent of 3-year-olds and 35 percent of 4-year-olds enrolled in public preschool. However, this percentage increase may also be partially explained by a slight decrease in the 3- and 4-year-old population.
The child care workforce
Mainly due to the impact of stabilization dollars rolled out to states as part of the Biden-Harris administration’s American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, the child care sector recovered to its pre-pandemic employment levels—though not until November of 2023, more than three years after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The temporary nature of these necessary investments combined with structural inequities that existed long before the pandemic has left the sector vulnerable, and jobs recovery to pre-pandemic levels was slower than all other parts of the labor market.62 Low wages and insufficient benefits perpetuate high turnover rates, challenges in finding and retaining qualified educators, and sluggish job growth.63
Hourly wages of early childhood educators
The early childhood education workforce, which is disproportionately and overwhelmingly women of color, is vastly undercompensated. Teachers face low and stagnant wages with few if any benefits, including health care and retirement support, and many struggle to afford basic needs. Approximately 43 percent of early educators rely on public safety net programs such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.64 Adjusting for inflation, median hourly wages for child care teachers increased by only $2.11 between 2015 and 2023. For preschool teachers, inflation-adjusted wages increased by less than 30 cents.65 In 2023, child care teachers made less than $15 per hour, and preschool teachers made less than $18 per hour.66 Comparatively, child care teachers in 2023 made less than animal caretakers, laundry and dry-cleaning workers, retail salespersons, parking attendants, and dishwashers. Preschool teachers made less than animal trainers, landscaping workers, aircraft service attendants, and nursing assistants.67 Early childhood educators make significantly less than kindergarten teachers, who make a median hourly wage of approximately $27.82.68
This update to the data dashboard also includes three new variables reflecting average hourly wages for Early Head Start and Head Start Preschool teachers. While average hourly wages are slightly higher for Head Start teachers than the overall child care and early learning sector, Head Start teachers have also experienced relatively stagnant wages over time. During the 2023–2024 program year, Early Head Start classroom teachers made slightly less than $20 per hour, and Head Start Preschool classroom teachers made just less than $26 per hour.69 Head Start Preschool assistant teachers made approximately $17.50 per hour in the 2023–2024 program year.70 When adjusting for inflation, average hourly wages for Early Head Start classroom teachers increased by $1.26 between 2015 and 2024, and average hourly wages for Head Start preschool classroom teachers increased by just 52 cents.71
Head Start teacher education requirements are higher on average than other early learning programs
It is important to note that Head Start programs have teacher qualification requirements that exceed those of most state child care licensing requirements and program requirements across the country, leading to higher education and training rates among Head Start teachers, on average. For example:
- Early Head Start center-based teachers must have at minimum a child development associate (CDA) credential or comparable credential and “have been trained or have equivalent coursework in early childhood development with a focus on infant and toddler development.”72
- Nationally, at least 50 percent of Head Start Preschool teachers must have a “baccalaureate degree in child development, early childhood education, or equivalent coursework.”73
- All center-based educators must have at minimum “an associate’s or bachelor’s degree in child development or early childhood education” or have completed equivalent coursework.74
- Head Start Preschool assistant teachers must have at least a “CDA credential or a State-awarded certificate that meets or exceeds the requirements for a CDA credential” or be enrolled in a “program that will lead to an associate or baccalaureate degree” or “a CDA credential program to be completed within two years of the time of hire.”75
Implementation of the 2024 final Head Start rule would increase teacher compensation, benefits, and mental health and wellness support, with the goal of working toward pay parity with kindergarten teachers. However, full implementation of the rule will require increased federal funding to support teacher wage increases while continuing to serve the same number of children.
Head Start program access
Head Start, which officially began in the summer of 1965, is the longest-running publicly funded early learning program in the United States. It is a powerful example of how access to high-quality early learning, intervention services, and wraparound family supports can have long-lasting positive impacts on young children and their families.76 As an anti-poverty program that has included family and community involvement in its model and prioritized flexibility to meet local needs from the start,77 Head Start programs continue to be crucial levers for promoting child and family well-being, as well as an essential part of the child care and early learning landscape.
While originally designed to target children living in poverty, Head Start program eligibility has expanded over time to include children up to 130 percent of the federal poverty threshold, children whose families are receiving public assistance such as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families or Supplemental Security Income, children who are experiencing homelessness, and foster children regardless of their foster family’s income.78 Additionally, programs must ensure that at least 10 percent of children enrolled are eligible for services under IDEA and are encouraged to serve as many children with disabilities as possible.79 Head Start programs also fill a critical child care and early learning gap in many rural communities across the United States. In a previous 2018 analysis, CAP found that rural Head Start programs made up 22 percent of the overall child care capacity in 10 surveyed states with the highest number of rural counties.80 In many rural communities, Head Start programs are often the only licensed early education program available.81
However, funding constraints and an outdated funding formula that does not adequately adjust for geographic differences in child poverty rates and cost of living limit the program’s ability to serve all eligible children.82 In the 2022–2023 program year, Early Head Start programs served an estimated 10.7 percent of infants and toddlers in poverty and Head Start Preschool programs served an estimated 35.4 percent of 3- and 4-year-olds in poverty.83 That same year, Early Head Start programs served only 5.5 percent of infants and toddlers experiencing homelessness, and Head Start Preschool programs served only 13.6 percent of 3- and 4-year-olds experiencing homelessness.84
10.7%
Percentage of infants and toddlers in poverty served by Early Head Start
35.4%
Percentage of 3- and 4-year-olds in poverty served by Head Start Preschool
5.5%
Percentage of infants and toddlers experiencing homelessness served by Early Head Start
13.6%
Percentage of 3- and 4-year-olds experiencing homelessness served by Head Start Preschool
Threats to Head Start—including funding cuts—endanger children, families, and communities who rely on Head Start services for developmental and academic support.85 In the 2023–2024 program year, Head Start, Early Head Start, and Migrant and Seasonal Head Start programs served 764,424 children in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. While this represents a slight increase from the 2022–2023 program year, enrollment rates remain below COVID-19 pandemic levels.
Despite rising early childhood poverty rates in 2023, funded enrollment for children in Head Start programs declined in the 2023–2024 program year, continuing a downward trend since 2020. Funding from Congress has failed to keep pace with rising program costs, program needs to increase educator salaries, and rising child poverty rates. Staffing challenges driven by low compensation continue to affect Head Start programs’ ability to find and retain qualified educators, limiting the number of children they can enroll. In a survey of Head Start and Early Head Start grant recipients at the start of the 2023–2024 program year, 65 percent of respondents reported that staff vacancies remain higher than usual.86 Top reasons for continued vacancies included compensation (51 percent), working conditions (17 percent), other job opportunities (15 percent), and other (14 percent, of which respondents often cited the lack of qualified candidates).87 Across the nation, 14 percent of classrooms were closed down, with 76 percent of those due to staff vacancies.88
Recommendations
The data outlined in this resource clearly illustrate that families nationwide continue to struggle with inaccessible and unaffordable child care options. At the same time, low compensation and job quality perpetuate high turnover rates for early educators and ongoing hiring challenges. The child care crisis has wide-reaching impacts, reducing children’s access to high-quality early learning opportunities, harming long-term family financial security, and affecting the economy overall.
Congress must secure robust, sustained public investments for a high-quality, mixed-delivery child care system that meets the needs of children, families, and educators
The child care system has been described as a textbook example of a broken market system, where demand for child care exceeds supply and a gap exists between what most families can pay and the true cost of providing high-quality care.89 Early childhood education is a public good that should be funded as such, but in the United States, child care and early learning have long been treated as a private good or luxury, sustained by high costs for families and low wages for early educators. Despite some executive actions to reduce costs for families and increase the availability of affordable child care options and unprecedented but temporary investments to stabilize the sector during the COVID-19 pandemic, a broken market cannot recover on its own. And while some states have begun addressing child care challenges through local investments, federal funding is needed to ensure that access to high-quality child care options and overall child and family well-being does not differ drastically between states. Only robust, long-term public investment can address the sector’s long-standing vulnerabilities and structural inequities.
Some existing policy proposals, such as the Child Care for Working Families Act (CCWFA), last reintroduced in May 2023, would expand access to high-quality child care and early learning, support early educators, and bring down costs for families, ensuring that no working family pays more than 7 percent of their income on child care, and families earning less than 85 percent of their state’s median income would pay nothing.90 Critically, the CCWFA would invest in supply building for a range of child care and early learning options to ensure families can access a high-quality program that meets their needs. Targeted investments would specifically focus on expanding access for families facing the greatest challenges accessing care, including by supporting programs in child care deserts and programs that offer nontraditional hours and services for dual-language learners, infants and toddlers, and young children with disabilities, as well as children in foster care and those experiencing homelessness.91
Child care policy solutions and investments must prioritize creating good jobs for early educators
Sustained and robust investment in the child care sector must include investments in the workforce of early educators caring for children nationwide. Due to the broken market of child care financing, the vast majority of child care providers simply cannot afford to pay workers competitive wages because doing so would require programs to increase tuition beyond what families can pay—leaving early educators with low and stagnant wages and few opportunities for career advancement. Approximately 43 percent of early educators rely on public safety net programs to cover basic needs and care for their families. With a workforce that is overwhelmingly made up of women, and disproportionately women of color, improving compensation is also essential for advancing racial and gender equity.92
Without significant improvements to compensation, benefits, and opportunities for career advancement, the child care sector will continue to struggle to attract and retain qualified early educators who are central to ensuring safe and high-quality early education. The Child Care for Working Families Act would provide the investments needed to boost staff wages, provide cost-of-living increases and benefits, and ensure pay parity with elementary school educators with similar credentials and experience. Additionally, the CCWFA would support opportunities for professional development and training that are critical to creating good jobs in the early childhood sector and elevating the field’s professional recognition. The Head Start rule finalized in August 2024, “Supporting the Head Start Workforce and Consistent Quality Programming,” would similarly help support and stabilize the teacher workforce through increased compensation, improved benefits, and mental health and wellness support. However, additional funding will be needed through the congressional appropriations process to ensure Head Start programs can implement the rule’s mandates without reducing the number of children served.
State and federal policymakers must invest in proven strategies to reduce childhood poverty and support family financial security
State and federal policymakers have a direct role to play in offsetting the high cost of raising a child and reducing the number of children growing up in poverty. Unconditional family cash benefits are one proven federal strategy for reducing early childhood poverty rates and have a high return on investment, leading to improved child well-being and educational outcomes and reduced child poverty rates.93 While states should expand and enact tax credits and other unrestricted cash benefits to support families with young children,94 federal support and funding of a cash benefit program would help ensure children across the country could benefit from this critical support. Despite having one of the highest child poverty rates among industrialized nations, the United States has a limited history of providing family cash benefits and tax credits to support family economic security early in a child’s life, and most cash benefit programs are tied to work requirements. Unconditional family cash benefits are a standard model among Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries,95 and most OECD countries with cash benefit programs provide more generous benefits than the American Rescue Plan Act’s expanded child tax credit,96 which resulted in a historic drop in child poverty in 2021.97
Policymakers at the state and federal levels and federal agencies must ensure that child care and early learning programs prioritize children experiencing homelessness and ease the burden for families to access these critical services
In 2023, approximately 557,600 children under age 5 experienced homelessness, an experience that has significant and long-lasting adverse impacts on early childhood health, well-being, and learning. Notably, access to high-quality early learning and child development programs has the potential to mitigate many of the negative impacts children face from experiencing homelessness, providing children with essential early learning services and wraparound family supports that promote family and child health and well-being. However, families experiencing homelessness face a unique set of challenges that constrain their access to essential early childhood services, and existing programs do not always reach or meet the unique needs of children experiencing homelessness.
Policymakers must protect and expand funding for key federally funded early learning and early intervention programs to increase their capacity to serve children and families experiencing homelessness. This includes funding for Head Start; CCDF; Early Intervention (IDEA Part C); and the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting program. Expanding program categorical eligibility for children experiencing homelessness, a proposal that has received bipartisan support, would also help expand access to critical early learning and early intervention services.98
Additionally, state and federal policymakers must invest in assistance programs and policies that help prevent families from experiencing homelessness in the first place. Families with young children must be prioritized with cash assistance programs and housing support to proactively prevent homelessness and protect young children from this harmful experience. This includes efforts to increase safe, affordable housing options, emergency rental and housing stability assistance, and aligning the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s definition of homelessness with the definition provided in the education subtitle of the McKinney-Vento Act to ensure children identified as homeless by early childhood programs are eligible for HUD homeless assistance.99 States in particular must improve identification by increasing statewide coordination, data collection, and reporting.100 States can also improve enrollment of young children experiencing homelessness in early childhood development programs by increasing targeted support; removing specific barriers that prevent homeless families with young children from accessing these programs; and enacting other policies such as categorical eligibility for early intervention screenings, referrals, and services.101
Federal policymakers must protect Head Start and funding for other key early learning programs
Child care and early learning programs are essential for the next generation and one of the most meaningful investments society can make.102 High-quality early learning programs promote healthy early development, school readiness, and positive long-term outcomes such as increased job earnings and better adult health.103 And because nearly 70 percent of young children across the United States have all available parents in the workforce, child care is also a critical profession that supports family economic security, promotes workforce participation, and strengthens the economy overall. Programs such as Head Start that include wraparound health, nutrition, and family support services alongside high-quality academic and developmental services are critical in supporting overall family well-being and helping parents pursue employment and educational opportunities that promote long-term family financial security.104 Congress must protect and expand program funding through the annual congressional appropriations process to expand family access to affordable, high-quality child care options and to realize the mandate of the newly finalized Head Start and CCDF rules.
Federal and state agencies must improve early childhood data quality and transparency to help target funding and assess the impact of programs that serve young children
Effective and equitable policymaking to improve high-quality child care and early learning for children and families across the United States requires clear and disaggregated data on the population and well-being of children and families as well as program access, affordability, and the conditions of the child care workforce. However, data on young children often lack detail and coordination between agencies that oversee various aspects of child care, early intervention, and early learning programs nationwide. Federal agencies—including the Office of Child Care, Office of Head Start, Human Resources and Services Administration, and Department of Housing and Urban Development—as well as state agencies that oversee child care, preschool, home visiting, and other early childhood programs should improve data quality, transparency, and disaggregation to help equitably target funding, track program outcomes, and coordinate continuous program delivery.
States can develop early childhood integrated data systems to help link data across different sources and create a holistic picture of children’s development, early learning access, and overall well-being.105 The Preschool Development Grant Birth through Five (PDG B-5) program is currently the only federal funding stream dedicated to building state-level early childhood systems and is a key tool states can use to enhance early childhood data collection and support program efficiency and effectiveness.106 For example, New Mexico used PDG B-5 grant funding to improve data coordination and quality by developing its early childhood integrated data system; Maryland and North Carolina used grant funding to improve and modernize their existing early childhood data systems.107
See also
Conclusion
Families across the United States have long faced challenges accessing affordable, high-quality child care options that fit their needs. Updated data on child care and early learning in each state and across the nation illustrate the urgent need for holistic public policymaking and robust investments in the sector. Having access to the most recently available information on key child care and early learning topics is essential for understanding who is most deeply affected by this crisis, the conditions of the workforce, and accessibility and affordability of early learning opportunities and for informing solutions that best support children, families, providers, educators, and the economy overall.
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Hailey Gibbs, Casey Peeks, Jared Bass, Kennedy Andara, Natalie Baker, Alex Cogan, and Kate Kelly for their thoughtful review and support in the development of this report, as well as Erin Grant, Anna Lovejoy, and Sophia Applegate for their fact-checking. The author would also like to thank Erin Patterson of SchoolHouse Connection for her consultation and guidance on data related to young children experiencing homelessness and Bill Rapp and the CAP Art team for their work on visuals throughout this report.