Models for Increasing Child Care Worker Compensation

Brief #8 from the series "Charting Civil Society," by the Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy.

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With more than half of all mothers with preschool-age children working outside the home, there is substantial demand for high-quality, affordable child care. But as many parents know, the supply of good quality child care is both limited and costly: There are relatively few well-trained and experienced child care workers; recruitment and retention of staff is difficult; and wages for child care workers, among the lowest paid in the U.S. labor force, generally come with few employee benefits. Not only does this situation defy economic models of supply and demand, it has confounded attempts to secure better compensation for child care workers.

The issue of child care worker compensation has been difficult to advance because of the potential costs associated with ensuring quality care and because there is a dearth of suitable policy or market mechanisms for improving compensation for child care workers. The issue has gained some momentum in the past few years, however, because of tight labor markets and a healthy economy that has left the federal and state governments with budget surpluses. Child advocates are taking advantage of this situation to press for better compensation for child care workers, and are building public support, mobilizing workers, and shaping policy tools to improve both compensation and the quality of child care programs.

Based on secondary data, Internet searches, and interviews with child advocates, this brief summarizes the initiatives that were underway at the end of 2000 in the 50 states and the District of Columbia.¹ Many of these initiatives operate as demonstration projects or in only a few counties within a state. They seldom cover all types of child care providers, and often have limited funding.

Nevertheless, the range of policy initiatives identified in this brief illustrates the creative approaches that are being taken by policymakers and child advocates to address the need to improve compensation for child care workers.

Notes from this section of the report

1. This brief is based on the 2001 report by Eric C. Twombly, Maria D. Montilla, and Carol J. De Vita. This research was supported by the Foundation for Child Development.

Note: This report is available in its entirety in the Portable Document Format (PDF).

The nonpartisan Urban Institute publishes studies, reports, and books on timely topics worthy of public consideration. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the Urban Institute, its trustees, or its funders.

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