In 2019, New Mexico made significant changes to their Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) eligibility policies to expand access to child care subsidies in the state, including increasing income eligibility thresholds and reducing or waiving copayments for families. This analysis presents estimates of the changes in the numbers of children and families eligible for CCDF subsidies in New Mexico under the different eligibility policies. To create the estimates, we applied each set of rules to the New Mexico families in the 2015–19 American Community Survey (ACS) data, using the Urban Institute’s Analysis of Transfers, Taxes, and Income Security (ATTIS) microsimulation model. The model captures detailed CCDF eligibility policies, including the state’s definition of the filing unit and that families might be eligible for subsidies in only a portion of the year. 

Our analysis finds that changes to the rules between October 2019 and May 2022 increased the number of New Mexico children eligible for CCDF by 70 percent and increased the number of families eligible for CCDF by 71 percent, when we assume no changes in the size of the population or the extent of parental employment. We found that

• 98,000 children in 57,000 families were eligible for CCDF using October 2019 policy rules,
• 155,000 children in 90,000 families were eligible using August 2021 policy rules, and
• 167,000 children in 97,000 families were eligible using May 2022 policy rules.

The largest increases in the number of eligible children and families were among families with higher incomes, families with parents working full time, and children who are Hispanic.