The Idaho House of Representatives has advanced a bill that would eliminate state-level regulations setting maximum child-to-staff ratios in child care programs. Though the bill is still pending and may be amended in the Senate, if the House version of the bill were to become law, child care programs would be required to decide how many children a single adult could care for at a time, without any clear limit. Currently, best practice guidelines set the maximum number of infants per adult at three, and this ratio increases as children get older (four toddlers per adult, seven preschoolers, and so on).

Across the country, a shortage of child care programs and staff has prompted conversations about how to build supply, with other states considering deregulating child care. Yet, research shows that raising the number of children a caregiver cares for could negatively affect children’s development, could overwhelm and push staff out of child care work, and conflicts with parent preferences.

Above all, raising child-to-staff ratios is unnecessary. There are alternative ways to build up the supply of child care and support children and child care providers—state policymakers just need to invest in them.

Why are child-to-staff ratios important?

Child-to-staff ratios protect and benefit everyone in the child care system: children, staff, and parents.

1. They are good for children. The developmental science is clear: young children’s early experiences and one-on-one interactions with caregivers shape their development. Lower child-to-staff ratios allow child care workers more time for one-on-one interactions and to respond to each child’s needs. Having fewer children to care for also allows workers to quickly and adequately respond when health and safety issues arise, such as infants needing frequent diaper changes while other children need to be supervised or a toddler choking on food at mealtime. 
   
   Because child-to-staff ratios are the norm across the country, much of the research (PDF) about ratios has been conducted in settings that have these limits. As a result, we don’t know what could happen to children in a state that proposes to eliminate state-level regulations altogether. But the science on how children learn and develop suggests deregulation could lead to bad outcomes for children—having their needs neglected at a minimum, and at the worst, causing harm.
2. They are good for staff. Child-to-staff ratios make the jobs of child care workers feasible, allowing them to effectively care for children. Imagine being a child care worker caring for three infants by yourself. Now raise that number to six or eight. Child care is already a stressful job (PDF), making that work more demanding will only worsen the situation and put children at a greater risk of neglect or harm. 
   
   Programs might be able to make more money collecting tuition, which would hopefully mean staff would be paid more. But turnover is already a challenge for the child care workforce, as less stressful and less demanding jobs are attractive in comparison. In fact, child care staff shortages is one of the primary reasons (PDF) for the lack of supply. Requiring staff to care for more children could exacerbate the child care supply crisis and drive more child care workers away.
3. Parents want them. When searching for and selecting child care options, research shows—unsurprisingly—that parents prioritize health, safety, and quality and often consider child-to-staff ratios. Any effective solution to the child care shortage needs to provide the type of care parents want. 
   
   In sum, the Idaho House bill potentially places children at risk of harm, makes the work of child care staff harder, may exacerbate the loss of child care supply, and ignores the protections parents value.

What alternatives could improve supply?

Fortunately, state policymakers don’t have to look far for alternatives that can and have improved child care supply. For decades, states have used federal Child Care and Development Block Grant funds to increase child care supply, and during the pandemic, COVID-19 relief funds bolstered the supply of care amid rapid program closures. Research suggests these investments worked.

A report by the US Department of Health and Human Services shows that federal COVID-19 relief funds provided grants to 220,000 providers caring for 10 million children, created 300,000 new slots in child care programs, and increased compensation for more than 650,000 child care workers. As pandemic-era funding ended, several states have stepped in to support the supply of child care as well. 

Using these various funding sources, states across the country are pursuing innovative ways to build and support child care supply:

• Efforts like those in Massachusetts, New York, and Virginia have offset costs associated with opening a new program or operating an existing program through startup grants, stabilization grants, and low-interest loans.
• DC, Illinois, Maine, and South Carolina have bolstered the compensation of child care staff through increased pay and workforce grants.
• Arkansas, Colorado, Iowa, and New York have supported the construction of a new building or renovation of an existing building to add classrooms, extra slots within a classroom, or reduce property taxes for providers.
• Efforts in Texas and Wisconsin have provided training and technical assistance to child care programs to support business practices.

Ultimately, the child care supply crisis is driven by a lack of funding (PDF). Only investing more—in proven and effective ways—will solve this core problem. Raising thresholds or eliminating state-level child-to-staff ratios may allow individual programs to bring down costs or enroll more children in the short term, but this solution also places children’s safety and development at risk, contradicts parents’ child care preferences, and may well lead to more teacher shortages and program closures in the long term. State and federal policymakers have alternatives to improve child care supply; they just need to invest.