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Working Families

Access to affordable, reliable, and high-quality early learning and child care opportunities provides working families with better job stability and overall economic security.

Here are five things to know about child care and working families.

  1. Child care prices are untenable across all program types, age groups, and geographic locations. In 2021, the cost of infant care ranged from 24.6% to 75.1% of income for single-parent households.
  2. Child care helps parents return to or stay at work, which can generate an additional $94,000 in lifetime earnings for mothers.
  3. Almost half of parents are absent from work at least once every six months due to child care issues.
  4. 74% of mothers and 66% of fathers have left work early, arrived late, or been absent because child care fell through at the last minute.
  5. In a recent poll, 59% of part-time or non-working parents say they would go back to work full-time if their child had access to quality child care at a reasonable cost.

Learn more:

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Moody’s Report: “Especially Strong Employment Effects” from Federal Support for Child Care

August 12, 2021

A new report from Moody’s Analytics — the renowned global financial firm, which provides economic research regarding risk, performance and financial modeling — examined the elements of President Biden’s Build …

News

With Release of Budget Resolution, Child Care and Preschool Should Remain a Top Priority in Reconciliation Package

August 9, 2021

UPDATE: On Wednesday, August 11th, the Senate voted to approve the budget resolution, setting the stage for Congressional Democrats to craft a sweeping economic package with significant investments in child …

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2021 State Fact Sheets: Examining the Impact and Unmet Need of Federal & State ECE Funding

August 3, 2021

FFYF has released the latest iteration of its annual state fact sheets, which draw on numerous data sources to offer details about the early childhood opportunities in each state made …

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The Expanded CDCTC Would Help More Families Afford Child Care

July 26, 2021

On Wednesday, the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) released a tool designed to help families understand the expanded CDCTC limits that were temporarily expanded for 2021 under the American Rescue Plan …

News

Primetime Coverage of America’s Child Care Dilemma from PBS NewsHour

July 23, 2021

Last week, in partnership with the Pritzker Children’s Initiative and the Stein Early Childhood Development Fund, PBS NewsHour aired a week-long the series, “Raising the Future: America’s child care dilemma,” …

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SURVEY: Child Care Issues Continue to Put a Strain on Working, Low-Income Families

July 1, 2021

A new Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) and Morning Consult survey of households with children under the age of five where all caregivers are employed, finds that the child care crisis, …

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Our Child Care System Is Not Meeting The Needs Of Families, Providers, or The Economy

June 28, 2021

Now is the time to build a system of early care and education that works.  Finding and affording quality child care and early learning options shouldn’t be the reason parents …

News

On Capitol Hill, Secretaries Cardona & Becerra Emphasize the Long-Term Value of Early Learning Investments

June 17, 2021

This week, members of Congress on capitol hill elevated the importance of investments in high-quality early learning and care in two hearings featuring Education Secretary Miguel Cardona and Health and …

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As America Recovers from the Pandemic, Data Shows Child Care Remains a Major Challenge for Working Parents

June 16, 2021

The results of a new Care.com survey reveal that finding and affording quality child care remains a major hurdle for working parents, and the pandemic only made things worse. Key …

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New Guidance Released for Use of ARP Act Supplemental CCDBG Funding

June 15, 2021

On Friday, the Office of Child Care (OCC) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released guidance on the use of $14.99 billion in supplemental Child Care and …

News

FFYF’S Sarah Rittling Joins ‘Engage for Women’ Co-Founder to Discuss Opportunities for Progress on Child Care & Early Learning

June 11, 2021

This week, FFYF Executive Director Sarah Rittling joined Engage for Women, a bipartisan organization that seeks to promote women’s economic security, to discuss the opportunity to build a child care …

News

U.S. Chamber of Commerce Calls for Greater Support and Investments for Child Care to Spur Economic Recovery

June 3, 2021

America’s economic success will depend on a high-quality, affordable child care system that allows parents to enter, re-enter, and stay in the workforce. Underscoring just how important child care is to …

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