Child Care Costs Skyrocket for Valley Families
posted by Louise Auerhahn
Friday, December 14, 2007, at 10:37 AM
Are families with kids being priced out of Santa Clara County?
A new report by the California Child Care Resource & Referral Network reveals that the average cost of care for one preschooler in the county is up to $10,597 per year, a 45 percent increase since 2001. Working parents are increasingly hard pressed to keep up with the cost (have you gotten a 45% raise recently?)
The first five years of a child's life are a time of critical intellectual, emotional and physical development. They learn to walk, talk, explore their world and interact socially with adults and other children.
Quality care and early childhood education may be the single most important investment we can make for our community's future. Research overwhelmingly shows that early education is critical to children's success in school and later on in life. Yet right now, kids, parents and providers are all suffering from the under-resourcing of child care and early education.
The cost for infant or toddler care is even further out of reach: $14,454 per year. A minimum wage earner working full-time makes just $15,600 per year. There's simply no way most low-wage workers can afford the market rate for quality child care.
Ironically, the people who are providing care and early education for our youngest kids are themselves in the ranks of low-wage workers. The median wage for child care workers in Silicon Valley is $11.41/hr. No wonder we've got such a shortage of child care (only 50,551 available slots for 195,871 kids, according to the Resource & Referral report.)
Over the next year our region will be making critical decisions about economic development, public budgets, and investments. A key topic in those discussions needs to be figuring out how to make early education work for all kids, parents, and providers.
[ Continue reading Child Care Costs Skyrocket for Valley Families ]
A new report by the California Child Care Resource & Referral Network reveals that the average cost of care for one preschooler in the county is up to $10,597 per year, a 45 percent increase since 2001. Working parents are increasingly hard pressed to keep up with the cost (have you gotten a 45% raise recently?)
The first five years of a child's life are a time of critical intellectual, emotional and physical development. They learn to walk, talk, explore their world and interact socially with adults and other children.
Quality care and early childhood education may be the single most important investment we can make for our community's future. Research overwhelmingly shows that early education is critical to children's success in school and later on in life. Yet right now, kids, parents and providers are all suffering from the under-resourcing of child care and early education.
The cost for infant or toddler care is even further out of reach: $14,454 per year. A minimum wage earner working full-time makes just $15,600 per year. There's simply no way most low-wage workers can afford the market rate for quality child care.
Ironically, the people who are providing care and early education for our youngest kids are themselves in the ranks of low-wage workers. The median wage for child care workers in Silicon Valley is $11.41/hr. No wonder we've got such a shortage of child care (only 50,551 available slots for 195,871 kids, according to the Resource & Referral report.)
Over the next year our region will be making critical decisions about economic development, public budgets, and investments. A key topic in those discussions needs to be figuring out how to make early education work for all kids, parents, and providers.
Labels: child care, cost of living, kids, low-wage work
[ Continue reading Child Care Costs Skyrocket for Valley Families ]
