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The news you hear on this network comes from the ground up, NPR's member stations in every state across this country. They have reporters in each community who are part of that community and give us all a picture of American life. This next story begins with a day care provider who decided to give up the job. Many working parents depend on day care centers or in-home providers, and some of their options are going away. Here's Hannah Yang of Minnesota Public Radio.
HANNAH YANG, BYLINE: Child care provider Amanda Rieder kept watch over a few of the kids she was taking care of as they explored her backyard.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Oh, we got a cricket.
AMANDA RIEDER: You guys got a cricket? Hey, no, be nice. We got to - can we find any more?
YANG: This was during the last week she would be operating her day care service in rural Minnesota. Rieder was in the process of closing it after eight years in the business.
RIEDER: Right now, I am just kind of going through everything, all my supplies, toys, equipment. Getting it all cleaned up, sanitized, you know, from all the kids, and getting ready to sell it, donate it.
YANG: With her costs skyrocketing and mountains of paperwork, it was just too much.
RIEDER: We have a hard time finding homeowner's insurance, vehicle insurance, being able to just have the basic needs of coverage just because we're operating a day care. And grocery bills, we all know, is outrageous.
YANG: At their peak in 2020, there were nearly 100,000 home-based child care programs in the country. Then the number started to drop because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The number started to rise last year as day cares began reopening. During the pandemic, $24 billion in federal child care stabilization funding allowed states to seek grants to help lower the costs for owners operating day care programs and boost salaries for workers. But the majority of that funding ended in 2023. According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children, since that time, more than half of center directors and family child care operators reported staffing shortages in their programs.
MIRANDA BAPP: OK.
YANG: Miranda Bapp, out with her 4-year-old son at a playground, has worked three day care centers in Minnesota. She was the director at the last center where she worked and managed programming, enrollment and staff scheduling.
BAPP: Our child care is - infants are 260 a week. Toddlers are 245 a week. Preschool is 235 a week. But our staff, our main core people who take care of the children in the setting, are making some of the lowest paid rate than any business profession that we have. I mean, you can go make $18 an hour at McDonald's, but my aids only make about $15 an hour.
YANG: Wages can vary widely, but according to the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, child care professionals earn an average of about $33,000 per year.
LISA THOMPSON: And that's a tough spot for us to be in.
YANG: Lisa Thompson heads the Minnesota Office of Ombuds for Family Child Care Providers.
THOMPSON: Parents can't pay more, and the people doing the work are not getting paid enough to actually keep people in the profession.
YANG: Since 2023, at least 11 states - including Minnesota, New Mexico, Massachusetts - and the District of Columbia have invested significant state money to support early childhood educators and stronger state child care systems. The majority of states, though, haven't addressed the crisis. Last April, some Democrats in Congress introduced a bill that would increase federal spending for child care and fund more child care slots at day care and home-based centers and more workers. Today's political climate may make passage of the bill unlikely. Some Republicans are backing policies that encourage more mothers to stay at home.
For NPR NEWS, I'm Hannah Yang in Mankato.
(SOUNDBITE OF DO MAKE SAY THINK'S "GOODBYE ENEMY AIRSHIP") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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