"Approximately 3 million child care teachers, assistants, and family child care providers in the U.S. care for 10 million children each day." These child care teachers and providers are better educated than the general population and yet earn lower wages and experience higher turnover rates than their comparably educated counterparts in the labor force ("A Profile of the Child Care Work Force," 1997).

Why should parents be concerned about low staff wages and high turnover rates among their children's child care providers? The National Child Care Staffing Study conducted by the Center for the Child Care Workforce (Whitebook, Howes, & Phillips, 1998) confirmed the link between staff wages, staff turnover, and quality in child care center settings. Numerous other studies have documented the impact of caregiver stability and continuity on children's development (Spodek & Saracho, 1992; Love, 1997; Ramsburg & Montanelli, 1999). When a child care teacher or provider leaves, children must adapt to new routines and new relationships. Parents, too, pay a price when child care staff leave, particularly if the caregiver's leaving means a change in child care arrangements. It is difficult to develop an open and trusting relationship between parent and provider when turnover is high. Yet, a trusting parent-provider relationship is a critical factor in high-quality care for children.

Over 50 early care and education professionals recently attended a public policy caucus sponsored by the Day Care Action Council of Illinois on the child care compensation crisis in Illinois. The day-long meeting began with reports about the extent of the child care compensation crisis around the state. Many of the child care center directors shared stories about the difficulties they experience in attracting and retaining qualified child care staff. Some talked of individual classrooms closing because of insufficient staff. The burden that child care directors reported in their ongoing battle to attract and retain staff was shared by the programs' parents and children who experienced great distress at losing beloved teachers and caregivers.

How serious is the child care compensation crisis in Illinois and elsewhere? In a report entitled Child Care Salaries and Staff Turnover: The Key to Child Care Quality, Ramsburg and Montanelli (1999) report findings from a 1998 salary survey of 859 child care centers and 1,042 family child care providers in Illinois. Findings include the following:

* Starting salaries for child care teachers were reported to be $7.40 per hour, with a range of $7.50 to $9.10 per hour among currently employed teachers.

* Less than half of the centers in the survey provided health benefits to child care teachers.

* Approximately 71% of family child care providers in Illinois earned a net income of $11,000 or less annually.

* Almost one-third of family child care providers in Illinois reported that they had no benefits of any kind (e.g., health, dental, life insurance, sick leave, paid holidays, pension, paternity or maternity leave).

The 1998 Illinois salary survey indicated that, in terms of turnover rates, for every 100 child care teacher positions in centers in 1997, 43 new child care teachers had to be recruited and hired due to turnover in the 2 years preceding the survey. "Low pay" was also reported by 92% of directors as the major reason that people are not attracted to employment in child care centers.

Illinois's child care worker profile mirrors the national picture, which suggests that child care staff are among the lowest paid of all classes of workers (Love, 1997). Child care workers with some college earn an average of $11,617 per year compared to the average annual salary of all female workers in the United States with some college education-$26,747 ("A Profile of the Child Care Work Force," 1997). Staff turnover among child care teachers is high nationally, ranging from 25% to 50% each year (Love, 1997). In contrast, the turnover rates in 1995-1996 were 6.6% for public kindergarten teachers, 7% for registered nurses, and 11% for hairdressers (Ramsburg & Montanelli, 1999).

What is the solution to the child care compensation crisis?

Child care wages depend largely, and sometimes entirely, on parent fees, while public school salaries depend on a broad tax base. Although some families are able to pay higher child care costs, child care is financially burdensome for most families (Children's Defense Fund, 1999). Full-time child care costs between $4,000 and $10,000 per year depending on such variables as a child's age, the program type, and geographic area. According to a recent report by the Children's Defense Fund (1999), child care costs twice as much as college tuition in cities in 15 states.

The following slogan from the Center for the Child Care Workforce, a nonprofit organization working to improve child care quality through improved compensation and working conditions for child care workers, describes the dilemma best: "Teachers can't afford to stay. Parents can't afford to pay. There's got to be a better way."

A variety of strategies to break the link between what parents pay for child care and what child care providers earn are being explored at community and state levels across the United States. These initiatives, supported by public and private dollars, include the following (Bellm et al., 1997):

* Wage supplements or retention grants designed to reward teachers and providers based on their level of education.

* Educational scholarship opportunities that include a salary increase when participants have reached their educational goals.

* Mentoring or apprenticeship programs that offer experienced caregivers an opportunity to share their skills with others and receive improved compensation.

* Higher reimbursement rates for providers of subsidized child care services who achieve an identified level of quality care.

What can parents do about low wages and high turnover rates in child care?

Parents can play a key role in easing the child care compensation crisis. The following strategies may help improve working conditions for child care workers:

* Parents using child care can find out about the compensation and benefit levels of their caregiver at the center or family child care home. Many of the participants at the Day Care Action Council public policy caucus talked about how little parents understood about the economics of child care, often because of providers' unwillingness to share information about their low wages with parents. Yet, the participants agreed, parents are logical and necessary allies in efforts to improve child care compensation.

* Parents can offer to increase their provider's wages or benefits (such as paid vacation, sick leave, and health insurance) if they can afford to do so. Parents can also contribute their time or their services, or they can donate useful items to their child care program. Parents can get involved in fund-raising efforts to benefit their child care center or family child care home.

* Parents can talk to their employer about establishing a child care benefit. Increasing numbers of employers are supporting child care through flexible spending accounts, resource and referral services, flexible work schedules, and the development of child care at or near the workplace. Employers need to know how much parents depend on good, stable, and affordable child care in order to work. Employers often report that there is no child care problem because their parent/employees come to work each day.

* Parents need to stay informed about local, state, and federal issues affecting child care. Parents can find out if their state or community is exploring a child care compensation initiative and can offer to share resources on the importance of doing so-such as this article and the resources cited at the end.

* Parents can contact their local, state, or federal representatives. Those who influence public policy need to know how parents feel about issues affecting child care. Local child care resource and referral agencies, the League of Women Voters, and the Cooperative Extension Service are good sources for information on public policy issues related to children and families.
Low staff wages and high turnover in child care exact a high price from children, parents, and parents' employers. In a chapter entitled "Child Care 2000," published in Issues in Child Care, Roger Neugebauer observes that the lack of movement in upgrading the low wages paid to teachers "could yet be the Achilles heel of quality child care" (Spodek & Saracho, 1992, p. 8). Child care has moved into the national spotlight partly as a result of welfare reform policies and the variety of recent studies on the critical importance of the early years on children's brain development (NAEYC, 1997; Ramsburg, 1997; Carnegie Corporation, 1994). Parents can capitalize on this momentum by doing what they can to help ease the child care compensation crisis.

For more information:

Azer, Sheri, & Elliott, Kimberly. (1999). States move toward systems that encompass training, compensation, and program quality. Child Care Bulletin [Online], 20. Available: http://nccic.org/ccb/issue20/issue20.html#1 [2000, February 18].

Center for the Child Care Workforce
733 15th St. NW
Suite 1037
Washington, DC 20005-2112
Telephone: 202-737-7700
Fax: 202-737-0370
Email: ccw@ccw.org
Internet: http://www.ccw.org

Children's Defense Fund. (2000). Child care basics [Online]. Available: http://www.childrensdefense.org/childcare/cc_basics.html [2000, February 16]. [NPIN editor's note (5-17-01): this url is no longer active, see http://www.childrensdefense.org/]

U.S. Department of Labor. Women's Bureau. Employer child care options [Online]. Available: http://www.dol.gov/dol/wb/childcare/ccguide.htm [2000, February 16].

Families and Work Institute
330 Seventh Ave., 14th Floor
New York, NY 10001
Telephone: 212-465-2044
Fax: 212-465-8637
Internet: http://www.familiesandwork.org/index.html

Haack, Peggy. (1994). Worthy wages and family child care [Online]. National Network for Child Care. Available: http://www.nncc.org/Business/fdc35_worthy.wages.html [2000, February 18].

Hagan, Rita, & Whitebook, Marcy. (1991). Worthy wages: The CCR&R role. TAP #4. Washington, DC: National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies.

National Association for the Education of Young Children. (1997). Where your child care dollars go [Online]. Early Years Are Learning Years. Available: http://npin.org/library/pre1998/n00150/n00150.html [2000, February 18].

National Association for the Education of Young Children. (1999). Making child care work for everyone [Online]. Early Years Are Learning Years. Available: http://npin.org/library/1998/n00090/n00090.html [2000, February 18].

Russell, Susan D. (1995, May/June). T. E. A. C. H. Project retains providers. Children Care Bulletin [Online], 3. Available: http://www.nccic.org/ccb/ccb-mj95/teachpro.html [2000, February 18].

Shore, Rima. (1998). Ahead of the curve: Why America's leading employers are addressing the needs of new and expectant parents. Executive summary [Online]. New York: Families and Work Institute. Available: http://www.familiesandwork.org/summary/curve.pdf [2000, February 18].

Sources

Bellm, Dan; Burton, Alice; Shukla, Renu; & Whitebook, Marcy. (1997). Making work pay in the child care industry: Promising practices for improving compensation. Washington, DC: National Center for the Early Childhood Workforce. (ERIC Document No. ED406026)

Carnegie Corporation of New York. (1994). Starting points: Meeting the needs of our youngest children [Online]. New York: Carnegie Corporation of New York. (ERIC Document No. ED369562) Available: http://www.carnegie.org/starting_points/index.html [2000, February 18].

Children's Defense Fund. (1999). State of America's children yearbook, 1999. Washington, DC: CDF. (ERIC Document No. ED433151)

Love, John M. (1997). Quality in child care centers. Early Childhood Research and Policy Briefs [Online], 1(1). (ERIC Document No. ED417827) Available: http://www.fpg.unc.edu/~ncedl/PDFs/briefI1.pdf [2000, February 18].

National Association for the Education of Young Children. (1997). Brain development research-What it means for young children and families. Early Years are Learning Years [Online]. Washington, DC: NAEYC. Available: http://www.naeyc.org/resources/eyly/1997/11.htm [2000, February 18].

A profile of the child care work force. (1997, July/August). Child Care Bulletin [Online], 16. Available: http://nccic.org/ccb/ccb-ja97/workforc.html [2000, February 18].

Ramsburg, Dawn. (April, 1997). Brain development in young children: The early years are learning years. Parent News [Online], 3(4). Available: http://npin.org/pnews/pnew497/pnew497b.html [2000, February 16].

Ramsburg, Dawn, & Montanelli, Dale. (1999). Child care salaries and staff turnover: The key to child care quality. Springfield: Illinois Association for the Education of Young Children.

Spodek, Bernard, & Saracho, Olivia. (1992). Issues in child care. New York: Teachers College Press. (ERIC Document No. ED365437)

Whitebook, Marcy; Howes, Carollee; & Phillips, Deborah. (1998). Worthy work, unlivable wages: The National Child Care Staffing Study 1988-1997. Washington, DC: Center for the Child Care Workforce. (ERIC Document No. ED419614)