Ensure Affordable,
Quality Child Care
Given the importance of supporting work as a
way to lift financial burdens from families,
more consideration must be paid to the cost
and quality of child care and the role its availability
may play in prioritizing work over staying home
with young children. According to the Economic
Policy Institute, the cost of child care in
a two-parent, two-child home can range from
$5,280 annually in rural Nebraska to $9,552
in Omaha or Lincoln. For a family of four living
at the poverty level as defined by the federal
government, child care would absorb nearly half
of their annual income. Without affordable child
care, parents are unable to work, causing them
to fall back onto full government assistance.
Parents rely on child care to earn the income
they need to support their families.
Child Care Assistance
States are allowed to set their income eligibility
levels for child care assistance at any level
up to 85% of state median income. Nebraska ties
for 48th place in the nation for setting eligibility
levels for child care assistance, with our guidelines
set at 37% of state median income. Opportunity@Work
advocates support the following improvement
to increase the affordability of child care:
- Increase eligibility levels for child care
subsidies up to 85% of state median income.
All working families should have the opportunity
to access quality, as well as affordable, child
care. Increasing eligibility levels to include
a larger population of those struggling to afford
child care is not enough. As parents enter the
workforce, ensuring good quality child care
is critical because child care providers play
an important role in a child's life, especially
for preschoolers whose early life experiences
play a fundamental role in their development.
Good quality child care enhances early brain
development, cognitive and language development,
and school readiness, setting the stage for
successful early school achievement.
Child Care Reimbursement
The reimbursement rate paid to providers by
the state is inadequate, failing to even come
close to reflecting current market prices. Due
to the low reimbursement rates, many providers
are reluctant to serve families receiving assistance.
When providers do serve these families, they
struggle to provide high quality child care.
Low rates make it harder for child care programs
to pay their staff decent wages, thus leading
to difficulty in recruiting quality staff, maintaining
safe facilities, and purchasing new books and
toys. Currently, Nebraska's child care reimbursement
rates do not even meet federal guidelines, which
encourage reimbursements at 75th percent of
current market rates as revealed in market surveys.
The short supply of quality early childhood
services has two detrimental effects: first,
disadvantaged children miss out on enriching
experiences needed to develop school readiness
skills; and, second, unmet child care needs
often threaten parents' ability to maintain
stable employment. Opportunity@Work advocates
support the following improvement to increase
the accessibility of quality child care:
- Increase child care reimbursement rates so
that they are more consistent with fees charged
in the child care market.
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