Child Care Subsidies Research Articles

Childcare subsidy receipt and reduced emotional neglect: Examining parents' enhanced self-efficacy as a mediator

BackgroundEach year 1.5 million children receive childcare subsidized under the Child Care and Development Fund, which supports working parents with low income in affording childcare; such policies hold promise for reducing child neglect. ObjectiveThe current study sought to examine how receiving childcare subsidies might reduce emotional neglect by supporting working parents' self-efficacy. Participants and settingData came from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) which oversampled births to unmarried mothers in large U.S. cities. The current study focused on the third wave of the study, when focal children were age three, and when many parents were using childcare. MethodsThe associations between childcare subsidy receipt, parent self-efficacy, and emotional neglect were analyzed with path modeling using a structural equation modeling framework. Furthermore, we estimated the indirect effect of subsidy receipt on emotional neglect via self-efficacy. ResultsReceipt of the childcare subsidy was significantly associated with decreased emotional neglect (b = –1.24, p = .045) and increased parent self-efficacy (b = .16, p = .004). Self-efficacy was significantly associated with decreased emotional neglect (b = –1.27, p < .001). The path model results showed a significant mediating effect of self-efficacy on the link between receipt of the childcare subsidy and emotional neglect (b = –.20, p = .01). ConclusionsThe present study highlights the potential for increasing access to affordable, high-quality childcare to improve parent and child well-being. Subsidies that increase access to high-quality childcare can benefit both mothers and children.

Family Perspectives on Childcare Subsidy Recertification in New Mexico: Barriers, Facilitators, and Implications for Family Stability

Family Perspectives on Childcare Subsidy Recertification in New Mexico: Barriers, Facilitators, and Implications for Family Stability

Mumpreneurs’ decision-making when facing uncertainty and competing goals

PurposeThis study examines the decision-making processes and coping mechanisms of mumpreneurs (entrepreneurs who are mothers) as they navigate complex environments characterized by uncertainty and competing goals that are heightened by their circumstances and marginalization.Design/methodology/approachIn-depth interviews were conducted with 26 female entrepreneurs in the United Kingdom who are raising young children.FindingsThe research develops a new framework based on regulatory focus theory. It uncovers multiple layers of uncertainty facing mumpreneurs, including traditional business-focused uncertainties such as global crises, market volatility and financial risks, but including uncertainties derived from the challenge of balancing business growth with family responsibilities. Despite these complexities, mumpreneurs pursue multiple competing goals related to their businesses, families and societal contributions. The study identifies four key coping and decision-making mechanisms employed by mumpreneurs in complex environments: intuition, adaptability, confidence and a dynamic interplay between promotion and prevention regulatory focus.Originality/valueThis study contributes to entrepreneurship literature by providing a nuanced understanding of how mumpreneurs are required to navigate uncertainty and competing demands and the key coping and decision-making mechanisms they use to achieve this. It challenges the binary view of regulatory focus theory and offers insights into the unique stress dynamics experienced by mother entrepreneurs. The findings underscore the need for tailored support systems, including coaching and mentoring programs for mumpreneurs with young children. Moreover, the research highlights the importance of policy interventions, such as increased childcare subsidies, to support parental entrepreneurship and advance gender equality goals.

Assessing unintended administrative burdens of technology: the case of swipe card attendance for child care subsidies

Assessing unintended administrative burdens of technology: the case of swipe card attendance for child care subsidies

The social determinants of resilience: A conceptual framework to integrate psychological and policy research.

The psychological study of resilience has increasingly underscored the need for children and families to access material and psychological resources to positively adapt to significant stress. Redistributive policies-policies that downwardly reallocate society's social and economic resources-can offer economically disadvantaged families sustained access to these resources and mitigate the harmful impacts of adversity. This conceptual article builds upon and integrates insights from psychological and policy research to develop a unifying multilevel resilience framework, which we call the Social Determinants of Resilience. We examine four U.S. redistributive policies that have been extensively studied for their effects on child and family outcomes as case studies: (1) Medicaid expansion; (2) the Earned Income Tax Credit; (3) childcare subsidies; and (4) Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. Informed by a scoping review of each policy, we propose that redistributive policies promote children's resilience through three mechanisms by (1) increasing families' resource and service access; (2) reducing family stress; and (3) enhancing adaptive cognitions, emotions, behaviors, and interpersonal processes that protect against the development of psychopathology and promote positive mental health outcomes. Highlighting current evidence for these resilience mechanisms as well as gaps in knowledge, we conclude by setting a multidisciplinary research agenda that can leverage this conceptual framework to advance the science on how redistributive policies enable children and families to thrive. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

School starting age and mothers’ labour supply: causal evidence from the 2012 education reform in Turkey

PurposeThis paper assesses the impact of a reduction in childcare costs, resulting from a change in compulsory schooling law, on mothers' labour supply in Turkey.Design/methodology/approachThe 2012 Education Reform lowered the school starting age, allowing children up to 60 months old to enrol in primary schools. Previously, the starting age was seven years old, corresponding to 72-month-old children. We consider this change as an implied childcare subsidy for mothers with eligible children and investigate its labour market consequences. Using Turkish Household Labour Force Surveys, we applied a differences-in-differences method to estimate the effect of this law on mothers' labour supply.FindingsThe results reveal that the reform did not alter mothers' labour supply behaviour, even when categorized by educational attainment and marital status. While the findings for married mothers align with previous literature, the results for single mothers, despite showing a positive magnitude, are not statistically significant.Originality/valuePrevious literature shows a strong correlation but limited causal evidence on childcare subsidies and maternal labour supply in Turkey. This study is the first to use a change in compulsory schooling law to provide causal evidence. The results suggest that mothers in developing countries may respond differently to subsidies than those in developed countries, especially when there is an extensive informal childcare market. Policymakers should consider this when addressing mothers' behavioural inertia.Peer reviewThe peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-02-2024-0110

Payment rates and the stability of subsidized child care: Evidence from Minnesota's child care assistance program

Participation instability has been recognized as a major challenge in state child care subsidy programs and may undermine the benefits of these programs to the children and families they are intended to support. Payment rates – the maximum amounts that state subsidy programs will pay for child care in a given period – directly determine which providers are affordable to subsidized consumers and what schedules of care they can afford. Payment rates also affect the resources available to providers and their incentive to accept subsidies. This study examines the effect of payment rate increases on the stability of participation in child care subsidies and the stability of subsidized care arrangements. We study the impact of a major update to payment rates for the Minnesota Child Care Assistance Program, using monthly child- and provider-level administrative data and a quasi-experimental design. We implement a regression discontinuity design built on the state's method of setting county rates. We find strong evidence that higher subsidy payment rates lead to more stable subsidy participation and care arrangements. Thus, state-determined payment rates are a critical policy lever that affects access to care.

What the Dutch benefits scandal and policy's focus on ‘fraud’ can teach us about the endurance of empire

In the benefits scandal, the Dutch state wrongfully accused at least 35,000 Dutch parents of young children of committing fraud with subsidies for childcare, based on ethnic profiling. Especially families with heritage in the former Dutch colonies in the Caribbean and Suriname were hit. Because they had to compensate for this supposed ‘fraud’, families were often thrown into severe debt and years of financial and legal struggle, a struggle that is ongoing for many. For the parents of more than 2,000 children, this even led to the loss of custody of their children. The Dutch state has formally acknowledged that ‘institutional racism’ was part of the problem, yet the scandal remains analysed by many, especially white scholars and journalists, as unintended, incidental and unrelated to Dutch colonial history. This commentary addresses the scandal as a case of an enduring colonial legacy of targeting racialised and gendered citizens in social policy. ‘Fraud’ is a social policy category through which this is made possible and violence continues to be inflicted upon racialised and gendered members of the Dutch population.

Child Care Subsidy Generosity and Child Maltreatment: The Moderating Effects of Administrative Burden

Child Care Subsidy Generosity and Child Maltreatment: The Moderating Effects of Administrative Burden

Prevalence and predictors of multiple, concurrent public early childhood education utilization among head start children

With growing public investment in early childhood services, families enrolled in Head Start (HS) have increasing opportunities to participate in other public early care and education (ECE) programs. Using integrated administrative data from across Iowa’s service systems, we examined the prevalence and predictors of HS children’s multiple concurrent ECE service utilization the year before entering kindergarten, focusing on state pre-K and child care subsidy (CCS). Results showed that 61 % of children participating in HS additionally utilized other public ECE programs, with 44 % participating in state pre-K, 8.3 % in CCS, and 8.7 % in both. Utilization patterns differed based on child and family characteristics. Children who were Black, living in urban areas, or born to single mothers were more likely to participate in multiple, concurrent services, especially a combination of services that included CCS. Results imply that improving coordination and collaboration across various ECE public programs may support HS families’ needs.

Allocation of Funds in Bilevel Subsidy Welfare Programs

Problem definition: Most subsidy welfare programs operate in a bilevel hierarchical structure, wherein a funding agency allocates funds to multiple service organizations. These service organizations invest in activities within their areas to generate societal impact for beneficiaries by enhancing the quantity and quality of services at local providers. The funds allocation decisions in such programs are complicated by the funding agency’s equity consideration, intricate relationships among contextual factors in societal impact generation, and information asymmetry between different entities about availability of additional funds for an agency. Methodology/results: We propose a model to analyze how the funding agency should allocate funds to generate the most societal impact equitably across areas. We show that the funding agency should direct more funds toward an area with a relatively balanced mix of subsidy-accepting and nonaccepting providers, or with fewer nonaccepting providers, and outreach activity is more likely to yield a higher investment return. Further, comparing the inequity levels and total societal impact under the proposed equity-ensuring method with those under other methods, we find that an efficiency-focused method enhances total societal impact, but can result in greater inequity, especially when there is a large across-area disparity in the size of beneficiaries. A simple formula-based method could achieve greater total societal impact, while not severely sacrificing equity in certain situations. Conversely, the equity-ensuring method always eliminates inequity by not severely sacrificing the total societal impact under a wide range of parameter values. Managerial implications: Given the growing impetus to consider equity within their operations, our equity-ensuring method helps the funding agencies adjust their allocation strategies to generate the greatest equitable impact. Finally, using a case study based on Massachusetts’ child care subsidy program, we illustrate that the proposed method achieves equity while enhancing the overall societal impact by approximately 3% versus the current formula-based method. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.2022.0474 .

Economic hardship and the role of cost in childcare decisions: An exploratory study

The high cost of US childcare has become burdensome to most families with young children, yet little is known about how childcare costs shapes parental childcare decisions. This study addresses a critical gap in knowledge by examining how economic hardships shape parental childcare decisions, along with the individual and community characteristics associated with the influence of cost on childcare decisions. Guided by the accommodation model and family stress model, we used data from a statewide consumer survey in Iowa to conduct the first known study to examine associations between household constraints (i.e., economic hardships) and respondent reports that cost influenced their childcare decisions at least once in the previous year (i.e., systemic barriers to childcare). As hypothesized, each form of economic hardship was associated with increased odds of cost influencing childcare decisions. Our logistic regression demonstrated that every standard deviation increase in our financial stress scale resulted in a 110% increase in the odds of cost influence, while each additional experience of material hardship (out of 16) increased the odds of cost influence by 10%. Additionally, we identified demographic variations, with cost playing a more prominent role for people who were Hispanic/any race, unemployed, and were between the ages of 18- to 34-years old. Overall, findings demonstrate that economic hardships are constraints that, coupled with systemic barriers like cost, shape childcare decisions across demographic groups, communities, and income brackets. Findings also suggest the need for more public support to alleviate the costs of childcare among all families, such as expanding childcare subsidies or funding the provision of care, which may mitigate the risk of negative outcomes associated with economic hardship.

Earnings and Employment Patterns Following Child-Care Subsidy Receipt

Earnings and Employment Patterns Following Child-Care Subsidy Receipt

LABOR MARKET INSTITUTIONS AND FERTILITY

AbstractSome high‐income countries have total fertility rates as low as one child. Using Spanish administrative data, we document that temporary contracts correlate with lower first birth rates. Also, women with children are less likely to work split‐shift jobs with long breaks in the middle of the day. We build a life‐cycle model where women decide on labor supply and fertility. We show that reforms eliminating duality or split‐shift jobs raise women's labor participation, narrow the employment gap between mothers and nonmothers, and boost fertility for working women. These reforms, together with childcare subsidies, increase married women's fertility to 1.8 children.

Raising America’s future: Search for optimal child-related transfers

The US differs from other OECD countries in terms of family policy size and composition. This study examines the welfare and macroeconomic effects of family policy reforms. I explore three policy instruments: child-related tax credits, childcare subsidies, and child allowances. The children are merit good due to pay-as-you-go social security structure. I show that expanding family policy, like the American Rescue Plan, improves welfare. I also define the optimal family policy for the United States. It accounts for about 3% of GDP, three times larger than the existing policy, and primarily focused on childcare subsidies. Family policy structure is critical for welfare evaluation because similar expenditure levels can result in contrasting welfare outcomes depending on policy composition. This study emphasizes the importance of carefully designed family policies, as well as the need for ongoing research and policy innovation to maximize societal benefits and promote equitable economic growth.

The Relationship Between Receipt of Childcare Subsidies and Child Protective Services Involvement in [MASKED COUNTY], Colorado: A Brief Research Report

The Relationship Between Receipt of Childcare Subsidies and Child Protective Services Involvement in [MASKED COUNTY], Colorado: A Brief Research Report

Do means-tested childcare subsidies discourage work?

We examine how means-tested childcare subsidies affect parental labor supply. Using the introduction of reduced childcare prices for low-income families in Norway in 2015, we show that these subsidies may have the unintended effect of discouraging work rather than promoting employment. First, structural labor supply simulations suggest that a negative parental labor supply effect dominates, ex ante. Ex post, we find a small and insignificant effect of means-tested childcare subsidies on parental labor supply in the reform year. We find no statistically significant bunching around the income limits in subsequent years, but we do find negative labor supply effects in subsequent expansions of the reform. Our results suggest that in a context where both parental employment and participation in formal childcare are high, means-tested childcare subsidies may have unintended parental labor supply effects.

Extra help for extra needs: Family perspectives on New Mexico's supplemental child care subsidy program for families at risk for involvement with child protective services

This study examines the perspectives of a sample of parents and primary caregivers who received child care subsidies through New Mexico's at-risk eligibility designation, which is reserved for families who are or are at risk for becoming involved with child protective services (CPS). Qualifying families pay no copays, have limited documentation requirements, and are provided with additional enrollment supports by specialized eligibility workers with lower caseloads and training in trauma-informed practices. Families reported positive experiences with their eligibility workers and with the enrollment process, saying almost universally that they did not face administrative burdens to enrollment and that their caseworker was responsive and helpful. Despite positive experiences with the subsidy system, families reported difficulties finding child care that met their needs, mainly due to challenges related to non-traditional work hours, transportation, and children's behavioral health needs. The study findings are exploratory but suggest that enhanced supports from specialized eligibility workers are valued by families facing complex risk factors and may help them access child care subsidies. Access to subsidies, in turn, helps families afford and access care. However, the utility of child care subsidies remains limited without a supply of care that meets families' logistical needs and supports their children's development. Given previously documented administrative burdens and challenges families face in accessing child care subsidies, New Mexico's approach has potential implications for other states aiming to enhance equitable access to care for families at risk for CPS involvement—a population that disproportionately experiences systemic disadvantages and destabilizing circumstances.

Expanding access to high-quality early care and education for families with low income in Maryland through child care subsidy policies

Documenting how federal and state child care policies increase equitable access to high-quality early care and education (ECE) for families with low- and moderate-incomes remains a challenge in part due to overlaps in policy enactment. This study used an interrupted time series analysis (ITSA) to describe changes to providers’ participation in Maryland's child care subsidy program following implementation of a constellation of child care policies enacted between January 5, 2015, and March 2, 2020 (i.e., prior to the COVID-19 pandemic). Findings indicate a marked increase in the percentage of licensed family child care (FCC) and center-based providers serving children with a subsidy following increases in household income eligibility levels and provider reimbursement rates in 2018. Provider participation rates varied by neighborhood income level, with participation expanding more in neighborhoods with lower poverty density relative to their starting level in 2015. Changes in child participation rates by income eligibility mirrored changes in state subsidy policy: children residing in income-eligible households above 200 % federal poverty level represented 4.4 % of the child sample in 2018, 13 % in 2019, and 18 % in 2020. The proportion of children with a subsidy who used higher-rated ECE increased significantly between January 2018 and January 2020 for all racial/ethnic groups, income eligibility levels, and urbanicity categories. The majority (62 %) of children who stayed in the subsidy program between 2018 and 2019 stayed with their same provider, many of which obtained their first rating or increased their quality rating during this time frame in accordance with a new requirement for providers to participate in the state's quality rating system to receive a subsidy reimbursement. Implications for future research, policy, and practice are discussed.

The Impact of Childcare Subsidies and Earnings Gaps on Gender Differences in Temporal Autonomy in Türkiye

This paper examines gender differences in discretionary time in Türkiye. Discretionary time, which is defined as the time remaining after one has done what is necessary in paid work, unpaid household work and personal care, is an indicator of freedom or, more broadly, of well-being. Using the 2014–2015 time use survey of the Turkish Statistical Institute, this study has found that in general, women have less discretionary time than men. There is also a remarkable difference between how men and women use their discretionary time: women spend less of it on leisure, volunteer work and personal care and more on unpaid work than men. This study also conducted simulations to examine the effects of childcare subsidies and increases in earnings of women. The simulations showed that childcare subsidies partially narrow the discretionary time gap between men and women. Surprisingly, increases in women's earnings reduce their discretionary time, increasing time disparity in dual-earner couples. This is because increase in women's earnings increase their shares in total household paid work time, but their share of unpaid labor time remains stable. As a result, these measures should be supplemented with family-support programs that promote equality within households.