New Findings on Children, Families, and Economic Self-Sufficiency: Summary of a Research Briefing

Do Child Care Susidies Help or Hinder Low-Income Families' Efforts to Work?

All parents, regardless of income, want child care that is beneficial to their children, reliable and trustworthy, and-perhaps even more important for inner-city and poor families-that ensures children's safety, according to research findings presented by Sandra Hofferth (1995) (see also Larner and Phillips, 1994). Hofferth's study was based on data from the National Child Care Survey 1990, a nationally representative survey of 27 million families with 47.7 million children under age 13, conducted from November 1989 through May 1990, and on a profile of child care settings, a sampling of all regulated and nonregulated family day care homes done by Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., from October 1989 through February 1990.

Despite similar hopes for child care, families in different income groups exhibit different patterns of child care use; working-poor families with children under age 6 are more likely than middle-class families to use a relative and less likely to use a center, sitter, or classroom program. Even more striking is the wide gap in the use of center care for infants and toddlers-5 percent for the working poor and 19 percent for the non-working poor.

Recent evidence suggests that these utilization patterns may not reflect parents' preferences, particularly for low-income, single mothers who are in the labor force. Indeed, evidence presented at the briefing by Hofferth (1995) and by Ellen Kisker (Kisk er and Silverberg, 1991), as well as other studies (see, e.g., Sonenstein and Wolf, 1991), suggests that large percentages of mothers who are single, poor, or in their teenage years would change arrangements if they could. Those using a relative are most likely to want to change arrangements; those using a child care center are least likely to want to change, according to Hofferth's findings. Indeed, there are growing indications that low-income parents are increasingly seeking center-based care for their older preschool children, with parents citing child safety, learning opportunities, and reliability as reasons for their desire to shift to center-based care (Hofferth, 1995).

If patterns of child care use among some poor parents don't reflect their preferences, what are the major determinants of the care their children receive? Research presented at the briefing indicates that parents' ability to implement their child care ch oices is strongly governed by the structure of subsidies and the conditions of low-wage work. Families that succeed in leaving welfare and entering the labor force sometimes remain poor and thus have a need for low-cost child care. Working-poor families are also, however, the least likely of all income groups to receive subsidies to help them purchase child care and preschool programs, Hofferth's study found (see Figure 5 [text or graphic]).

Hofferth said that only 18 percent of working-poor families reported receiving some assistance in paying for child care; adding assistance through the income tax system increased the proportion receiving some assistance to 30 percent of working-poor families (compared with 37 percent of nonworking poor families). A separate study, cited by Meyers (1994), found that many AFDC recipients were unaware of child care subsidies and other programs designed specifically to assist them.

Accordingly, working-poor families spend a substantially higher share of their budgets on child care than do more advantaged families (see Figure 6 [text or graphic]). They lack both the subsidies and the purchasing power to place their children in the kind of care arrangements that they prefer (Hofferth, 1995).

But subsidies alone are not enough. Mismatches between child care and job schedules pose an additional obstacle to juggling parenting and working that may disproportionately affect low-income families, according to findings presented at the briefing.

Working-poor parents are more likely than nonpoor working parents to work nonstandard hours and have changeable schedules, but most child care centers and family day care homes tend to operate during standard business hours (Hofferth, 1995). One-third of working-poor mothers work on weekends, severely limiting the availability of centers and family day care homes; only 10 percent of centers and 6 percent of family day care homes provide care on weekends. Another 8 to 9 percent of working-poor mothers work evenings or nights; only 3 percent of centers and 13 percent of regulated and 20 percent of nonregulated family day care programs provide care in the evenings. And almost half of working-poor parents work on rotating or changing schedules, which presents an even greater challenge to their efforts to obtain stable child care (Hofferth, 1995).

These recent data suggest that just as families make the transition from dependency to self-sufficiency, they are likely to experience reduced financial support for child care and serious hardships in coordinating child care and work schedules. These findings raise questions about equity of access to preferred child care arrangements by working-poor and low-income families, and the consequences of existing inequities for work effort. It would also be useful to know how the patchwork of child care arranged by some parents in low-paying jobs with nonstandard hours affects children's development.

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