ED464711 PS030310
Title: Estimating the Size and Components of the U.S. Child Care Workforce and Caregiving Population. Key Findings from the Child Care
Workforce Estimate. Preliminary Report.
Author(s): Burton, Alice; Whitebook, Marcy; Young, Marci; Bellm, Dan; Wayne, Claudia; Brandon, Richard N.; Maher, Erin
Author Affiliation: Center for the Child Care Workforce, Washington, DC.(BBB34905); Washington Univ., Seattle. Human Services Policy
Center.(BBB34378)
Pages: 49
Publication Date: May 2002
Sponsoring Agency: Administration on Children, Youth, and Families (DHHS), Washington, DC. Child Care Bureau. (BBB33982)
Contract No: 90YE0024
Available from: EDRS Price MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS.
Availability: Center for the Child Care Workforce, 733 15th Street, NW, Suite 1037, Washington, DC 20005-2112. Tel: 202-737-7700; Fax: 202-737-0370; e-mail: ccw@ccw.org. For full text: http://www.ccw.org/pubs/workforceestimatereport.pdf.
Language: English
Document Type: Reports--Research (143)
Geographic Source: U.S.; District of Columbia
Journal Announcement: RIENOV2002
In response to rising demand for information on the child care workforce, the Center for the Child Care Workforce (CCW) and the Human Services Policy Center (HSPC) have initiated a 2-year project to develop a framework and methodology for quantifying the size and characteristics of the U.S. child care workforce, focusing on the workforce serving children ages birth through 5 years (non-kindergartners). The estimation model used was a "demand-based" approach, drawing on national data sets in which child care consumers describe their current use of child care services and the child to adult ratios for this age group. Also taken into account were the best available data on child care worker supply and turnover. Among the key findings of the study are that of the 2.3 million individuals paid to care for children in a given week, approximately 24 percent work in center-based settings, 28 percent provide family child care, 35 percent are paid relatives other than family providers, and 13 percent are paid non-relatives such as nannies. Approximately 29 percent of caregivers care for infants, 49 percent care for toddlers, and 22 percent care for preschoolers. There are also approximately 2.4 million individual caregivers providing unpaid child care during a given week. The number of child care workers has been seriously undercounted in previous analyses and thus their economic and social contribution underestimated. Also, given the high number of caregivers working with toddlers, skills for this age group should become a major focus of training and professional development. The project's second year will focus on adapting methodology to produce state- and community-level estimates. Three appendices detail the data sources and methodology, and discuss the patterns of child care usage from which workforce estimates are derived. (Contains 49 references.) (KB)
Descriptors: Caregiver Role; *Child Caregivers; *Day Care; Early Childhood Education; *Family Day Care; *Labor Market; *Labor Supply;
Labor Turnover; Models; National Surveys
Identifiers: Estimation; Nannies
