Why it matters: The funding amounted to a $24 billion Band-aid patched over an industry that’s long struggled. When the bandage comes off, the state of child care in the U.S. is likely to be even worse than it was before 2020.
- “There’s going to be a real crisis here,” said Cathy Creighton, director of Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations Buffalo Co-Lab, who’s studying the impact of the additional funding for providers.
By the numbers: As many as 70,000 centers, looking after 3.2 million children, may close after the funding runs out, according to one widely cited estimate from the Century Foundation.
State of play: The cliff is approaching just as women, particularly mothers, are hitting their stride in the U.S. labor market — with workforce participation at new highs and the employment gap between men and women at record lows.
- If the dire forecasts prove true, millions of parents — particularly mothers — are going to be left with some hard choices.
- Their child care provider could shut down or raise prices past affordable levels, which is widely expected — and many parents could exit the job market entirely.