Childcare Costs On The Rise

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Story Published: Dec 17, 2008 at 5:45 PM PST

By Melissa Wagner

A new study by the Department of Early Learning says our state ranks among the least affordable states for child care.

On average parents can expect to pay 6 thousand to 75-hundred dollars a year, per child, for daycare. That's about 125 dollars a week. With just one kid, if you work for minimum wage, that's almost half your paycheck. Parents are struggling, and so are the daycare facilities.

Laura Taylor owns three daycare centers in the Yakima area. She says "It costs so much to take care of kids."

From the food they eat, to the tools they use, for consumers everything has gone up in price over the last year. The same is true for daycare facilities. Eventually they'll have to cover the higher costs by raising prices.

Taylor's Tots serves about 100 families. But she says for the first time ever, she has openings at her Gleed location. "Some families are struggling, so we have vacancies because some families are needing to cut their budgets out or some families are struggling to pay bills," says Laura.

Taylor's Tots raised their prices a dollar a day, or 22 dollars a month. But it's still not enough. Laura says that she's getting ready to start up an overnight babysitting service. Partly to help out families, but for her company as well because she doesn't want to lay off any of her staff during these tough times.

She says her staff is already underpaid compared to what they're worth. Still, Laura has hope for the future. "Obama just said he was going put some money back in to early childhood education and that would be a huge benefit," she says.

It's a benefit families and caregivers need right now. Even those who get government money for childcare are finding it difficult to stay afloat and are turning to relatives and friends to watch their kids for free. When parents have to choose between daycare and putting food on the table, it just may be our kids who are losing the most in this recession.

There are more than 177-thousand children enrolled in licensed child care facilities in Washington. The centers also report more than 13-thousand vacancies, or 10 percent of capacity.

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