WASHINGTON — DC families with young kids know childcare is expensive, but one group is releasing a report Wednesday that shows the ripple effect cost on the entire community.
Under 3 DC surveyed 308 parents in 2023 to determine how much childcare for kids younger than 3 is costing families.
Through aggregating survey responses, they determined that childcare losses for D..C parents amount to $252 million annually.
Losses for businesses stack up to $79 million, the report said, due to lower output, more workforce disruptions, and lower workforce capital.
And, the report said taxpayers as a whole are seeing $64 million in losses.
Danielle Geong knows about the cost all too well.
She has a 2-year-old daughter in daycare, and she said the cost amounts to about 17% of her family's income annually.
She said in 2023, she and her husband spent nearly $23,000 on childcare -- after they were finally taken off waitlists.
“Our family's livelihood, and our economic future is just solely contingent on securing a reliable childcare provider. And I say that, because if I've experienced gaps in employment over the last two years, and childcare was just the last expense that you could even conceivably consider cutting out of your budget," Geong said. "It's just not feasible, based on how difficult it was to get in, in the first place.”
The report shows multiple striking statistics detailing how a lack of affordable childcare impacts parents' employment:
- 21% said they were demoted or transferred to less desirable positions
- 21% said they were let go or fired
- 28% said they had to quit their jobs
- 36% said they had to turn down a promotion
- 52% said they had to reduce work hours
At a time when District leaders are working to attract more people to live and work in DC, the report found that inaccessible childcare could have the opposite effect.
The report said that 57% of respondents said cost of early education will affect their ability to keep living in DC.
Most said that a reasonable percentage of their income that should be devoted to childcare is 7%, so they're pushing leaders to help make that possible.
Geong said it starts with how the community and its leaders think about early childcare.
"I think we have to think about this like public infrastructure, like roads, schools, you know, like PK3-12. That kind of public and social good that children, and this kind of care work really is," she said. "And when we think about it in that way, then we think about how when we invest in our youngest citizens, when we invest in their development, everyone benefits and so that's really what I would like to see...Speaking for myself, I would love to see kind of universal, publicly funded early education systems."
D.C. has enacted multiple pieces of legislation aimed at helping families with childcare (Pre-K for All in 2008 and Birth to Three for All DC Act in 2018), but Under 3 DC said they are not always fully funded and implemented.
They're pushing for that Wednesday morning when they present their full report at The Wilson Building at 10 a.m.
You can read the full report here.