Community Corner
Daycare Almost As Much As Housing In Pa., New Study Finds
Parents in Pennsylvania spend nearly as much on daycare as they do on housing — and that's if they have just one child, a new study says.
Parents in Pennsylvania spend nearly as much on daycare as they do on housing — and that's if they have one child, according to a new study by the Economic Policy Institute.
The study reported that the cost of infant daycare in Pennsylvania is $10,640 a year per child, or $887 per month. Prices can be much higher in certain areas, including the Philadelphia suburbs. The average price of infant daycare is just about $60 less than the average cost of housing, the study says.
Infant care for one child would take up 15.8 percent of a typical family’s income in Pennsylvania, the study finds. For a person making minimum wage, daycare would be 70 percent of their income. A typical child care worker in Pennsylvania who earns $19,220 would have to spend more than 55 percent of their earnings to put their own child in infant care.
In comparison, the average annual college tuition in Pennsylvania is just $1,967 more than daycare for one infant child, the study says.
Parents with more than one child face an even larger financial burden. Child care for two children— for example, an infant and a 4-year-old—costs $18,712 in the Keystone State.
Pennsylvania is 20th in the nation for most expensive infant care.
The Economic Policy Institute, which says it's time for an "ambitious" national investment in childcare, said reform that capped families’ child care expenses at 10 percent of their income would generate $7.55 billion of new economic activity in Pennsylvania alone.
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
