Child Care Affordability and Availability

Abstract

he changing shape of the family and of women's role in society, together with an increased economic necessity to participate in paid work has meant that child care has become one of the biggest issues for Australian families and social policy makers today. An increasing proportion of mothers entering the workforce has been associated with a parallel increase in the need for nonparental child care. Child care in the shape of informal and formal care aims to fill this gap. Today, the labour force participation rate of women has reached 57 per cent; twenty years ago it was 44 per cent (ABS, 2005b). On the other hand, women remain the primary caregivers of dependent children. As a result, child care demand and use has grown rapidly over the past two decades. In 2004, the Australian Government supported 561,876 child care places (Productivity Commission, 2005). Child care has been shown to benefit both society and the child. It does this, for example, by providing parents (particularly women) with an opportunity to participate in the work force, increasing workforce attachment and human capital, and decreasing reliance on welfare payments (Anderson, Foster and Frisvold, 1999; Blau, 2000; Hofferth and Collins, 2000). While causal relationships between the availability and affordability of child care and female labour force participation remain the subject of debate in Australia and elsewhere, there is substantial work that suggests a connection between the two (Baxter, 2004). Evidence suggests that difficulties experienced in accessing affordable and good quality child care interfere with the ability of mothers of young children to participate in the workforce (Hofferth and Collins; Kisker and Ross, 1997). Quality child care in the 'early years' is also considered to be beneficial to a child through providing a stimulating, educational and caring environment that aids a child's social, educational and physical development (see, for example, Anderson, Foster and Frisvold, 2004; Burchinal et al, 1996). Studies have shown that quality early childhood programs serve as an early intervention device, aiding in reducing future social problems such as crime, unemployment and teenage pregnancies (Weikart, 1998). Child care has also been considered to be an important instrument to encourage higher reproduction and fertility rates in nations experiencing falling fertility levels (OECD, 2004). Castles (2002) found high use of child care to be strongly correlated with high fertility rates. It is important that high quality child care is accessible to all Australian families. Affordability, together with availability, determines a family's ability to access child care services (Press and Hayes, 2000). Through analysis of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics of Australia (HILDA) survey, we attempt

The composition of parents’ and grandparents’ child-care time: gender and generational patterns in activity, multi-tasking and co-presence

“…Orloff 2009; Pfau-Effinger 2004). A national paid parental leave scheme was introduced in 2011, women's workforce participation has risen over time and there are partial child-care tax subsidies, however (Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) 2012; Cassells et al 2005; Pocock, Skinner and Williams 2012). Notwithstanding, long hours in formal non-parental child care is not the norm, and the majority of Australian children in formal care attend for less than 20 hours per week (ABS 2012).…”

Macro-structural predictors of Australian family day care quality

“…In addition, FDC may be the only option for child care in regional and remote areas of Australia ( 3 ). In contrast, households in metropolitan Australia are more likely to experience multiple challenges accessing child care (e.g., lack of quality, center location, and center choice) than households in regional Australia or remote Australia ( 43 ).…”

Return of the Nanny: Public Policy towards In‐home Childcare in the UK, Canada and Australia

“…Overall, there is little consistency in the way informal and formal care is defined, and these inconsistencies are often evident in national administrative and policy definitions as well (Cassells et al . ; Bryson et al . ).…”

“…As introduced earlier, formal and informal care is often distinguished through the regulation of care settings and the qualification of care workers (Rutter and Evans ; Cassells et al . ). An analysis of regulation, in addition to public funding, of in‐home childcare is critical for comparing how in‐home childcare is positioned differently in Australia, the UK and Canada.…”