Excerpts
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Parents simply can’t afford to bring their babies because of the high cost of child care. The Kayas can’t afford to run an infant room with the staff-to-baby ratio that is required. And the government subsidies that were barely holding the child care industry together are now uncertain.
Colorado’s child care shortage has grown so dire, and the cost of care so steep, that many parents say safe, affordable care is now out of reach. At the same time, many day care owners say they are stuck in survival mode.
Child care providers, long plagued by slim profit margins, were almost at their breaking point before a recent disruption to federal funding. Some families, even those with two working parents, are living paycheck to paycheck just to cover the weekly day care bill — if they manage find a safe, high-quality spot.
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The challenges are hitting many of the state’s most vulnerable kids hardest, though finding and securing affordable child care has increasingly become a problem for families regardless of their means. Child care providers and advocates who see child care as a public good, say one way to ease the struggle for everyone is more spending by local, state and federal governments. Colorado is among the states that spend the least on child care per child, according to a report national nonprofit Child Care Aware of America released last year on state contributions to child care and early learning. That leaves few options for affordable care and few spots available at licensed child care centers for Colorado kids from infancy to age 5.
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“The market can’t fix child care”
The state’s flailing child care system hurts far more than the families and providers trying to navigate it, child care advocates say, pointing to impacts that touch nearly every person and every part of a community. Obstacles to reliable and affordable care can hamper parents’ ability to work, sidelining some — often mothers — from the workforce as they opt to stay home with their children. That translates to a real economic loss locally and statewide, experts say.
And missing out on early childhood education can hold a kid back, stunting basic academic and social skills that can leave them trying to catch up to their peers once they’re in school, according to child care providers like state Sen. Scott Bright.
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