Different Patterns of Shaping Child Care Policy Environment Across States

Purpose. Child care policy has a substantial influence on shaping child care environment and choosing child care services among working families. With welfare reform in 1996, the role of state in deciding child care policy rules has been increasing with increased funding and authority of state government and those changes led a dramatic variation in state level child care policy rules. However, little has been known its diverse child care policy across states. Previous studies did not go further simple descriptions of variations and have not considered both quality regulation and child care subsidy rules together. The current study examines how states differentially create state child care environment using policy adoptions in quality regulation and child care subsidy rules.   

Methods.Fifty states including the District of Columbia constituted the sample. Two different datasets, Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) Policies Database in 2011 and Child Care Licensing Study in 201l were used for the analysis. CCDF Policies Database included details on subsidy policy, such as eligibility limits, family copayment, and reimbursement rate. The Child Care Licensing Study in 2011 included quality regulation rules such as staffing, monitoring, and licensing regulations. Two hierarchical cluster analyses were conducted using Ward’s method and squared Euclidean distances on two policy areas: four child care subsidy rules and three quality regulations policy levers. Cluster solutions were chosen based on the findings on previous research and differences in scores across clusters by ANOVA. Cross-tabulation between two cluster memberships examined how states shape the child care environments using both policy rules.

Results.The five-cluster solution was chosen in the cluster analysis on child care subsidy policy. There were significant differences in mean scores of all child care subsidy policy rules among groups at p=.001 level. Clusters were: (1)states with generous provision; (2)those with moderate provision; (3)those with restrictive provision; (4)states with generous incentive to high quality care only; and (5)states supporting on extremely low income families. The five-cluster solution was chosen in the cluster analysis on quality regulation. There were significant differences in mean scores of all quality regulation rules among clusters at p=.001 level. Clusters were: (A)states with loose regulation, (B)those with less strident child-staff ratio, (C)those with most stringent child-staff ratio, (D)those with more staff training requirement, (E)state with more frequency inspection. Combinations of two cluster membership showed that states providing more generous child care subsidies were likely to have less stringent regulation rules. There were states that tried to reinforce quality of center care by using both child care subsidy and regulation rules. There was no state which had cluster memberships of both stringent child-staff ratios and generous subsidies.

Implications.This study demonstrated that interstate differences in child care policy were driven by states’ policy adoption. Cross tabulations of two different cluster memberships shed light on how states chose different policy schemes with limited budgets. Future research should examine the ways that the state’s political environment, policy practices including political and cultural attitudes to target populations, and detailed funding allocation under limited budget constraint affect policy choices.