What Factors Are Associated with Low Income Working Mothers Using Childcare Subsidies in the U.S.?

Purpose: In the U.S., the childcare subsidy program refers to the governmental financial assistantship that helps low income working parents pay for childcare. The primary goal of the childcare subsidy program is to low-income parents to be self-sufficient and to access high-quality childcare. However, the current take-up rate for the childcare subsidy (CCS) is low, among 8.7 million children eligible for CCS in their states, only 2 million (23%) received subsidies in 2019. Factors that may be associated with the low rate of using CCS, including parents not being aware of CCS, the nature of instability of CCS, parental characteristics (limited English proficiency, structural racism, unpleasant interactions with childcare agency, and long travel distance to childcare agency. The purpose of the current study is to examines individual-level factors that impact mothers’ use of CCS within a more fragile population (mostly single and cohabiting mothers) by specifically examining mothers, children, and household characteristics.

Method: Using Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) (N=4898) wave 3 (child age 3), 2239 CCS-eligible mothers were identified as having children under 13, living in poverty below 200%, and being regularly employed, in school, or searching for jobs. Among 2239 mothers, mothers were identified as CCS recipients if they have government/childcare centers pay for their care (N=507) (Johnson & Herbst, 2013). Mothers who use exclusive parental care, who did not receive CCS from any source, and who receive CCS from an alternative source (eg. employer, family) were coded as eligible CCS non-recipients. Mother characteristics (family structure, education, work type and status, immigrant), children characteristics, household characteristics (number of adults/child, poverty) were used to predict the likelihood of using CCS. All model analyses were conducted with weights, and the missing values were dealt by multiple imputation-chained equations.

Results: Maternal race/ethnicity (African-American mothers), family structure (single mothers and cohabitant mothers than married mothers), immigrant status (non-immigrant), maternal age (younger mothers), maternal educaiton (high school graduate than less than high school), and household (living with more adults) were more likely to receive CCS. Compared to full time employed mothers, school/searching for jobs received more and part-time workers received less CCS. Interactions were found between family structure and work status (married mothers who worked part-time was the least likely to receive less CCS) and between maternal education and work status (mothers beyond high school and working part time was the least likely, and mothers with high school graduate and seeking for a job was the most likely to receive CCS).

Implication: As indicated in the goal, CCS receipt was significantly associated with work related factors (work status, education status). Similar to federal data, most mothers who were eligible for CCS did not take CCS particularly among immigrant and low educated mothers. Further, married mothers and those living with more numbers of adults in the household were less likely to use CCS. This should be investigated further how they arrange quality child care and why not receiving CCS (possibly parental care or relative care) which is another goal of CCS.