BERKELEY, CA — The national jobs recovery has bypassed the child care sector, according to analysis by the UC Berkeley Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE).
Despite adding 8,800 jobs in July, child care employment is still 8.4% below what it was in February 2020. Considering there was a child care shortage before the pandemic, the ongoing shortage is especially concerning for the outlook of the sector.
Today’s release is based on the latest U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) jobs report.
-88,300k
Child care jobs lost since Feb 2020
91.6%
Percentage of child care jobs today compared to Feb 2020
Child care job numbers from selected states and metro areas continue to fluctuate each month. While child care employment in New Jersey has nearly reached pre-pandemic levels, Massachusetts child care jobs are down 12.93% and Texas jobs down 9.97% from February 2020.
Check back with us or revisit the site page each month for the updates.
*More details on the data source:
- Data Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2022). Employment, Hours, and Earnings from the Current Employment Statistics survey.
- Current month’s jobs numbers are a preliminary estimate by BLS. Our figures include BLS adjustments to previous months and thus may differ from earlier Jobs Tracker Figures. These estimates include employees in the “child day care services” industry, which includes child care, Head Start, preschool and school-age care programs. The estimates include employees only and do not include self-employed workers, such as owners of home-based child care figures published by CSCCE.
- These estimates include employees in the “child day care services” industry, which includes child care, Head Start, preschool and school-age care programs. The estimates include employees only and do not include self-employed workers, such as owners of home-based child care.
- This employment data cannot be disaggregated by education, race/ethnicity, role, setting, or funding stream.