The U.S. Labor Department said in a recent report that the average price of daycare and preschool jumped 6 percent last month, which is about double the country’s current inflation rate of 3.2 percent.

The report noted that there is a high likelihood that daycare centers and preschools will have to further increase prices due to higher overall costs and the end of federal pandemic aid, which will expire next month. The 2021 bill provided $24 billion for these providers. The paper said the bill was popular and more than 220,000 child-care providers took advantage of the additional funding. 

The paper spoke to a mother from Blaine, Minn., who said she paid $2,500 a month for childcare this summer, which is more than what she pays for her mortgage—and a 10 percent increase from last year. 

While prices are increasing for parents, wages for child-care workers have remained stagnant, at about $19.95 an hour—up about 4.6 percent from last year, but far below the average $33.50 an hour average by service workers. 

Chloe Gibbs, an economist at the University of Notre Dame, told Yahoo! Finance that the still-hot jobs market means “staff has more outside options, they can command higher wages.”

News Nation, citing the Century Foundation, reported that more than 70,000 daycare centers could close without the additional aid, meaning that more than three million children would be without care.

TRENDPOST: The WSJ report noted that the lack of affordable childcare pushed many women out of the workforce.

“I was working, had a really great full-time job. That changed after they asked me to come into the office,” one mother told News Nation. “We are looking at another rent payment and half of a car payment just for full-time care.”

The Cleveland Plains-Dealer reported that more than half of Ohio parents who are not full-time working parents say they would return to work if they had access to quality childcare at an affordable price. (See “AMERICAN PARENTS HAVING TOUGH ECONOMIC TIME TAKING CARE OF ADULT KIDS” 18 Apr 2023 and “COVID LOCKDOWNS, NOT THE ‘PANDEMIC’ RUINED LIFE ON EARTH” 4 Apr 2023.)

More than 90 percent of those surveyed by the First Five Years Fund said they believe it is important for working parents of young children to be able to find and afford quality childcare programs, “a sentiment felt by more than 85 percent of every political party affiliation.”

Research shows the rise in prices could cost families $9 billion a year in lost earnings and cities just over $10 billion in lost economic activity, the report said. The report said families across the U.S. pay close to $11,000 per year on average for childcare.

News outlets like to blame “the Pandemic” for destroying the economy and for creating other problems, but the reality is that it was the useless political mandates that locked down the nation that caused incalculable socio-economic damage to the economy. (See “COVID-19 LOCKDOWNS LEFT CHILDREN BRAIN DAMAGED, NEW STUDY SUGGESTS” 6 Dec 2022, “AS FORECAST: U.S. SCHOOL CHILDREN GETTING DUMBER AFTER COVID LOCKDOWNS” 26 Oct 2022 and “WHO NEEDS COLLEGE? UNIVERSITIES STRUGGLE WITH ENROLLMENT AFTER COVID LOCKDOWNS, AS WE FORECAST” 12 Oct 2022.)