“Can’t Compete”: Why Hiring For Child Care Is A Huge Struggle

“I can’t compete with the sign-up bonuses and paying $ 20 an hour at the amusement park,” said Ms. Mossefin, who cares for children from infancy to 12 years old. an hour here. I can’t because I can’t raise the prices on my parents because we are all suffering.

Last week she lost an employee at an auto factory. She cut the number of children she cares for by a third to 12, says she works much more than full time himself.

She won $ 18,000 last year after paying her bills and her employees’ salaries. This year – with a lower turnout, an additional $ 4,500 spent on cleaning supplies, and the $ 1,000 she spent on Indeed trying to hire – she expects to make $ 14,000. Full-time tuition for a toddler is $ 756 per month, and she recently increased it by about $ 4 per week. But she knows her customers, who mostly work at the local Whirlpool factory or fast food restaurants, can’t pay more than that.

“I understand, I was a single mom,” she said. “It’s just something my city needed.

The pandemic threatened to shatter an already fragile child care system. Centers that managed to reopen after the closures struggled initially with low enrollment rates – many parents were uncomfortable sending their children away. Workers did not always receive masks and other protective equipment, health care or risk premium.

“You have a situation where the workers were already struggling, and then they are under immense pressure to work, not only with a lack of resources, but also with a lack of concern and respect for the welfare of the workers. daycare, ”said Lea JE Austin, executive director of the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment at the University of California, Berkeley.

Now that parents want to return to daycare, they can’t find her, leaving some without full-time coverage for the third consecutive school year.