For Immediate Release 

Media Contact: Will Bohlen, [email protected] 
Survey home: https://www.naeyc.org/ece-workforce-surveys 

Survey: Child Care Affordability Crisis Deepening for Educators and Families 

~ Thousands of child care providers surveyed by NAEYC document a year of tough choices as rising costs, reduced public funding, and educator burnout threaten families and the economy ~

WASHINGTON (February 24, 2026)—A new survey by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) of thousands of early childhood educators across the country illustrates how a deepening affordability crisis is destabilizing educators, programs, and the families they serve, and how insufficient public investment continues to threaten the supply of quality child care and early learning programs. 

The survey, NAEYC’s 11th since 2020, shows that: 

• Operating costs—and tuition—continue to rise for a strong majority of programs. 
• Educators perceive greater job loss and financial instability among the families they serve, increasingly impacting enrollment. 
• Educators continue to report rising burnout and instability. 
• Programs are seeing cost increases across the board, including for food and supplies, facility maintenance, insurance, and staff wages and salaries. 
• Programs are seeing a reduction in public support, impacting their stability.

“There is a significant gap between what parents can afford and what early childhood educators need to live,” said NAEYC CEO Michelle Kang. “As public funding stagnates and costs keep rising, more early childhood educators will leave the field, and more programs will close—with lasting consequences for children, communities, and our economy.” 

The survey’s key findings are relatively consistent with previous surveys and include: 

• A sizable jump in the percentage of respondents reporting increases in insurance and facilities costs over the last year. (68% saw liability insurance costs increase, up from 46% last year; 66% saw property insurance costs increase, up from 45%; 44% saw rent or lease costs increase, up from 32% last year.)  
• Across most setting types, a majority of program leaders reported raising tuition in 2025 to offset rising costs. But respondents working in programs receiving public funding less often reported having to raise tuition than those that did not. 
• Close to half of respondents reported that their programs were not enrolled at their preferred capacity, with family affordability and staffing challenges remaining the top cited causes. More than half of program leaders said the families they served experienced increased job loss or financial instability in 2025. 

Furthermore, among all survey respondents: 

• Nearly half reported an increased sense of burnout, and more than half reported increased feelings of uncertainty driven by low wages, staffing shortages, and the physical and mental demands of the job. 
• 22% reported they were considering leaving the ECE field in the next year, but more than half of those considering leaving said they would be very or extremely likely to stay with access to increased wages and benefits, overtime pay, adequate support from colleagues and administrators, and student loan forgiveness. 
• 57% reported that their trust in institutions had declined over the last year, and survey respondents reported families’ access to child care subsidies and total program funding declining nearly three times as often as they reported increases. 
• Nearly 20% of all respondents indicated that changes in immigration enforcement had an impact on their program enrollment in 2025, and 34% of program leaders reported increased disruptions among families related to immigration enforcement.

The survey, conducted in January 2026, included more than 7,000 early childhood educators from all states and settings, including faith-based programs, home-based providers, Head Start programs, and child care centers. 

In its policy brief on the survey, NAEYC notes that several national policy changes threaten to deepen the challenges families and educators face, including the long-term impact of budget reconciliation legislation that cut critical safety net programs, a proposed rescission of regulatory protections for providers serving families relying on child care subsidies, and increased immigration enforcement affecting program enrollment and family stability. 

At the same time, NAEYC highlights bright spots: State and local leaders continue to make bold investments toward more equitable child care systems, and Congress recently passed a bipartisan funding bill that included modest funding increases for key child care and early learning programs while protecting other threatened programs. NAEYC advocates that Congress build on this momentum by substantially increasing funding for child care and early learning programs and establishing policies that protect and support educators, children, and families. 

The full NAEYC survey brief and methodology can be found at NAEYC.org/ece-workforce-surveys. State-based briefs will be published at a later date.

About NAEYC 

The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) is a professional membership organization that works to promote high-quality early learning for all young children, birth through age 8, by connecting early childhood practice, policy, and research. In 2026, we celebrate 100 years of advancing a diverse, dynamic early childhood profession and supporting all who care for, educate, and work on behalf of young children. Today, the association comprises tens of thousands of individual members of the early childhood community and 50 Affiliates across the country, all committed to delivering on the promise of high-quality early learning. 

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