Socioeconomic and race/ethnic disparities in child care quality at 48 months of age

Quality child care is associated with favorable developmental outcomes including enhanced cognitive development, greater language proficiency, and improved social skills. Past research suggests that disadvantaged children receive poorer quality childcare, however at the population level it is not known how childcare currently received by poor and ethnic minority children compares with that of other children, and the extent to which Head Start makes a difference in the quality of care available to these groups. This paper uses a nationally representative dataset, the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (ECLS-B), to: 1) examine the child care arrangements of poor and non-poor children and those in different race/ethnic groups; 2) evaluate the degree to which childcare quality varies by poverty status and race/ethnicity; and 3) identify factors associated with lower-quality child care receipt. We find that poor and non-poor children experience equivalent child care quality in some settings such as Head Start day care centers, but not in others such as family day care--including Head Start family day care. Childcare in all settings received by African American children was consistently ranked lowest in quality among all race/ethnic groups. Multiple regression analyses identified factors that are independently associated with childcare quality. The findings suggest that socioeconomic and race/ethnic disparities in childcare quality persist and are particularly acute in family day care settings.