Tools and Resources

Cost of Preschool Quality & Revenue Calculator
This is an Excel-based tool that help users determine costs and funding sources related to implementing high-quality preschool programs. The calculator can inform funding allocations by estimating costs of expansion and quality enhancements to identify trade-offs on quality and access associated with different pre-K policy options.

Family Budget Calculator
This calculator measures the income a family needs in order to attain a modest yet adequate standard of living.

Living Wage Calculator
This calculator estimates the cost of living in your community or region based on typical expenses. It can help employers determine a local wage rate that allows residents to meet minimum standards of living.

Provider Cost of Quality Calculator
This tool can help policymakers, providers, and other stakeholders estimate the annual cost and revenue for full-time child care provided through child care homes or centers at different quality levels.

Where Does Your Child Care Dollar Go?
This tool is informed by national averages and integrates local data to provide state-specific estimates for the cost of care. Users can modify seven elements of the child care program, including salaries, benefits, teacher-child ratios, and classroom materials. As users modify the seven elements, the tool calculates the monthly cost per child of providing care at the chosen level of quality.

Other Reports from the National Academies:

Animated Overview: Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education
This 2018 video summarizes the main findings of the Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education report.

A Vision for Financing Early Care and Education
This 2018 issue brief for policymakers summarizes the findings of the Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education report related to needed policy changes.

Interactive Review of the Financing Report
This interactive website highlights the main findings of the Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education report and includes videos and additional resources.

Parenting Matters: Supporting Parents of Children Ages 0-8
This 2016 report examines the integral role that parents play in the lives of young children.

Promoting the Educational Success of Children and Youth Learning English
This 2017 report assesses the current research, policy, and education landscape related to dual language learners.

Supporting the Transformation
This 2018 issue brief for the business community summarizes the findings of the Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education report and describes how contributions from the business sector can be employed as part of a transformed financing system.

Transforming the Workforce for Children Birth Through Age 8
This 2015 report provides a comprehensive review of the science of childhood development and its implications on the education professionals that work with children B–8.

New America Resources:

Putting Degrees Within Reach: Strategies for Financing Early Educator Degrees
This 2019 brief examines strategies currently in use to assist early educators working to obtain a college degree and list important things to consider when designing programs to help educators earn a degree.

The Care Report
This 2016 report examines the cost, quality, and availability of child care across the United States.

Transforming the Early Education Workforce: A Multimedia Guidebook
This 2017 guidebook makes the Transforming the Early Education Workforce report more digestible and actionable, and includes key takeaways, videos, interactive tools, a glossary, and more.

Resources from Leading Organizations:

Child Care for All: A Blueprint for States (The Century Foundation)
This 2019 report details six priorities for state child care reform that will help ensure that child care policies are robust and impactful.

The video above explains why costs are so high while early childhood teachers are paid so little. It was produced by Child Care Aware of America, a national advocacy group, and the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment at the University of California-Berkeley.

Early Learning in the United States: 2019 (Center for American Progress)
These 2019 fact sheets provide state-specific information on child care costs, workforce wage levels, and gaps in child care funding and access.

Financing Early Educator Teacher Quality (Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE))
This 2019 report examines a set of cost models with regard to assumptions about resources for teachers and their working environments. These assumptions drive the per child and total systems estimates produced for budgetary purposes and ultimately frame the daily realities of early educators.

Financing Early Educator Quality: A Values-Based Budget for Every State (Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE))
This 2020 report offers cost estimates for an overhauled early care and education system in each individual state.

Funding Our Future: Generating State and Local Tax Revenue for Quality Early Care and Education (The Build Initiative, Center for American Progress, Children's Funding Project, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, University of Maryland)
This 2019 report provides early childhood leaders with funding strategies for increasing the revenue from state and local sources that can be directed to high-quality early care and education.

Minnesota Cost Modeling Report (Minnesota Department of Human Services)
This 2020 report offers a state-specific model for measuring the true cost of providing child care.

Most States Offer Preschool Programs and Rely on Multiple Funding Sources (Government Accountability Office (GAO))
This 2019 report examines (1) the number and characteristics of state ECE programs and the extent to which they share characteristics or overlap with federal or other state programs; and (2) how states fund their ECE programs, including any related benefits and challenges reported by states.

States’ Payment Rates Under the Child Care and Development Fund Program Could Limit Access to Child Care Providers (Department of Health and Human Services)
A 2019 report that explains how a majority of child care providers charge more for full-time infant care than states’ CCDF payment rates, limiting families’ access to care unless they can pay the difference between provider prices and state payment rates.

Strategies in Pursuit of Pre-K Teacher Compensation Parity (Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE))
This 2017 report examines a small set of states and cities with the goal of understanding the policy rationale and process for moving toward compensation parity in different contexts.

The Early Childhood Workforce Index 2018 (Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE))
This 2018 index offers state-by-state information on early childhood workforce conditions and policies.

This 2018 video produced by the National Women's Law Center describes the challenges of accessing child care for working families and the benefits of assistance to children and families.

Who’s Paying Now? The Explicit and Implicit Costs of the Current Early Care and Education System (Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE) and the Economic Policy Institute)
This 2020 report breaks down the economic costs of the current ECE system and highlights the economic benefits that would be gained under a transformed system.

See the Glossary for key word definitions.