For many families, childcare is a major monthly expense, and the cost continues to rise.<\/p>\n
In addition to higher prices, parents are facing limited availability, making it difficult to find a childcare option that fits their needs, schedules and budgets.<\/p>\n
Childcare costs increased 5.2% nationwide between September 2024 and September 2025, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Department of Labor says families can spend between 8% and 16% of their income on care for just one child. For lower-income families, childcare can account for an even larger share of the household budget.<\/p>\n
Parents also may have to coordinate childcare with their work schedules and financial assistance programs.<\/p>\n
Asylinn Parmenter, director of ABC Child Care, said the demand for daycare remains high in the community.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely, there’s a big need for daycare in the community, finding a spot,\u201d Parmenter said.<\/p>\n
Parmenter said families applying for CCIS, a childcare assistance program, may face additional challenges because they need to find a childcare provider while also coordinating care with their employment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you’re applying for CCIS, you have to have a daycare first, but then you also have to line it up with your job,\u201d Parmenter said. \u201cSo, it’s kind of a struggle parents have, and we work to try to close that gap.\u201d<\/p>\n
With childcare costs continuing to rise and availability remaining limited, families are increasingly balancing the cost of care with other household expenses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For many families, childcare is a major monthly expense, and the cost continues to rise. In addition to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[25781,2438,26540,136,138,137,1510,23794],"class_list":["post-266921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-childcare","tag-cost","tag-daycare","tag-erie","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news","tag-family","tag-parents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}