Rebecca Bailin pays $32,000 a year for her five-month-old’s all-day child care in New York City.
That’s higher than the national average, but not unusual. Many parents in the city and in other parts of the country can relate, as Care.com’s 2025 Cost of Care Report found many parents spend 22% of their household income on child care. Bailin said she couldn’t find anything cheaper within walking distance of her home.
“People are spending enormous amounts and they can’t make it work, but they don’t have a choice,” Bailin said. She’s executive director of New Yorkers United for Child Care, a nonprofit that started organizing parents, grandparents and anyone else in favor of free child care in 2023. Families tell Bailin they feel embarrassed to share how much they pay for child care, “because there’s this real feeling that it’s your fault. That you weren’t savvy enough.”…