Variation in child care access across neighborhood types: A two-step floating catchment area (2SFCA) approach.

Finding safe and high-quality child care is critical to working parents. However, research suggests that formal child care—both family child care and center-based child care—is in short supply in the U.S. We hypothesize that compared to urban neighborhoods, child care access will be lower in outlying suburban neighborhoods with newer and less developed social infrastructure. Applying the 2SFCA method, we predict variation in the supply of child care relative to demand—a measure of child care access—across California neighborhoods that vary by geography as well as sociodemographic and employment characteristics. Similar to prior research, we find that percent Latinx of a neighborhood is associated with lower child care access. In terms of neighborhood type, as we predict, we find that child care access is lower in newly developed suburban areas compared to most other neighborhood types. This finding suggests the importance of incentives to create formal child care facilities in new suburbs, neighborhoods that house a quarter of all young children in the state. • A 2SFCA method was applied to measure child care access in California. • Child care access by neighborhoods types is analyzed. • Child care access is lower in newly developed suburban areas compared to most other neighborhood types. • Percent Latinx of a neighborhood is associated with lower child care access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]