Supporting Child Care Workers as Parents: How the Kentucky Subsidy Income Exclusion for Child Care Employees Helps Increase Access to Child Care

In response to the dwindling child care labor pool, some states began to review other options to improve the ability of child care programs to recruit and retain staff. Kentucky was the first state to make child care workers eligible for publicly funded child care subsidy regardless of their household income.

Kentucky’s workforce investment sought to:

1. Ensure child care programs could be fully staffed to serve children.
2. Make child care more affordable for child care workers who otherwise might struggle with the price of child care for their own children.
3. Make child care jobs more competitive with other employment options in communities.

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