When schools and childcare facilities closed due to the pandemic, working parents were forced to leave their jobs. Many parents stayed home to care for children, with the burden falling disproportionately on women.
In response, the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry urged businesses to be as flexible as possible in addressing the challenges their employees faced.
Businesses responded. In sizable numbers, employers devised supports that helped parents meet their dual responsibilities to work and family. Businesses that Pennsylvanians trust and love, including Sheetz and The Giant Co., are making financial commitments and partnering with providers to assure access to quality child care for communities and employees.
Now comes the question: What next? The PA Chamber, United Way of Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania Early Learning Investment Commission began to think about the answer by asking questions of their own. Two surveys conducted in spring 2021 and juxtaposed in a new white paper, “COVID-19 Pandemic Report: Child Care is Essential for Working Families and Businesses,” show that the lack of childcare is a workforce barrier for families.
For families known as ALICE — for “asset limited, income constrained, employed” — the results show that juggling work and child care needs was a significant concern during the pandemic.
From the business perspective, the findings show that employers also experienced a negative impact from child care challenges:
• 54% of employers believe they lost employees due to lack of childcare during the pandemic.
• 41% of employers who offered childcare supports to employees during the pandemic plan to continue after the pandemic ends. Most commonly, employers offered flexible schedules and remote work (72%), while about one in four offered unpaid leave, salaries to support childcare, or paid leave.
• 38% of employers say their employees have moderate to high childcare needs.
In this atmosphere, interest is strong among employers to help working families meet their childcare needs. They see it as a key tool to improve retention, recruitment, productivity, and their reputations as family-friendly enterprises. For ALICE families, this is especially important because juggling work and childcare needs was one of their biggest childcare concerns during the pandemic.
Families aren’t the only ones struggling to find help. Employers are, too. Seventy percent don’t know that they can access resources to help employees find and afford quality childcare. Plus, nearly half of employers that did not provide childcare support during the pandemic had no choice because they simply didn’t have the resources to offer tangible help.
Clearly, businesses want to help, but as they focus on emerging from the pandemic, they need supports of their own — resources that incorporate seamlessly into operations and deliver results in workforce productivity and reliability.
Fortunately, these resources are at hand. They include Early Learning Resource Centers (ELRC), which are localized, one-stop hubs for information on childcare availability and assistance; the 211 Information and Referral Line, connecting people with help for a variety of needs; and COMPASS, the state’s online application tool for health and human services.
The PA Chamber, Pennsylvania Early Learning Investment Commission and United Way of Pennsylvania are also helping by supporting strong childcare networks in communities. Together and separately, we advocate for state and federal policies that strengthen the workforce through availability, reliability, and quality of childcare.
The post-pandemic era presents an opportunity to strengthen the ability of working families to raise their kids while they also succeed at work. Equipping businesses with the power to support childcare for the workforce is a key factor in this imperative, paving the way to economic recovery for stronger families, communities, and businesses.
(Gene Barr is president and CEO of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry and a member of the Pennsylvania Early Learning Investment Commission.)
