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Study: Child care in Minnesota among nation's most expensive

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Oct 10, 2011 at 9:44 am

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) - A new national study ranks Minnesota among the least affordable for child care, with a $9,900 annual average cost for a center-based day care.

The study by the National Association of Child Care Resources and Referral Agencies studied only the state's 1,500 center-based providers and didn't include the more than 11,000 in-house care providers.

The study found that Minnesota ranks as the fifth least affordable state for prekindergarten child care, after New York, Montana, Massachusetts and Wisconsin.

And the St. Paul Pioneer Press reports (http://bit.ly/pQmUzk ) that's after the annual cost of infant care dropped 5 percent to $12,900 and for a preschooler dropped 4 percent to $9,900.

The high costs of child care coupled with the recession have resulted in more families turning to state subsidies for child care.