Slow Growth Continues for Large For Profit Organizations

Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/slow-growth-continues-for-large-for-profit-organizations/5021573/

Child Care is hot, hot, hot! At least that is the impression one would get from following the national news, where ­stories like these keep popping up . . .

• Business leaders gather in Atlanta for a Summit on Early Childhood Investment.

• U.S. Chamber of Commerce pushing preschool initiatives in 48 states.

• President Obama proposes historic investment in early childhood ­services.

So, yes, there is a growing coalition building support for major increases in public support for early childhood ­services. But so far this is all talk . . . with little impact on services on the ground.

In fact, with the impact of the economic slow down, sequestration, and the ­federal government shut down, child care in the United States has undergone a sustained period of ‘no growth’ and even shrinkage in sectors heavily dependent on public subsidies.

Four Years of No Growth

For the 50 largest child care organizations in North America (see table on page 76), this indeed has been a period where expansion is a distant memory.

A few of the Top 50 organizations �" KinderCare Learning Centers, Bright Horizons Family Solutions, Childcare Network, and Children of America �" have had recent growth spurts. How­ever, taken as whole, the ...