Policy Backgrounders

Public Investment in Childcare and Early Education Policies

November 11, 2020

Compared to other OECD countries, the United States is considered an outlier with regard to public investment in childcare and early education. Since the end of the nineteenth century, many OECD countries have significantly expanded the scope and generosity of family-friendly labor market policies. In 2002, the European Council set a target of making formal childcare accessible to at least 90 percent of children between three years old and the mandatory school age and at least 33 percent of children under the of age three in EU Member States by 2010.