ABSTRACT

Child care regulation, plagued by controversy, continues to be a hot potato for politicians and an unresolved issue for parents. Consequently, the question of whether regulation should be in the hands of federal or state agencies goes unanswered. State licensing is based on minimal standards, which vary tremendously from state to state. Morgan (1987) found that 15 states apply general program requirements to all age groups, whereas 9 states provide detailed requirements for infants and toddlers. Half the states set staff/child ratios for 6-month-old infants at 1:4; South Carolina has a 1:8 ratio for this age group. Federal regulation, which is frequently resisted by both child care providers and clients, has been no more promising than state licensing and has proved difficult to implement at the state level. Fiene and Nixon (1985) estimated that there are 118,000 licensed child care providers, who serve 1.2 million children daily at an annual cost of $6.3 billion, but that less than 1% of state day care funds is spent on monitoring child care. The current debate on child care licensing differs little from debates in the past except for specific issues being discussed: the increasing numbers of mothers returning to the workplace during the first few months of their babies’ lives, the role of voluntary national accreditation, and the scandals over alleged sexual abuse in day care. The debate over unchanging problems in licensing continues, but these new considerations have an impact on the solutions that can be found.