The child care industry in the United States is facing a crisis on two fronts. In the short term, the coronavirus pandemic and the recession it caused leaves child care providers struggling to stay afloat and families embattled in work-life conflicts with no clear end in sight. Yet structural problems with the nation’s child care industry existed long before the novel coronavirus came to our shores.

The coronavirus recession is shining a light on ongoing challenges within the child care industry and the patchwork of public policies designed to help families access care. Child care has long been too expensive, hard to access, and low quality.

Advocates, experts, and even presidential candidates across the political spectrum have proposed long-term reforms to U.S. child care policy. Frequent components of these reforms—including increased subsidies to families, training and support for the workforce, and investments in communities’ supply of child care centers and providers—are likely to make meaningful differences in families’ experiences with the child care system.

Even the most comprehensive plans, however, would benefit from additional academic research.

There is a rich body of literature on child care in the United States, but several policy-relevant research gaps persist that could have implications for proposed reforms to the child care system. To begin filling these gaps, this past September, the Washington Center for Equitable Growth convened a roundtable of researchers who study child care and related topics. The purpose of this roundtable was to discuss where such holes in the literature might exist and promising strategies for future studies.

This column summarizes these conversations and points toward potential opportunities for scholars interested in engaging in policy-relevant child care research. Equitable Growth is committed to supporting this research.

Read the full article about child care reform by Sam Abbott at Equitable Growth.