Application Barriers and the Socioeconomic Gap in Child Care Enrollment

Henning Hermes, Philipp Lergetporer, Frauke Peter and Simon Wiederhold ()

No 16915, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Why are children with lower socioeconomic status (SES) substantially less likely to be enrolled in child care? We study whether barriers in the application process work against lower-SES children — the group known to benefit strongest from child care enrollment. In an RCT in Germany with highly subsidized child care (N = 607), we offer treated families information and personal assistance for applications. We find substantial, equity-enhancing effects of the treatment, closing half of the large SES gap in child care enrollment. Increased enrollment for lower-SES families is likely driven by altered application knowledge and behavior. We discuss scalability of our intervention and derive policy implications for the design of universal child care programs.

Keywords: randomized controlled trial; information; application barriers; early childhood; child care; educational inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 I21 J13 J18 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 92 pages
Date: 2024-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur and nep-exp
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Published - published in: Journal of the European Economic Association , 2025, 23 (3), 1133 -1172

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Related works:
Journal Article: Application Barriers and the Socioeconomic Gap in Child Care Enrollment (2025)
Working Paper: Application Barriers and the Socioeconomic Gap in Child Care Enrollment (2024)
Working Paper: Application barriers and the socioeconomic gap in child care enrollment (2024)
Working Paper: Application Barriers and the Socioeconomic Gap in Child Care Enrollment (2021)
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