Communities have long invested in roads, utilities, broadband, and workforce development. It’s time to recognize childcare as essential economic infrastructure.
A qualified candidate turns down a job offer. Not because of salary. Not because of benefits. Not because of the commute. They simply can’t find childcare that matches the hours they’d be expected to work.
For the employer, it’s another vacant position. For the community, it’s lost economic potential.
That scenario is playing out in communities across the country, and it points to something economic developers haven’t traditionally considered part of their work: childcare.
For decades, economic developers have focused on the traditional building blocks of growth: attracting employers, preparing sites, investing in infrastructure, expanding housing, and strengthening talent pipelines. Those investments remain essential. But today, as workforce availability becomes one of the defining constraints on economic growth, communities across the country are confronting another challenge that directly influences their ability to compete: childcare.
For too long, childcare has been viewed primarily as a family issue or a social service. While it is certainly both, it is also something more fundamental: economic infrastructure.
Just as roads connect workers to jobs and broadband connects businesses to markets, childcare connects parents to the workforce.
Without reliable childcare, parents cannot fully participate in the labor force, employers struggle to fill critical positions, and communities leave economic potential on the table.
That’s why childcare shouldn’t be treated as separate from economic development. It’s one of its essential foundations.
At TPMA, we’ve partnered with communities across the country on workforce and economic development challenges. Three recent childcare studies illustrate this relationship particularly well. Hamilton County, Hancock County, and the Northwest Indiana Forum couldn’t be more different in size, geography, or economic profile. Yet they all reached the same conclusion: childcare is essential to workforce participation, business productivity, and long-term economic competitiveness.
The Workforce Challenge Hiding in Plain Sight
Across the country, employers consistently identify workforce availability as one of their greatest challenges. Yet one of the largest barriers preventing people from working often receives far less attention: parents can’t participate in the workforce if they can’t access reliable, affordable childcare.
In every childcare study TPMA conducted, families described the same challenges: rising costs, limited availability, long waitlists, and schedules that don’t match today’s work hours. These barriers force parents into difficult decisions: reducing their hours, declining promotions, postponing a return to work, or leaving the workforce altogether.
Most workforce strategies focus on attracting new workers. Childcare does something different. It activates workers who are already part of the community. That’s a fundamentally different strategy than trying to recruit more people from somewhere else.
One of the strongest findings came from Hancock County. To better understand that opportunity, TPMA introduced the concept of the work-willing parent. These are people who are ready and able to work full-time but can’t because childcare is either unavailable or unaffordable.
The analysis estimated that 521 work-willing parents could return to the workforce if childcare barriers were addressed, generating between $21 million and $28 million in additional annual earnings while increasing the county’s Gross Regional Product by as much as $63 million.
Those aren’t just childcare outcomes. They’re economic development outcomes. They also represent one of the highest-return workforce investments a community can make because the talent is already there.
Every community is searching for ways to strengthen its workforce. Unlike many workforce initiatives that take years to produce results, expanding access to childcare can immediately increase labor force participation by enabling people who already want to work.
Employers Are Already Feeling the Impact
Hamilton County, one of the nation’s most affluent counties, found that employers reported childcare challenges at nearly every stage of the employment lifecycle. Employees miss work, reduce their hours, leave jobs, and candidates decline employment opportunities because dependable childcare isn’t available.
The same story emerged in the Northwest Indiana Forum, a diverse seven-county regional economy within the greater Chicago metropolitan area and one of North America’s leading industrial and logistics corridors. Employers identified childcare as a growing barrier to recruitment, retention, workforce stability, and long-term economic competitiveness.
For economic developers, these aren’t isolated workforce challenges. They’re economic competitiveness challenges. Companies evaluating locations increasingly want confidence they can recruit and retain the workforce they need. In today’s economy, childcare has become a competitive advantage.
Why Childcare Creates Competitive Advantage
Families want confidence they can build careers without sacrificing their financial future. Employers want confidence they can recruit and retain the workforce they need. Communities want confidence they can compete for talent, business investment, and long-term growth.
Reliable childcare means more people can work. Employers have a larger talent pool. Businesses grow. Household incomes rise. Communities collect more tax revenue and can reinvest in future growth. Childcare makes that cycle possible.
Communities have always invested in infrastructure that enables economic growth. Childcare belongs on that list.
A New Economic Development Imperative
Communities that invest in childcare aren’t just supporting families.
They’re investing in workforce participation.
They’re investing in employer competitiveness.
They’re investing in stronger regional economies.
They’re investing in long-term prosperity.
When parents can work, businesses can grow.
When businesses grow, communities prosper.
That’s economic development.
If your community is struggling with workforce shortages, childcare may be part of the solution. TPMA helps communities quantify childcare needs, measure economic impacts, and develop practical strategies that strengthen both families and local economies.
About the Author
Zachary Rice is a Principal at TPMA, where he helps communities across the country develop data-driven strategies that strengthen workforce competitiveness, economic development, and long-term prosperity. He has led childcare and workforce studies for communities including Hamilton County, Hancock County, and the Northwest Indiana Forum, helping local leaders quantify childcare needs, measure economic impacts, and develop practical strategies that strengthen both families and local economies.