Childcare markets
Can they deliver an equitable service?

Author/Editor(s):

Eva Lloyd, Helen Penn

Format:

Hardback, 264 pages, 234 x 156 mm

ISBN

9781847429339

Published:

20 Jun 2012

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North America customers can order this book here from the University of Chicago Press.

In this fascinating book, a group of distinguished scholars provide incisive analyses of market-based child care around the world. They convey child care for what it is--both a service to parents and a major determinant of children’s development and future life course. An informative must-read for both scholars and policymakers. Edward Zigler, Ph.D. Sterling Professor of Psychology, Emeritus Director Emeritus, The Edward Zigler Center in Child Development and Social Policy, Yale University

Lloyd and Penn have drawn together a multi-disciplinary, international, team of experts to study and reflect on childcare markets’ consequences for young children and their families. The book will be of great use to those studying the mixed economy childcare, and those interested in market-based approaches of other caring public services. Mike Brewer, University of Essex.

About This Book

The viability, quality and sustainability of publicly supported early childhood education and care services is a lively issue in many countries, especially since the rights of the child imply equal access to provision for all young children. But equitable provision within childcare markets is highly problematic, as parents pay for what they can afford and parental income inequalities persist or widen. This highly topical book presents recent, significant research from eight nations where childcare markets are the norm. It also includes research about ‘raw’ and ‘emerging’ childcare markets operating with a minimum of government intervention, mostly in low income countries or post transition economies. Childcare markets compares these childcare marketisation and regulatory processes across the political and economic systems in which they are embedded. Contributions from economists, childcare policy specialists and educationalists address the question of what constraints need to be in place if childcare markets are to deliver an equitable service.

Author Biography

Eva Lloyd, Reader in Early Childhood at the University of East London, UK, and Co-director of the International Centre for the Study of the Mixed Economy of Childcare (ICMEC), has extensive childhood policy research experience. Helen Penn is Professor of Early Childhood at the University of East London and Co-director of ICMEC. Her research focuses on the impact of childcare marketisation on children, families and services, taking a global overview.

Contents

Part I: Introduction: Childcare markets: an introduction ~ Eva Lloyd
Childcare markets: do they work? ~ Helen Penn
What future for the mature UK childcare market? ~ Philip Blackburn
Part II: Explorations in childcare markets: Local providers and loyal parents: competition and consumer choice in the Dutch childcare market ~ Janneke Plantenga
Tinkering with early childhood education and care: the case of early education vouchers in Hong Kong ~ Gail Yuen
Markets and childcare provision in New Zealand: towards a fairer alternative ~ Linda Mitchell
Publicly available and supported early education and care for all: the case of Norway ~ Kari Jacobsen and Gerd Vollset
Childcare markets in the US: supply and demand, quality and cost, and public policy ~ Laura Sosinsky
Workforce shortages in the Canadian ECEC sector: how big, how costly and how solvable? ~ Robert Fairholm and Jerome Davis
Raw and emerging childcare markets ~ Helen Penn
Part III: Ethics and principles: Need markets be the only show in town? ~ Peter Moss
ABC Learning and Australian early childhood education and care: a retrospective audit of a radical experiment ~ Jennifer Sumsion
Childcare markets and government intervention ~ Gillian Paull.

ReviewsOwn it? Review it!

Childcare markets
Childcare markets explores different models of early childhood education & care (ECEC) provision across 8 different countries. The book notes that the increasing marketisation of UK childcare provision has occurred with very little public discussion or scrutiny about the merits of such a move and it reflects the editors and contributors concerns that we are approaching a juncture regarding the availability, quality and sustainability of ECEC within modern welfare states. This is particularly true of the current situation in the UK where think tanks such as IPPR, Resolution Foundation and the Social Market Foundation are all advocating different models of childcare to increase maternal employment as a way of stimulating the economy. These reports often focus on the economic benefits of such models and this book is a vital contribution to this debate as it is committed to exploring the consequences of childcare markets for young children and their families in terms of equity (my emphasis). The book includes case contributions from childcare and education backgrounds alongside those from economists and is useful to have the two approaches counterposed in this way. Reading about the care and education of pre-school children in terms of corporate penetration;investment returns; and market consolidation highlights that childcare has become big business with more emphasis on financial and economic outcomes (for providers) than on emotional and social ones for children and their families. A strong chapter from Peter Moss asks 'need markets be the only show in town?' particularly relevant at a time when local authorities are viewed as a provider 'of last resort' under the 2006 Childcare Act ,,In summary, an excellent, well researched and thought provoking book which will hopefully highlight alternative ways of delivering ECEC to practitioners and policy makers in the UK and beyond.,
Reviewed by Stephen Crossley

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