Publications

Building Blocks and Bottom Lines: The Financial Realities of Operating a Child Care Business in North Carolina

August 2025

Child care providers across North Carolina are facing growing financial instability as they navigate the end of federal relief funding and increasing operational costs. This report explores how private child care programs, including center-based, family child care homes, and faith-based providers are working to sustain their programs amid rising tuition pressures, workforce shortages, and inadequate public funding.

2025 Child Health Report Card

April 2025

The North Carolina Child Health Report Card, published biannually by the North Carolina Institute of Medicine and NC Child, tracks key indicators of child health and well-being in four areas:
Healthy Births
Access to Care
Secure Homes & Neighborhoods, and
Health Risk Factors

The report provides data on such health concerns and risk factors as teen births, infant mortality, poverty, and child deaths.

Teeth Talk: Lessons from a Listening Tour on Child Oral Health Outcomes and Access in North Carolina

January 2025

By speaking to parents, dental care professionals, public health officials, school district personnel, and community members we heard firsthand from those with lived experience providing care or trying to find it for their families.

Empowering Work: How Increasing Employment Among Parents of Young Children Can Grow North Carolina’s Economy

October 2024

A new report from N.C. Commerce and NC Child assesses the number of prime-age adults who could potentially participate in our labor market, the impact these new entrants would have on our state economy, and how child care solutions could enable this growth.

Untapped Potential in NC: How Child Care Impacts North Carolina’s Workforce Productivity and the State’s Economy

August 2024

The U.S. Chamber Foundation, in partnership with the NC Chamber Foundation and NC Child, commissioned a survey of 517 North Carolina parents with children under the age of six. Survey results were then used to model an estimate of the direct financial impact of insufficient child care coverage on North Carolina’s economy.

Investing in NC’s Children: Implement a Statewide Child Care Subsidy Floor

June 2024

North Carolina's child care landscape is struggling. Without taking the proper steps to ensure this critical industry is sustainable and set up for ling-term success, North Carolina's children, families, and economy will feel the impact of failure.

Investing in NC’s Children: Protecting the Child Care Workforce

June 2024

Child care access and affordability are a struggle for working families across North Carolina. Without an adequate workforce to provide care, children, families, and our local businesses will suffer the consequences.

2024 Legislative Agenda

April 2024

NC Child's 2024 Legislative Agenda is leading with policy priorities that build family economic security and safeguard youth mental health.

Prevent youth suicide & address the children’s mental health crisis

April 2024

Our children are facing a mental health crisis. Youth suicides and the number of anxiety or depression diagnoses have both risen sharply over the past several years.