The Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) subsidized child care for about 35,000 children each month in 1994. To qualify for child care subsidies, children must be from low-income families with parents who are working, going to school, homeless, or involved in some other DSHS program. DSHS establishes maximum rates it pays for child care. The rates vary with the child's age, whether the care is full or part-time, and whether the care is provided in a child care center, a licensed family home, or in the child's own home. And because child care rates vary by location, DSHS sets separate rates for its six administrative regions. Providers charge DSHS their usual and customary rates or the DSHS rate, whichever is less. Federal funding for these programs is contingent on linking DSHS child care rates to rates paid in the private child care market. Here, we report on the fourth in a series of surveys of the Washington State child care market. For this study, approximately 2,500 providers were interviewed by telephone in the Spring of 1994.
