Child care keeps getting more expensive, with fees rising faster than family income and inflation in many states, even as the nation struggled to emerge from one of the worst recessions in decades, a new report found.

The report is packed with examples of the broken economics of child care. For example, average child care center fees for infants were more than what a family paid, on average, for food last year in every region of the country, according to the report “Parents and the High Cost of Child Care.” (Click here for the full report). Families with kids also aren’t imagining it, over the last decade child care costs rose twice as fast as their median income, the report said.

And the average annual cost of center-based child care for an infant was higher than the average annual tuition and expenses at a four-year college in 40 states, the report found. These costs jumped in an industry where workers’ wages can be depressingly near working poverty levels. 

Overall, the cost of child care for an infant ranged from $4,550 a year to $18,750 a year. Sadly, Washington State ranked among the least-affordable states for center-based child care for a four-year-old. Those states are: Massachusetts, New York, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Colorado, Maine, Pennsylvania, Montana, Rhode Island and Vermont.

The annual snapshot of child care costs also has ideas on making good quality care more affordable, including:

• Lowering barriers to aid for child care costs.
• Helping expand the capacity of the child care system to meet the needs of more families.
• Working to help publicly funded prekindergarten and Head Start programs provide all-day child care during the entire year.

Check it out.