As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Modesto ranks the 107th largest city in the nation.

Modesto is the rare California city where the wage math actually works for childcare workers. Stanislaus County provider pay reaches 75.6% of the local single-adult living wage — the closest parity in this report and one of the better readings in the country — produced not by generous wages but by a Central Valley cost of living the coast cannot match. The result is the report's highest workforce dimension score, lower turnover, and infant-room continuity that holds longer. Center-based infant care runs $17,404 a year, well below California's $23,760 average, eating 22.3% of the city's $77,899 median household income. The bottleneck is supply: 2.24 establishments per 1,000 children under five, half California's average, leaving outer Modesto and the surrounding county under-served.

Key highlights & actionable takeaways

Ranked 117 of 250, score 51 (Moderate); mid-pack for California, lifted by a 99.6/100 workforce reading — the report's highest.
Provider wages reach 75.6% of local living wage — the report's closest parity, produced by Central Valley costs the coast cannot match.
2.24 licensed establishments per 1,000 kids — half the California average; supply, not affordability, holds the score back.

Actionable takeaways

Lead with the workforce-parity outlier. Modesto's 75.6% provider-wage-to-living-wage ratio is the report's closest parity — produced not by generous wages but by a Central Valley cost of living the coast cannot match; lower turnover and longer infant-room continuity are the visible results.
Compare to Fresno, Stockton, and Bakersfield. All four Central Valley cities share the cohort's price-vs-income mismatch, but Modesto's $17,404 infant tuition is the lowest among them and the 99.6/100 Workforce subscore is the cohort's outlier — the structural takeaway is that lower local costs, not pay raises, do the work.
Watch supply density in outer Modesto. At 2.24 establishments per 1,000 kids — half the California average — the Central Valley's spread-out geography concentrates centers in the city core, leaving outer Modesto and surrounding Stanislaus County under-served.

Affordability — 56/100

Center-based infant care in Stanislaus County costs $17,404 a year, projected to 2025. That's substantially below California's $23,760 average and only slightly above the national $17,163. On Modesto's median household income of $77,899, infant care consumes 22.3% of pre-tax earnings — close to the national 21.9% and seven points under California's 24.7%. The childcare-to-rent ratio is 0.90.

For a Central Valley family, the math is more workable than it is in coastal California. A two-child family using center care for infant and toddler ($17,404 + $12,605 = $30,009) would pay 39% of median income — still heavy, but well shy of the half-of-income loads that San Bernardino and similar cities face. Family child care pricing ($13,028 for an infant) compresses the gap further. Modesto is one of the few California cities where local prices and local incomes haven't decoupled to the point of dysfunction.

Supply — 24/100

Stanislaus County licenses roughly 18,360 slots against 47,120 children under 5 with working parents — the standard 39 slots per 100 kids that the state pro-rata estimate produces. The thinner story is local: 2.24 licensed establishments per 1,000 children under 5, well below California's 4.23 and the 4.21 national average. The Central Valley's spread-out geography concentrates centers in the city core, leaving outer Modesto and the surrounding county under-served. Supply, not affordability, is what keeps Modesto's score in the middle rather than the upper tier.

Workforce — 100/100

Stanislaus County childcare workers earn a median $19.04 an hour, or $39,610 a year — slightly higher than California's $18.38 average. The EPI living wage for a single adult in the Central Valley is $25.20 — meaningfully lower than the coast — and that arithmetic produces the headline: provider pay equals 75.6% of local living wage, the closest parity in this report and one of the better in the dataset. The local effect is the kind of wage-to-cost relationship the rest of California's center workforce doesn't have. Modesto programs report less of the chronic turnover that defines staffing in Orange County and the Bay Area, and infant-room continuity holds longer.

Family strain — 36/100

Mothers' labor force participation for kids under 6 sits at 62.5% in Modesto, below California's 65.6% and the national 68.2%. The single-parent share is 35.2%, six points above California's 29.1%. The combination — depressed mothers' LFP plus elevated single-parent share — points to a city where childcare access shapes parents' work decisions more than in higher-income California. The high workforce score doesn't fully offset the household-level pressure that Modesto's lower median income creates.

Policy support — 56/100

California's policy framework supports Modesto families through the same statewide programs every California city draws on: pre-K serving 48% of 4-year-olds at $15,192 per child, CCDF subsidy reach of 16.4% of eligible kids, and 8 weeks of paid family leave at 90% wage replacement (effective 2004). California meets 4.2 of NIEER's 10 quality benchmarks. Policy is measured at the state level.

In-home care in Modesto

In-home care in Modesto runs at Central Valley rates, well below the coastal California bands. Full-time live-out nanny pricing reflects the local labor market and is more accessible to Modesto's middle-income households than equivalent care in the Bay Area or Orange County. Family child care providers — many running out of their own homes — are the dominant in-home model here, with paid nanny placements concentrated in the higher-income end of the city's income distribution.

Methodology: The the score is a 0-100 composite score across five dimensions: Affordability (30 pts), Supply (25 pts), Workforce Health (15 pts), Family Strain (15 pts), and Policy Support (15 pts). City-level prices and supply use the city's primary containing county. Policy Support is measured at the state level. Full methodology and data sources: beverly.io/research/methodology.

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2019-2023 5-year estimates; U.S. Department of Labor Women's Bureau National Database of Childcare Prices; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics OEWS (May 2024) and QCEW; Buffett Early Childhood Institute / Bipartisan Policy Center / Child Care Aware childcaregap.org (Sept 2025); NIEER State of Preschool Yearbook 2024; HHS ACF CCDF FY2023; National Partnership for Women & Families (March 2026).

Methodology. The State of Childcare Index is a 0-100 composite score across five dimensions: Affordability (30 pts), Supply (25 pts), Workforce Health (15 pts), Family Strain (15 pts), and Policy Support (15 pts). Each dimension draws on publicly available federal data: U.S. Census ACS (5-year), DOL Women's Bureau NDCP, BLS OEWS and QCEW, the Buffett/BPC/CCAoA childcaregap.org dataset, NIEER State of Preschool, and HHS ACF CCDF reports. City-level prices and supply use the city's primary containing county. Policy Support is measured at the state level. Full methodology and data sources: /research/methodology.