As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Vallejo ranks the 223rd largest city in the nation.

Across the Carquinez Strait from Solano County's other urban anchor, Fairfield, sits Vallejo — the same county pricing, a different family-strain story. Single-parent households make up 40.6% of families with children, nearly twelve points above California's 29.1% and the highest in this cohort. Mothers' labor force participation runs 67.9%, but in Vallejo that figure reflects necessity rather than abundance: housing-to-income compression, a $21,966 infant-care price, and a 0.91 childcare-to-rent ratio combine to make dual incomes the only viable arrangement for many households. The workforce score of 76 — driven by the $18.24 wage clearing the state median — is the city's bright spot. The composite: 53, Moderate tier, ranked 22nd in California despite the heaviest family-structure load in the cohort.

Key highlights & actionable takeaways

Score 53/100 (Moderate); ranked 106 nationally, #22 of 54 in California — Solano County, East Bay outer ring across from Fairfield.
Infant center care $21,966 — 24.5% of $89,496 household income; childcare 0.91 times annual rent.
Single-parent share 40.6% — highest in the California cohort, twelve points above state's 29.1%; family-strain score 39.6.

Actionable takeaways

Twin Fairfield on Solano County price, contrast on family strain. Both inherit the same $21,966 infant tuition and the same $18.24 wage, but Vallejo's 40.6% single-parent share against Fairfield's lower share is the structural difference — same county, very different family-strain stories.
In-home demand skews toward backup and after-school, not full-day live-in. With nearly half of households single-parent and two-thirds of mothers working, the local nanny market sells flex coverage rather than the live-in nanny model that defines coastal Bay Area cities.
Single-parent rate is the highest in the California cohort. Twelve points above California's 29.1% — a structural difference worth a focused story on what household composition does to family-strain scores when costs and wages are held constant.

Affordability — 51/100

For a Vallejo family with one infant in a Solano County licensed center, the going rate is roughly $21,966 a year. That's 24.5% of the city's $89,496 median household income — well above the federal HHS affordability benchmark of 7%. A second child in a toddler room adds another $14,598, pushing two-child center bills past $36,000 before tax. Vallejo runs slightly cheaper than the statewide California average ($23,760 for infant center care) because Solano County sits on the East Bay's outer ring, away from San Francisco-Oakland price intensity. The childcare-to-rent ratio comes in at 0.91 — meaning a year of infant care costs almost as much as twelve months of the city's $2,013 median rent. For working families here, the implication is concrete: a typical Vallejo household pays about $4,800 more per year for a single infant slot than the national median family does.

Supply — 47/100

Solano County has roughly 39 licensed slots for every 100 children under five with working parents — enough to keep Vallejo out of the formal "childcare desert" classification, but still leaving the majority of working families to compete for under-supplied spots, lean on family, or stitch together informal care. The county supports about 110 licensed childcare establishments, or 4.24 per 1,000 kids under five, in line with the California state average of 4.23. Statewide, the Bipartisan Policy Center pegs California's gap at 35.8% — meaning more than a third of the children whose parents would use licensed care can't access a slot. Vallejo families inherit that supply pressure without the dense provider network of the inner Bay Area.

Workforce — 76/100

Vallejo's workforce score is one of the brighter spots in this report. The median childcare worker in Solano County earns $18.24 an hour — about $37,930 a year — measurably above the national median of $15.41 and slightly ahead of the California state median of $18.38. The catch: the local living wage for a single adult is $27.87 an hour, so providers are still earning only 65.4 cents on the dollar of what it costs to live here independently. That gap is what fuels the chronic staffing churn programs report across the East Bay. Better-than-national pay buys retention against Mississippi and Alabama, not against the cost of living in Solano County itself.

Family strain — 40/100

Vallejo carries the heaviest family strain in this nine-city California cohort. The single-parent share — 40.6% of households with kids under 18 — is nearly ten points above the California average (29.1%) and well above the national figure (31.8%). Mothers' labor force participation for kids under six runs at 67.9%, near the California state rate but with a very different undertone: in Vallejo the high participation reflects economic necessity more than abundant high-paying jobs. Combined with a housing-to-income squeeze that puts childcare costs nearly at parity with rent, the strain dimension here looks structural, not transitional.

Policy support — 56/100

California provides a moderate floor of state-level support: 48% of 4-year-olds and 10% of 3-year-olds are enrolled in state pre-K, with $15,192 spent per child enrolled — among the higher per-child investment levels nationally. The state's Paid Family Leave program, on the books since 2004 and expanded since, replaces 90% of wages for up to 8 weeks. Federal Child Care and Development Fund subsidies reach about 16.4% of eligible California families. Pre-K quality benchmarks remain limited, with only 4.2 of NIEER's 10 standards met. Policy is measured at the state level; Vallejo families inherit it.

In-home care in Vallejo

In-home care in Vallejo typically reflects East Bay metro nanny-market patterns, with full-time live-out rates running in the broader Bay Area band rather than at San Francisco-proper levels. With a 40.6% single-parent share and 67.9% mothers' LFP, demand here skews toward backup and after-school care more than full-day live-in arrangements. Nanny shares between two families — common across Solano and Contra Costa — let working parents access in-home flexibility at roughly half the per-family cost of a sole-charge nanny.

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.