As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Aurora ranks the 145th largest city in the nation.
Aurora's median household earns $90,109 a year — above the Illinois median, above the national one — and still lands in the Strained tier at 41/100, ranked 208 of 250. The reason is geographic: Kane County families pay the same $21,613 infant tuition that DuPage and Cook charge, but the city's income base, between Chicago's professional core and Naperville's dual-tech-finance affluence, sits well below either. Two in three kids under six live in households where every available parent works. Licensed supply covers 42 seats per 100 of those kids, the same shortfall that defines the metro. Aurora is what the western Chicago corridor looks like when high cost meets ordinary income.
Key highlights & actionable takeaways
- Score 41/100, Strained, ranked 208 of 250 — 5th of 6 Illinois cities, below the state's own 42 despite a $90,109 median household income.
- Infant center care runs $21,613 a year — 24.0% of household income; Kane County offers 42 licensed seats per 100 working-parent kids under five.
- Family strain score 46.4, second-lowest in the cluster; 67.2% of kids under six live in households where all available parents work.
Actionable takeaways
- Compare Aurora to Naperville at the Kane-DuPage line. Identical $21,613 county-level infant tuition, but Naperville's $150,937 median household earns roughly $61,000 more than Aurora's. The provider rates are uniform; the income geography isn't.
- The structural driver is provider density, not policy. Aurora's 2.74 establishments per 1,000 kids under five is the second-thinnest among Illinois cities in this report, after Rockford — a deficit Springfield can't fix with a CCDF-rate change alone.
- Watch family-childcare-home counts in Kane County. Family homes drop the price by about $8,200 a year per infant; the question is whether Illinois licensing can grow that supply line where centers haven't.
Affordability — 31/100
A typical Aurora family with one infant in a licensed center pays about $21,613 a year — the standard DuPage/Kane County price that applies across the western Chicago suburbs. Against an Aurora median household income of $90,109, that bill consumes 24.0% of pre-tax pay. The state-published childcare-to-rent ratio is 1.17, meaning infant care costs about 17% more than a year of rent here. Family childcare homes drop the price to roughly $13,385 for infants — a meaningful cushion for households that can find a slot. Aurora sits about 9 points above the Illinois state affordability score, but well below Naperville next door, where the same provider rates apply but the income base is roughly two-thirds higher. The lived implication: an Aurora family pays about $4,400 more per year for infant care than the national median family.
Supply — 35/100
Kane County's licensed capacity comes to about 42 slots per 100 kids under five with working parents — identical to the Cook County figure and well below the 73-per-100 national benchmark. Establishment density in Aurora itself is sparse at 2.74 licensed providers per 1,000 kids under five — the lowest among Illinois cities in this cluster except Rockford. With 38,997 working-parent kids under five and roughly 16,393 estimated slots in the county service area, more than half of demand cannot be matched to supply. The state's overall gap of 37% (Bipartisan Policy Center, Sept 2025) is amplified in Aurora, where provider density compounds the regional capacity shortfall.
Workforce — 62/100
The median childcare worker in Aurora earns $16.40 an hour, about $34,110 annually — roughly $2,000 above the national median. Against the local single-adult living wage of $25.80, that wage covers about 64%. The per-hour figure pools across the broader metro, so workers in Aurora face the same dynamic as workers in Chicago or Naperville: pay slightly above the national childcare median, but not enough to cover one adult's full living costs in a metro where housing has continued to climb.
Family strain — 46.4/100
Mothers' labor force participation for kids under six is 66.5% in Aurora — slightly below the national 68.2% and well below Illinois's 71.5%. The harder-to-read figure is that 67.2% of children under six live in households where all available parents are in the workforce, signaling that families are stretching across two earners but not necessarily seeing more workforce availability among mothers specifically. Combined with a single-parent share of 33.7%, the strain score reflects a working-class and middle-class population that needs childcare across nearly every household, in a county where the slot supply has not kept up.
Policy support — 44.6/100
Illinois enrolls 35% of 4-year-olds in state pre-K, with $6,171 per-child spending and 8 of 10 NIEER quality benchmarks met — below the national 45% access rate. The state offers no paid family or medical leave, and CCDF reaches 20.1% of eligible kids. Aurora inherits the Illinois state score, and the practical reach of CCDF in Kane County tracks the statewide pattern.
In-home care in Aurora
In-home care in Aurora typically reflects metro-wide Chicago nanny market patterns, with full-time live-out rates in line with the broader Illinois market. With a 24%-of-income center burden and slot supply meeting fewer than half of working-parent demand, families increasingly turn to nanny shares — pairing two households with one caregiver — to bring per-family hourly costs into rough parity with center tuition while preserving a 1:2 ratio. Au pair placements through State Department-designated J-1 sponsors are also a recognized option in dual-income suburban households here.
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 (Kane County for Aurora). 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).