As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Fort Wayne ranks the 82nd largest city in the nation.

Fort Wayne ranks 245th of 250 cities in the 2026 index — bottom 6 nationally, last in the Midwest 1 cluster — at 28/100. Allen County is a formal childcare desert: 33 licensed slots cover every 100 working-parent kids under five, against the 73-per-100 national figure. Infant tuition at the Indiana statewide average of $17,302 consumes 28.7% of a $60,293 median household income. The harder-to-read indicator sits inside the family strain dimension, which scores just 21.3 — the worst in the cluster. Mothers' labor force participation for kids under six runs 61.8%, well below the national 68.2%, against a 41.7% single-parent share. The implication is that Fort Wayne families are absorbing the supply gap by exiting the workforce rather than competing for slots that don't exist.

Key highlights & actionable takeaways

Score 28/100, Crisis, ranked 245 of 250 — bottom 6 nationally and last in the cluster.
Allen County is a formal childcare desert — 33 licensed slots per 100 working-parent kids under five; infant care consumes 28.7% of household income.
Family strain score 21.3, the worst in the cluster; 41.7% single-parent share alongside 61.8% mothers' LFP, one of the lowest in this report.

Actionable takeaways

The structural driver is exit, not engagement. Mothers' LFP at 61.8% — well below national — in a desert-level supply market reads as families absorbing the gap by leaving the workforce, not competing for slots that don't exist. That is a different policy story than Indianapolis.
Indiana's NDCP gap is a measurement story worth reporting. Fort Wayne's $17,302 figure is statewide-averaged because no Indiana county is covered. Allen County rates likely diverge from Marion County rates, and the local press is the only place that can surface that.
CCDF at 43% is Fort Wayne's one policy lever. With 245th-of-250 ranking and a desert-classified county, Indiana's relatively high subsidy reach is doing more work for low-income Allen County families than any other policy variable — worth interviewing FSSA about how that take-up holds.

Affordability — 10/100

For a Fort Wayne family with one infant in a licensed center, the annual bill runs about $17,302 — roughly the national median in dollar terms. As with Indianapolis, the figure is a state-level estimate from Child Care Aware of America's 2024 survey, projected to 2025, because the National Database of Childcare Prices does not cover Allen County or any Indiana county. It is statewide-average pricing rather than Fort Wayne-specific. Against an Allen County median household income of $60,293 — about $18,000 below the national median — that single tuition consumes 28.7% of pre-tax pay, the second-worst burden in this cluster after Rockford. The childcare-to-rent ratio is 1.50, meaning a year of infant care costs half again as much as a year of rent. Family childcare homes drop the price to about $9,983 a year. The lived implication: a Fort Wayne family pays nearly the same dollar amount for infant care as a Naperville family but earns 40 cents on the Naperville dollar.

Supply — 15/100

Allen County's licensed system covers about 33 slots per 100 children under five with working parents — well below half the 73-per-100 national figure and the same desert-level density that defines Marion County to the south. The county meets the formal "childcare desert" threshold. Establishment density at 2.41 providers per 1,000 kids under five is among the thinnest in this report. With about 10,799 estimated slots against 33,047 working-parent kids in the county, roughly two-thirds of demand cannot be matched to licensed capacity. Indiana's 45.9% statewide gap (Bipartisan Policy Center, Sept 2025) is the structural backdrop.

Workforce — 74/100

The median Fort Wayne childcare worker earns $13.92 an hour, about $28,950 annually. Against an Allen County single-adult living wage of $21.37, that wage covers 65.1% — slightly above the national 62.6%. The score reflects Fort Wayne's modest cost of living rather than strong childcare wages. Workforce conditions here are the one bright spot in an otherwise difficult picture: providers can recruit and retain at rates somewhat closer to the local cost of living than in higher-cost metros.

Family strain — 21.3/100

Mothers' labor force participation for kids under six is 61.8% in Fort Wayne — well below the national 68.2% and one of the lower rates in this cluster. Combined with a 41.7% single-parent share — 10 points above the national figure — and a desert-level supply gap, the strain picture is acute. The relatively low LFP in a city without strong supply suggests families are absorbing the gap by exiting the workforce rather than competing for unavailable slots — a pattern visible across several Crisis-tier Midwest cities and one of the structural drivers of Fort Wayne's bottom-tier ranking.

Policy support — 45.8/100

Indiana enrolls just 9% of 4-year-olds in state pre-K — among the lowest access rates nationally — with $10,023 per-child spending (well above the national norm) and 2 of 10 NIEER quality benchmarks met. CCDF reaches 43% of eligible kids, one of the higher subsidy reach rates in the country. The state has no paid family or medical leave program. Fort Wayne inherits the Indiana policy score; the high CCDF reach is the one policy lever that materially eases the burden for the lowest-income working families here, though it still misses a majority of eligible households nationally.

In-home care in Fort Wayne

In-home care in Fort Wayne typically reflects smaller-metro Indiana nanny market patterns, with full-time live-out rates well below those in metro Chicago or major coastal cities. With Allen County in childcare desert status and two-thirds of working-parent demand unmet by licensed supply, formal in-home arrangements are less common than informal caregiver and family-based care, particularly given the city's lower median income. Where in-home care does appear, it most often takes the form of a single-family nanny in a dual-professional household or a nanny share organized through neighborhood or workplace networks.

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 (Allen County for Fort Wayne). Indiana counties are not covered by the National Database of Childcare Prices, so price figures are state-average estimates from Child Care Aware of America's 2024 survey, projected to 2025. 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; Child Care Aware of America 2024 state survey (Indiana NDCP gap); 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.