As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Concord ranks the 247th largest city in the nation.
Cabarrus County has 38 licensed childcare establishments. That number anchors Concord's profile: 2.68 providers per 1,000 children under five, about half the High Point figure and well below the national 4.21. Charlotte's exurban spillover has pushed Concord's median household income to $84,752 — the highest in the North Carolina cluster — and pulled infant tuition with it, to $15,470 a year, also the highest in the state's nine scored cities. Childcare workers earn $13.87 an hour, 57.3% of a single-adult living wage, while Bank of America back-office sites in the same county pay $19. The Supply dimension score of 13.2 is among the worst in the entire 250-city index. Concord ranks 211th nationally.
Key highlights & actionable takeaways
- Score 39 (Strained), ranked 211 of 250; Supply dimension 13.2/100 — among the lowest of any city in the index.
- Cabarrus County has 2.68 licensed providers per 1,000 kids under 5 — about half the High Point figure, well below the 4.21 national norm.
- Infant care $15,470/year — highest in NC's nine cities; workers earn $13.87/hour against $19 Bank of America back-office wages in the same county.
Actionable takeaways
- 2.68 establishments per 1,000 kids is the lowest provider density in the entire 250-city dataset. Charlotte's commuter spillover added population and pricing without adding centers — Cabarrus has roughly half the provider density of neighboring Mecklenburg.
- Charlotte-pegged tuition without a Charlotte center base. Concord families pay $15,470/year — the highest infant tuition of any NC city in the index — for the thinnest provider choice. The exurb model has imported the price but not the supply.
- Watch for Bank of America back-office expansion. Every new $19/hour processing seat in Cabarrus pulls one more childcare worker out of a $13.87 classroom; the wage gap is already the limiting factor for new center openings.
Affordability — 69/100
On the surface, Concord looks like one of North Carolina's more affordable childcare markets: infant center care at $15,470 a year claims 18.3% of the $84,752 median household income, below both the state (18.6%) and national (21.9%) burden ratios. The catch is the absolute price — at $1,289 a month, a Concord infant slot costs almost $2,500 more per year than the same care in High Point or Greensboro. The Charlotte spillover is doing the work here: Cabarrus County has absorbed Charlotte commuters and Charlotte-pegged pricing while remaining technically outside Mecklenburg. Childcare costs run 94% of median rent, and a typical Concord family with one child in infant care spends roughly $3,200 more per year than a family using the state-average slot.
Supply — 13/100
This is where Concord struggles. Cabarrus County reports 4,529 licensed slots against 16,977 kids under five with working parents — about 27 per 100, putting the county solidly in childcare-desert territory. Worse, only 38 licensed establishments serve those kids, or 2.68 providers per 1,000 children under five, one of the thinnest densities in the index. North Carolina's statewide gap between need and capacity sits near 56%; Concord is on the wrong side of that average. The Supply dimension score of 13.2 reflects what families experience: long waitlists and few options when one program closes its infant room.
Workforce — 20/100
Despite Charlotte-adjacent prices, Concord's childcare wages don't follow. The median childcare worker in the Charlotte metro labor market earns $13.87 an hour, about $28,840 a year, against a Cabarrus County single-adult living wage of $24.19 — only 57.3% of what's needed to cover one adult's basic costs. With 4,010 workers in the broader metro industry, the math defines the staffing crisis: Charlotte-area centers compete against Charlotte-area retail and warehouse jobs that pay $17 to $19 an hour without the licensure burden, and the Workforce Health score of 20.1 captures the resulting churn.
Family strain — 58.2/100
Mothers' labor force participation for kids under six is 68.6% in Concord — close to the national average and a touch above the state's 67.5%. Single-parent households make up 31.9% of families with children, just below the national norm. The strain reading here is less about extreme parental burden than about a two-earner economy where both incomes go to keeping the house and the daycare slot — typical of fast-growing exurbs that absorbed Charlotte demand without building the family-services backbone to match.
Policy support — 23.8/100
Concord families inherit the same North Carolina policy environment as every other city in the state: NC Pre-K reaches 22% of four-year-olds at $7,117 per child, meeting 9 of 10 NIEER quality benchmarks. No three-year-olds are served by state pre-K. There is no state paid family leave program. CCDF subsidies reach 13.4% of eligible children, and Head Start statewide enrolls about 18,677 children. Policy is measured at the state level; the local picture is the state picture.
In-home care in Concord
In-home care in Concord reflects Charlotte-metro nanny market patterns, with full-time live-out rates aligned with the broader Mecklenburg-Cabarrus market. Given the supply scarcity — only 38 licensed centers in the county — nanny shares between two families have become a particularly logical bridge, halving the per-family cost and bypassing the multi-month center waitlist. The Charlotte au pair host community is established enough that suburban Cabarrus families occasionally tap into it, though the program changes since 2025 have raised the all-in cost calculus for new placements.
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).