As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary this year, Austin ranks the 11th largest city in the nation.
Most cities ranked in the country's top ten cluster in policy-rich Northeast states, with paid family leave on the books and per-pupil pre-K spending in five figures. Austin sits sixth of 250 nationally on Beverly's index — the same neighborhood as Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Bellevue, Washington — without any of those policy supports. Texas inherits zero weeks of paid family leave and pre-K spending of $4,682 per child. The arithmetic is private: a $91,461 median household income, the highest in the Texas cluster, carries the cluster's heaviest absolute infant tuition ($14,626 a year) and still posts a 16% burden — well below Houston, Dallas, and the national figure. Travis County's establishment density runs above the state average. Austin clients drive Beverly's Texas business; the index reflects what their dollars buy.
Key highlights & actionable takeaways
- Score 69 (Strong), ranked 6 of 250; 4th of 31 in Texas — top-10 nationally despite the state's zero-weeks-of-paid-leave policy floor.
- Austin's $91,461 median income carries the cluster's heaviest infant tuition ($14,626/year), and still posts the lowest cost burden of any large Texas city at 16%.
- Travis County density 4.42 establishments per 1,000 kids under 5 — above Texas (3.17) and US (4.21) rates; mothers' LFP 69.1%, above the national 68.2%.
Actionable takeaways
- Austin's #6 ranking is a pure income story. The state delivers zero weeks of paid family leave, $4,682 per pre-K child, and 2 of 10 NIEER quality benchmarks — Austin clears the top 10 nationally on $91,461 median household income alone, the same neighborhood as Cambridge MA and Bellevue WA, with none of the policy.
- Travis County density is the supply lever to watch. 4.42 establishments per 1,000 kids beats both the Texas (3.17) and national (4.21) rates; if growth in Bee Cave, Lakeway, and Round Rock outpaces new center openings, the cushion erodes fast.
- Workforce wages will set the ceiling. $14.34/hour against a $23.71 living wage means Austin's center economics depend on tuition that only its top quartile of households can absorb without strain — any retail-floor wage hike compresses classroom staffing within months.
Affordability — 88/100
A year of full-time infant center care in Travis County runs $14,626 — the highest absolute infant tuition of any Texas city in the index. But Austin's $91,461 median household income is also the highest, and the result is an infant cost-burden of 16.0% — well below Houston (20.2%), Dallas (19.3%), and the 21.9% national figure. Toddler care is $11,771; preschool, $12,462. Family child care homes are slightly cheaper at $12,824 for infants.
Travis County prices run about 23% above the Texas state average for infant center care — the steepest metro premium among large Texas cities, reflecting the cost of running a center where median rents are $1,655/month and qualified teachers can command competitive wages from Austin's broader service economy. Childcare-to-rent runs 0.74 — below 1.0, meaning rent is still the larger budget line, though only because Austin rents are themselves elevated.
A typical Austin family with one infant in center care pays about $2,700 more per year than a Texas family at the state median for the same age band — the trade for higher absolute incomes that make the burden more manageable.
Supply — 76/100
Travis County has roughly 50,000 licensed slots and 90,000 children under 5 with working parents — and 327 licensed establishments. The county's 4.42 establishments per 1,000 children under 5 is well above the Texas state rate (3.17) and slightly above the national rate (4.21). For a city with the Texas state-level supply score of 17.6/100 hovering in the background, Austin's local infrastructure is conspicuously stronger than the state composite suggests.
The strength reflects two decades of population growth that pulled both demand and provider capacity north and south of the Colorado River — and a concentration of dual-income tech and university households whose ability to pay center prices kept the supply side investing.
Workforce — 45/100
The median Travis County childcare worker earns $14.34/hour — about $29,830 a year — or 60.5% of the local living wage of $23.71/hour. Better than Dallas's 59.3% but still well below the threshold where an early educator can independently afford the city she works in. Austin's tech-driven cost-of-living means the wage gap bites harder here than the dollar figure alone suggests; the same $14.34 buys substantially less in Austin than in Lubbock or El Paso.
Turnover at Travis County centers tracks the metro's broader retail and hospitality wage floor — when nearby employers raise to $17-18/hour, classrooms feel it within months.
Family strain — 66/100
Austin's Family Strain score of 66.1/100 is the strongest in the Texas cluster by a wide margin and a primary driver of the city's national #6 finish. Mothers' labor force participation among kids under 6 sits at 69.1% — above both the 62.8% Texas state figure and the 68.2% national rate. Single-parent households make up just 26.9% of families with kids — five points below the national average and dramatically below Houston (41.5%) and Dallas (39.8%).
The pattern reflects Austin's professional-household concentration — dual-earner tech and university families who can afford to keep both parents in the workforce — and a markedly different demographic profile than the state's other large metros.
Policy support — 48/100
Inherited from Texas. The state enrolls 52% of 4-year-olds in public pre-K and 11% of 3-year-olds at $4,682 per child, meets 2 of NIEER's 10 quality benchmarks, reaches 16.4% of eligible children with CCDF subsidies, and offers zero weeks of paid family leave. Austin Independent School District operates one of the larger city pre-K programs in the state, but state-level inputs cap the policy score regardless of local effort.
In-home care in Austin
Austin's in-home care market has expanded sharply with the metro's growth, particularly across the western and southwestern arc — Westlake, Tarrytown, Barton Hills, Travis Heights, and the newer affluent pockets in Bee Cave and Lakeway. Full-time live-out nanny rates in the city typically run in the $25-35/hour band, with senior nannies, multiples specialists, and household-manager hybrids often pricing at the upper end. Tech executive households increasingly seek nannies who can travel for hybrid work arrangements.
Nanny shares are particularly common in central neighborhoods like Hyde Park, Bouldin Creek, and Mueller, where dense networks of professional families coordinate care between two households at $18-25/hour per family. Au pair placements through the State Department's J-1 program have grown rapidly among Austin tech families relocating from international postings, and among multi-kid households where the all-in cost competes favorably with two full-time center spots.
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).