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We provide evidence on the distributional effects of Quebec's universal child care policy. Our analysis uncovers substantial policy relevant heterogeneity in the estimated effect of access to subsidized child care across two developmental score distributions for children from two-parent families. Whereas past research reported findings of negative effects on mothers and children from these families, igniting controversy, our estimates reveal a more nuanced image that formal child care can indeed boost developmental outcomes for children from some households: particularly disadvantaged singleparent households. We present suggestive evidence that the heterogeneity in policy effects is consistent with differences in home learning environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rising participation of women in paid work has not only heightened demand for universal early education and care programs but also led to increased use of childcare amongst children at earlier ages. Prior research investigating Quebec’s universal highly subsidized childcare documented significant declines in a variety of developmental outcomes for all children aged 0–4 years. However, past analysis has not explored whether these effects vary for children of different ages. In this article, we demonstrate substantial heterogeneity in policy impacts by child age. Children who gain access to subsidized childcare at earlier ages experience significantly larger negative impacts on developmental scores, health, and behavioral outcomes. The sole exception is the negative relationship between access to subsidized childcare and hyperactivity scores which steepens with child age. Our analysis additionally provides significant evidence of treatment effect heterogeneity within ages, and reveals benefits from access to universal childcare on developmental scores for those that are above 3 years of age. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In Canada, advocates of universal child-care often point to policies implemented in Quebec as providing a model for early education and care policies in other provinces. While these policies have proven to be highly popular among citizens, initial evaluations of access to these programs indicated they led to a multitude of undesirable child developmental, health, and family outcomes. These research findings ignited substantial controversy and criticism. In this study, we show the robustness of the initial analyses to 1) concerns over whether negative outcomes would vanish over time as suppliers gained experience providing child-care; 2)concerns regarding multiple testing; and 3) concerns that the original estimates measured the causal impact of child-care availability and not child-care attendance. A notable exception is that despite estimated effects stemming from the policy indicating declines in motor-social development scores in Quebec relative to the rest of Canada, our analyses imply that on average attending child-care in Canada leads to a significant increase in this test score. However, our analysis reveals substantial heterogeneity in program impacts that occur in response to the Quebec policies and indicates that most of the negative impacts reported in earlier research are driven by children from families who only attended child-care in response to the implementation of this policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]