More than one child care worker in 10 hasn’t returned to their jobs since the pandemic began, a shortage of nearly 100,000 workers, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This shortage in part explains a finding in a February 2022 survey that 39% of women caregivers had left the workforce or reduced their work hours since the pandemic began. More than four-fifths (83%) of women in the survey said they could not afford to stop working.