Updates on New Hampshire’s Child Care Crisis

You put up a job posting. You find a strong candidate. The offer is fair. They come back to you a week later and turn it down. Child care fell through. You’ve heard this story before, maybe more than once. About 17,300 Granite Staters each month in 2024 were not working because of child care gaps.¹ The New Hampshire Legislature is in the middle of a contested session right now, and child care is at the center of it.

Why the Shortage Is as Bad as It Looks

Between 2019 and 2023, New Hampshire had roughly 53,700 children under six whose parents were in the workforce and who needed care. However, capacity in licensed facilities sat at about 44,600 slots. That’s a gap of approximately 9,100 slots before you factor in facilities unable to reach capacity due to understaffing or other intrinsic issues, or providers suppressing enrollment to maintain quality.²

The providers themselves are caught in a structural bind. Center-based infant care averaged $17,250 per year in 2023 in cost to families. The workers delivering that care earned a median hourly wage of $15.62, less than a retail salesperson and roughly half what a kindergarten teacher earns.³ Turnover runs at 17 percent annually, against an 11 percent average for all occupations in the state.⁴ Families pay too much. Workers earn too little. Providers can’t fill seats. The whole system operates at about 86 percent of licensed capacity because there aren’t enough teachers to run full classrooms.

Legislature in 2026

Three bills moved through the State House and Senate this month, each targeting a different piece of the problem. Here’s where each one stands as of mid-March 2026.

House Bill 1433: A Tax Credit for Employers Who Add Child Care Seats

The House passed HB 1433 in late February on a consent calendar — meaning it was considered noncontroversial enough to pass without individual debate.⁵  The bill creates a tax credit equal to 50 percent of qualifying expenditures against either the business profits tax or the business enterprise tax. The credit is available for the first two years after a business adds 12 or more new child care seats. The state caps total annual credits at $5 million, awarded on a first-come, first-served basis.

It now heads to the Senate. Given the Senate’s reluctance to advance spending bills this session due to fiscal concerns, the timing is uncertain.

Senate Bill 483: $15 Million for the Child Care Workforce Grant Program

The Senate unanimously passed SB 483 and then immediately voted to table it – a procedural move that keeps the bill alive but off the floor until the Senate decides to revisit it or the session ends.⁶

The bill would have funded the state’s child care workforce grant program with $15 million in general funds. The program, which began in 2023, provided retention and recruitment grants directly to providers. It was originally funded with federal TANF surplus dollars, but the federal government denied that use in October 2025. The Senate tabled SB 483 because of broader concerns about the state’s fiscal year outlook.

Senate Bill 645: Expanding Child Care Scholarship Eligibility

The Senate passed SB 645, which increases the income eligibility threshold for the Child Care Scholarship Program from 85 percent of the state median income to 95 percent.⁷ The bill would be funded by redirecting two percent each of tobacco and liquor tax revenues to the Department of Health and Human Services. It now moves to the Senate Finance Committee for a second hearing.

What You Can Do Right Now

If you’re growing a team in New Hampshire, child care access is a retention and recruitment variable that has direct relevance. There are three things worth doing before these bills resolve.

First, pay attention to HB 1433’s Senate path. If you’re in a position to add child care capacity, the 50 percent credit against your BPT or BET liability is meaningful. But you’ll need to act before the $5 million annual cap is absorbed by larger employers who move faster.

Second, ask your employees. If child care is a reason people are reducing hours or considering leaving, look at ways you can work with your employees to help support their schedules.

Third, understand your current employment agreements and consider updating them with childcare in mind. Flexible scheduling, remote work provisions, and leave policies all intersect with child care. If your contracts and handbook were last updated a few years ago, they may not reflect the way your team actually works today, or the way you want to come across to prospective hires.

Footnotes

1. U.S. Census Bureau, Household Pulse Survey, Phase 4.0 Cycle 01 through Phase 4.2 Cycle 09 (2024) (reporting monthly average of approximately 17,300 New Hampshire residents not working due to child care responsibilities for children not in school or daycare). https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2024/demo/hhp/cycle01.html ↩
2. New Hampshire Child Care Licensing Unit data provided to the NH Child Care Advisory Council (June 13, 2024); New Hampshire Fiscal Policy Institute, High Prices and Low Availability of Child Care in New Hampshire: Challenges Continue in 2025 (Jan. 14, 2025) (reporting average of 44,645 licensed slots against estimated need of 53,752 children, yielding a shortage of approximately 9,107 slots; September 2024 data showing providers operating at 86 percent of licensed capacity). ↩
3. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2023 State Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates for New Hampshire (reporting median hourly wage of $15.62 for child care workers and $16.71 for retail salespersons; reporting median annual wage for kindergarten teachers approximately double that of child care workers). https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nh.htm ↩
4. New Hampshire Employment Security, Short-Term Employment Projections, 2023 Q2 to 2025 Q2 (projecting 17 percent annual turnover for child care workers compared to 11 percent for all occupations). https://www.nhes.nh.gov/elmi/products/proj.htm ↩
5. N.H. H.B. 1433, 2026 Reg. Sess. (passed House of Representatives on consent calendar, February 2026) (creating a credit equal to 50 percent of qualifying expenditures against the business profits tax or business enterprise tax for businesses that increase child care offerings by 12 or more seats; capping total annual credits at $5 million). [CITE-CHECK: Verify exact House passage date and confirm Senate referral] https://gc.nh.gov/bill_status/legacy/bs2016/billText.aspx?sy=2026&id=1477&txtFormat=html ↩
6. N.H. S.B. 483, 2026 Reg. Sess. (unanimously passed by Senate, then tabled by Senate, March 5, 2026) (proposing $15 million in state general funds for child care workforce grant program; original appropriation contingent on TANF federal approval denied October 2025 by the Administration for Children and Families). https://gc.nh.gov/bill_status/legacy/bs2016/billText.aspx?sy=2026&id=1233&txtFormat=html ↩
7. N.H. S.B. 645, 2026 Reg. Sess. (passed Senate consent calendar, March 5, 2026) (increasing Child Care Scholarship Program income eligibility threshold from 85 percent to 95 percent of state median income; funding via two percent of tobacco tax fund and two percent of liquor tax revenues directed to N.H. Dep’t of Health and Human Services; referred to Senate Finance Committee). https://gc.nh.gov/bill_status/legacy/bs2016/billText.aspx?sy=2026&id=1273&txtFormat=html ↩