Childcare in the Netherlands: Lessons in Privatization

In 2005 the Child Care Act was introduced in the Netherlands. The explicit objective of the childcare reform has been to stimulate the operation of market forces so that childcare services are provided in an efficient way. The change towards a demand-driven financing system implies that there is no longer public provision of childcare services in the Netherlands. The emerging picture shows that the availability and use of childcare clearly increased since 2005. Due to the focus on working parents there is still inequality in childcare use by family type, yet this inequality does not seem to translate into unequal use of high quality childcare services by different socio-economic groups. Quality has been on a downward trend since process quality information was first collected in 1995. Yet, it seems likely that this negative trend is not the result of privatisation, but rather the rapid expansion in supply.