Assembling information from several sources and a drawing on specially designed new survey, this paper finds that the shortfall in the supply of child care facilities remains large with respect to potential demand but is less severe with respect to the effective demand by households in Italy....

The paper presents a model of the market for early child care services, where the preferences of households and local government are influenced by relative prices, disposable income and cost conditions, as well as «social norms» such as the attitude to working women and the value assigned to...