KC Ranked Top Metros For Working Moms

Posted May 12, 2025

The Kansas City metro has been named one of the best large U.S. cities for working mothers.

In an analysis from CoworkingCafe, Kansas City ranked third among the best metros for working moms, with a population of over one million. CoworkingCafe found that 76.5% of mothers in the Kansas City metro are employed.

Additionally, the analysis found that Kansas City has the second-highest employee-based health insurance coverage at 80.5%, the third-lowest childcare cost as a share of family income at 7.7% and the fifth-lowest cost of living among large U.S. cities. Kansas City’s childcare cost as a share of family income also came in less than St. Louis, where childcare takes up 9.4% of the median income.

Ahead of Kansas City in the rankings for top large metros for working mothers are Minneapolis, MN, ranked at No. 1 and Washington, D.C., at No. 2. The KC metro was then followed by Grand Rapids, MI, at No. 4 and Hartford, CT, at No. 5.

In 2024, 73% of all mothers with children under 18 were in the labor force, according to an April record from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. An increase from 68.3% in 2015.

Of the mothers in the workforce now, nearly 17% of them work remotely, according to CoworkingCafe. In 2023, 13.8% of the total working population worked from home, with 15.3% representing the female working population. In Kansas City, the work-from-home rate for mothers is 21.6%.

The analysis from CoworkingCafe also ranked mid-sized metros with population ranges from 500K-1M and small metros from 300K-500K. In the mid-sized rankings, Portland, ME, took the number one spot while Santa Rosa, CA, took the lead for the small metros category.