Lawmakers have temporarily expanded the Child Tax Credit (CTC) available to families with children in 2021. This policy is anticipated to reduce child poverty by nearly half.
Under the American Rescue Plan, President Biden expanded the existing child tax credit (CTC) and made it fully refundable, both increasing the benefits families receive and allowing families to receive increments of the benefit monthly. Now we need to make it permanent.
To support child care through COVID and to ensure a robust recovery and an equitable economy in the future, child care requires at least $50 billion in direct public spending to support providers and families.
The Trump Administration appears to be pivoting from an earlier child care tax deduction proposal to one based on tax credits. This proposal is couched within a blueprint for tax reform that would give enormous tax cuts to wealthy Americans and corporations. But a modest step towards addressing child care affordability for some families cannot compensate for the Administration’s overall tax and budget proposals that put low-income families at grave risk of economic insecurity.
