The increase in child poverty in 2022 is unacceptable. Our past progress shows that child poverty is a policy choice \u2014 we know how to reduce child poverty when our country\u2019s lawmakers have the political will to act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This historic one-year increase in child poverty in 2022 is due largely to the expiration of improvements to the Child Tax Credit included in the American Rescue Plan Act, which in 2021 had prevented nearly 3 million children from experiencing poverty. The termination of other assistance in 2022, such as the third round of Economic Impact Payments, as well as the ending of expansions to the Unemployment Insurance program also contributed to the increase in child poverty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Increases to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits were critical in helping to reduce food insecurity and mitigate the increase in child poverty in 2022. The program alone lifted 1.4 million children out of poverty and lifted a total of 2.2 million children out of poverty when combined with increased school meal benefits. However, these benefits were not enough to overcome the impact of the expiration of several forms of cash assistance or to combat the high cost of food, rent, and other goods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poverty has Significant Implications for Our Children and Our Country<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The increase in child poverty in 2022 is unacceptable. The progress made in 2021 proved that child\npoverty is a policy choice \u2014 and one that is entirely preventable when our\ncountry\u2019s lawmakers have the political will to act. Poverty, even for a short\ntime, can have significant negative implications for children\u2019s development and\nfuture success. Poverty means less\nincome in households for a plentiful amount of nutritious food, safe shelter,\nproper physical and mental healthcare, clean diapers, education materials, and\nother materials that are critical to a child\u2019s healthy development. Poverty means increased stress for parents\nand caretakers, reducing their mental and emotional bandwidth for their children\nas they struggle to try to make ends meet for their household.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poverty is linked to worse physical health outcomes for children<\/strong><\/a>, including chronic diseases such as asthma. Children living in poverty are at higher risk of experiencing food insecurity, which negatively impacts their growth and development<\/strong><\/a>. This contributes to a lack of school <\/strong><\/a>readiness<\/strong><\/a>, and poor children obtain lower levels of educational attainment and earn less as <\/strong><\/a>adults<\/strong><\/a> when compared to their non-poor peers. The duration of poverty matters<\/strong><\/a> for children \u2014 the longer a child experiences poverty, the greater the likelihood they will experience poverty as an adult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Poor families with children are more likely to come into contact with the child welfare system. Reporters of child maltreatment too often conflate poverty with neglect due to misunderstanding or bias, and therefore report neglect when the real issue is poverty and lack of resources. Child Trends reports that nearly half of states do not specifically exempt poverty-<\/strong><\/a>induced deprivation from their definitions of child maltreatment<\/strong><\/a>, which makes children from poor families in these states more susceptible to being reported, investigated, and substantiated for child neglect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Poverty doesn\u2019t just have negative implications for\nindividual children, but for our society as a whole, costing our country upwards of $1\ntrillion a year<\/strong><\/a> in lost economic output.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The good news is, we know what works to combat child\npoverty. A 2019 non-partisan,\nlandmark <\/strong><\/a>study from the\nNational Academy of Sciences<\/strong><\/a> confirms that the negative outcomes\nassociated with child poverty directly result from a lack of income, and that\nwhen families receive cash assistance, it not only reduces child poverty but\nalso improves children\u2019s short-and long-term health, educational, and economic\noutcomes, both by increasing access to resources that support children\u2019s\nhealthy development as well as reducing household stress. Cash assistance has a\ntwo-generation effect in promoting economic mobility: In addition to supporting\nchildren, the assistance helps adults in the household afford child care,\ntransportation to work, higher education, or job training programs that lead to\nsteady employment and higher-paying jobs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The outcomes from the 2021 expansions to the Child Tax\nCredit confirm these findings. Numerous\nsurveys found<\/strong><\/a> that households with children reported using the\npayments to buy food, pay rent, cover child care costs, and provide clothing,\neducational materials, and activities that enrich children\u2019s lives in the\nshort- and long-term. Child poverty was\nnearly cut in half, and food insufficiency among families with children\n(households that reported that they sometimes or often do not have enough to\neat) decreased by\nover 25%<\/strong><\/a>. <\/strong>Families\nreported that the <\/strong><\/a>payments gave\nthem a sense of relief<\/strong><\/a> from the constant worry of how to cover\nbills and keep their household afloat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It is critical that we act to not only regain the progress\nwe made in reducing child poverty in 2021, but work to ensure that every child\nhas the resources to thrive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We must start with a true understanding of just how many\nchildren are experiencing material hardship in the United States. Income\nthresholds used to measure poverty remain much too low, so many households with\nchildren with incomes that greatly exceed the poverty line still experience\nsignificant financial insecurity and hardship. \nThere are existing tools<\/strong><\/a> that show <\/strong>us that families, even those\nin areas with a lower cost of living, need to earn much more than twice the\npoverty line (which in 2022 was $31,453 for a family of four with two children)\nfor an adequate standard of living. It is critical that we improve upon\nexisting poverty measures<\/strong><\/a> <\/strong><\/a>to\n<\/strong>more accurately reflect household material hardship and deprivation and\ninclude children in the U.S.\nterritories.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We must also work to advance racial equity. Even with the\nprogress made in 2021, significant racial and ethnic economic disparities still\npersisted, and now in 2022, the poverty gap widened between Black and Hispanic\nchildren compared to white children. Children in immigrant families continue to\nface more significant barriers to economic stability than non-immigrant\nfamilies due to restricted access to tax credits and other benefits. The\nSupplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) data released for 2022 does not consider\nchildren in Puerto Rico and the other U.S. territories but figures show they\nface higher rates of poverty than children in the 50 states and the District of\nColumbia due to their unequal access to federal benefits as part of a long\nhistory of racism and discrimination against Americans living in the\nterritories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While we have the evidence as to what works to combat\nchild poverty, our country has lacked the political will necessary to make\nlasting progress. Setting a national child poverty reduction target in the\nUnited States provides a tool for advocates, the media, and voters to hold\nlawmakers accountable to making child poverty reduction a top priority. Other\ncountries have proven the effectiveness of poverty reduction targets \u2014 the\nUnited Kingdom cut its child <\/strong><\/a>poverty rate in\nhalf<\/strong><\/a> between 1999 and 2008 after setting a child poverty\nreduction target, and before the outbreak of COVID-19, Canada had\nreduced child poverty by more than a third <\/strong><\/a>since 2015<\/strong><\/a>.\nIn the United States, momentum is growing, with child poverty reduction targets\nestablished in California<\/strong><\/a>,\nand most recently in Puerto Rico<\/strong><\/a> and <\/strong>New York state<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Setting a target will help create the momentum needed to\npass long-term policies and investments needed to ultimately end child poverty\nin the United States, such as a permanent monthly child allowance and reforms\nto the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program that would\nincrease cash assistance to low-income families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The SPM is the most realistic measure of annual\npoverty, using a household income threshold based on the cost of food,\nclothing, shelter, utilities, and a small number of other needs, and adjusts\nthis figure for family size and geographic differences in housing costs. The\ncensus then considers cash income (including child support), in-kind benefits,\nminus taxes (or plus tax credits), work expenses, out-of-pocket medical\nexpenses, and child support paid to another household.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Using the SPM, which considers the impact\nof the Child Tax Credit and other critical assistance provided for households\nwith children, 12.4% of children (nearly 9 million) lived in poverty in 2022\ncompared to 5.2% (3.8 million) in 2021.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n This means the child poverty rate more than\ndoubled \u2014 a 138% increase \u2014 in just one year, resulting in an additional 5\nmillion children experiencing poverty in 2022.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Below are government programs included in the SPM and the\nnumber of children lifted out of poverty because of each program.* <\/p>\n\n\n\n *Note that these numbers reflect the expiration of expansions to the\nChild Tax Credit, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and Unemployment Insurance, as\nwell as the termination of the third round of Economic Impact Payments in 2022.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2021, the Child Tax Credit alone lifted nearly 3 million\nchildren out of poverty. Due to the\nexpiration of improvements made to the Child Tax Credit in the American Rescue\nPlan Act, in 2022 the Child Tax Credit still had an significant impact but only\nlifted half as many children \u2014 1.4 million \u2014 out of poverty. Columbia\nUniversity\u2019s Center on Poverty and Social Policy finds that if the improvements\nto the Child Tax Credit continued in 2022, the child\npoverty rate would be <\/strong><\/a>over 4\npercentage points lower<\/strong><\/a>,<\/a>\nsparing 3 million children from experiencing poverty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While significant disparities still existed, improvements to\nthe Child Tax Credit had narrowed the racial child poverty gap by reaching many\nBlack and Hispanic children that were previously left out of receiving some or\nall of the Child Tax Credit because their families earned too little to be\neligible. That gap widened once again in\n2022, as the Child Tax Credit reverted back to previous law which leaves out one-third of\nall children<\/strong><\/a> from receiving the full credit, with Black and\nHispanic children disproportionately left behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Children in\nimmigrant families continue to face higher rates of poverty<\/strong><\/a> than\ntheir nonimmigrant peers because they face more significant barriers to\neconomic stability than nonimmigrant families due to restricted access to tax\ncredits and other benefits. For example,\nan <\/strong><\/a>estimated 1\nmillion immigrant children without Social Security numbers<\/strong><\/a> have\nbeen unfairly excluded from receiving the Child Tax Credit since 2018. Other\nimmigrant households have been unable to access the Child Tax Credit because of\ndelays in\nfiling and receiving Individual <\/strong><\/a>Taxpayer\nIdentification Numbers (ITIN<\/strong><\/a>s), and some may avoid filing\naltogether for fear of negative implications to their immigrant status.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Children in Puerto Rico and the other U.S. territories are\nnot accounted for in the Supplemental Poverty Measure, but available\ndata shows that they continue to experience poverty rates <\/strong><\/a>nearly 4 times\nhigher than children in the 50 states<\/strong><\/a>. Improvements to the Child\nTax Credit made in the American Rescue Plan Act included a permanent expansion\nto allow families of all sizes in Puerto Rico to be eligible. (Previously, only\nfamilies with three or more children were eligible, leaving out 90 percent of\nfamilies on the island.) Families in Puerto Rico, however, were not eligible to\nreceive the advanced monthly payments, and efforts are still ongoing<\/strong><\/a> to\nhelp eligible families in Puerto Rico file for the credit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Official Poverty Measure (OPM) represents the share of children in the United States under age 18 who live in families with incomes below the federal poverty level, which is used to determine eligibility for many public assistance and means-tested federal programs<\/strong><\/a>. The OPM only accounts for pre-tax cash income and uses a federal poverty definition that consists of a series of thresholds based on family size and composition. In 2021, poverty under the OPM was defined as annual income below $29,678 for a family of four with two children, while extreme poverty was defined as less than $14,839 per year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The OPM shows that without the impact of tax credits, such as the Child Tax Credit, and inkind benefits, child poverty was higher in 2022, at 14.9% compared to 12.4% under the SPM, representing an additional 2 million children experiencing poverty under the OPM. The OPM did not see a significant statistical change from last year for children.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWe Must Act to End Child Poverty in the United\nStates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
How We Can Take Action <\/h1>\n\n\n\n
Annual Census Data for 2022<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Supplemental Poverty Measure <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nThe Impact of the Expiration of Improvements to the Child Tax Credit<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nOfficial Poverty Measure<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Other helpful data resources<\/h2>\n\n\n\n