Doing More for Our Children
A new report from the Century Foundation proposes a universal child allowance and an expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC) to reduce the child poverty rate. Doing More for Our Children notes that nearly 17 percent of children in the U.S. lived in poverty in 2013, and finds that a universal child allowance that provides families with $2,500 per child would cut that rate to 11.4 percent. The report argues that the investment necessary for such a policy – about $110 billion per year – is worth the dramatic reduction in child poverty.