Child tax credit's expiration had a swift and totally predictable outcome

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Friday February 18, 2022 · 8:20 AM PST

2022/02/18 · 08:20

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK - SEPTEMBER 02: Two young girls walk up to the donation tables while a woman picks up food items during Food Bank for New York City's 5 Borough Pop-up sponsored by Grub Hub at Walter Weaver P.S. 398 on September 02, 2021 in Brooklyn, New York. (Photo by Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for Food Bank For New York City)

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Child poverty went up 41% between December and January for one very simple reason: The expanded child tax credit expired. The expanded child tax credit expired for two very simple reasons: Every single Republican opposed it, and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin opposed it.

That’s 3.7 million more children in poverty, with Latino and Black children hit the hardest, according to the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University. Everyone knows how to keep those kids out of poverty because the United States government did it for six months, and then, thanks to a small number of people—overwhelmingly wealthy, overwhelmingly white, overwhelmingly men—3.7 million children were made poor in the space of a month.

Let that sink in.

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The expanded child tax credit sent monthly checks of $250 for children ages 6 through 17 and $300 for children ages 5 and younger, to 36 million households with over 60 million children. In addition to lifting millions of children out of poverty, the money helped families that were struggling to stay out of poverty do so. It helped families that had enough to pay the basic bills but nothing more send their kids to Girl Scouts, or get extra support for children with special needs. It helped single mothers pay for child care while they went to college.

This is a program that cost $120 billion a year, a small fraction of the $778 billion U.S. defense budget. It’s also money that could be viewed as a very smart investment in the future: Study after study shows that boosting income for families with children leads those children to have better educational outcomes, better work outcomes, better health outcomes.

But Manchin—he of the Maserati and $500,000 annual coal income—thinks parents might use the money to buy drugs despite all the studies showing they’re using it to buy food and clothes and a modicum of stability for their kids. Despite, also, the Republican drug-tests-for-welfare schemes that have lost money because the cost of the drug testing was more than the benefits rejected as a result of positive tests.

It’s not just Manchin. Every Republican opposes this, too. But no one expects better of Republicans. Whether we lament it or celebrate it, everyone expects cruelty from them. Today, we know that 3.7 million children are experiencing poverty—and we know how to stop it. We know who could stop it. It’s on the consciences of those senators. The ones who have consciences.

Child tax credit's expiration had a swift and totally predictable outcome

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