The Evolution and Impact of Federal Antipoverty Programs for Children.

Despite our wealth, child poverty in the United States remains too high. The social safety net prevents and mitigates poverty for millions of children each year and evidence demonstrates long-term positive effects for recipients. But absent a commitment to universalism, our public investments in children produce uneven - and often inequitable - results. Our current system is heavily means-tested and work-conditioned. Though heavily targeted, it varies widely in adequacy and coverage by location and across population groups and it fails to serve all children in need. This article describes the evolution of the US social safety net for children over the last century. It traces the early 20th century origins of the contemporary system and the changes it saw through the mid-century's War on Poverty expansions and late 20th century's welfare reforms. Focusing specifically on federal cash and near-cash programs, it discusses key facets and principles of the current social safety net structure, its impact on children's health and economic well-being, remaining gaps, and promising advances for the future. Temporary improvements to the social safety net enacted as part of the pandemic response indicate important ways in which our public supports can reach more families, more consistently, moving forward. To reduce child poverty, one of the most promising approaches is to enact a national child allowance in the United States. Converting the existing Child Tax Credit into a universal child allowance, making it more generous, and delivering it to families on a regular basis throughout the year can accomplish this goal.

The Efficacy of Cash Supports for Children by Race and Family Size: Understanding Disparities and Opportunities for Equity.

More than one-third of US children live in families with three or more children. The contemporary impact of larger family size on children's family resources remains an under-explored point of inequity. Larger family size is not only more common among Black and Hispanic children, but Black and Hispanic children in larger families (Black children, especially so) face higher poverty risks relative to White children in larger families. This analysis uses children's number of siblings and children's race and ethnicity to chart the intersectional aspects of disparity in the risk and incidence of poverty and the anti-poverty effects of large federal cash supports, the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit. It draws upon 2014-2017 Current Population Survey data and the NBER TAXSIM calculator to apply 2018 tax law, inclusive of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. It reveals well-documented disparities in poverty rates and benefit access and receipt experienced by children of color are further exacerbated by policy structures that discriminate against an under-acknowledged aspect of children's family life: their family size. Racial bias in policy design that sees tax credit access mechanisms and earnings and benefit structures disproportionately exclude that Black and Hispanic children also disproportionately exclude Black and Hispanic children by their family size. Without reforms that tackle both inequities, policy action that closes the poverty gap between larger and smaller families will see the racial gap in child poverty remain.

Supporting children and families through the pandemic, and after: The case for a US child allowance.

The COVID-19 pandemic has precipitated a contraction in economic activity that is unprecedented in both its nature and speed. In doing so, it has exposed who is protected and supported by modern welfare states, and who is not. While the US has a relatively robust set of social insurance and assistance programs for older Americans and working-age Americans who become unemployed or disabled, it lacks - in contrast to many other wealthy nations - a comparably strong universal or wide-reaching mechanism to support families with children. The US emergency relief packages enacted to date will undoubtedly mitigate the economic effects of the current crisis for many families, but because this legislation relies on the existing social policy infrastructure, its intended cash relief reinforces current inequalities and underserves families with children, with a particular impact on immigrant families and families of color. To protect all families with children through the immediate crisis and beyond, existing gaps and inequities in the US social safety net must be addressed. The creation of a national US child allowance offers a concrete and evidence-based way in which to do so. This analysis outlines key shortcomings in the existing system of US public support for families with children, the ways in which these shortcomings have been exacerbated in the COVID-19 economic response package to date, and how a national child allowance can provide the immediate relief families need during the pandemic and the unfolding economic downturn, as well as lay the foundation for positive health and development for all children in the years to follow.

Child Poverty: The United Kingdom Experience.

The United States has long struggled with high levels of child poverty. In 2014, 2 of 5 (42.9%) of all American children lived in economically insecure households and just over 1 in 5 children lived below the official absolute poverty line. These rates are high, but not intractable. Evidence from the US Census Bureau's Supplemental Poverty Measure, among other sources, shows the effect that public investments in cash and noncash transfers can have in reducing child poverty and improving child well-being. However, with significant disparities in services and supports for children across states and the projected decline of current federal spending on children, the United States is an international outlier in terms of public investments in children, particularly compared with other high-income nations. One such country, the United Kingdom (UK), faced similar child poverty challenges in recent decades. At the end of the 20th century, the British Prime Minister pledged to halve child poverty in a decade and eradicate it 'within a generation.' The Labour Government then set targets and dedicated resources in the form of income supplements, employment, child care, and education support. Child poverty levels nearly halved against an absolute measure by the end of the first decade. Subsequent changes in government and the economy slowed progress and have resulted in a very different approach. However, the UK child poverty target experience, 15 years in and spanning multiple changes in government, still offers a useful comparative example for US social policy moving forward.