Benefits
In Case You Missed It...
Rosenbaum: Executive Action on Food Assistance Strengthens Federal Response to Hunger
The President’s executive order to address food hardship is a strong response to families’ immediate hardship during the COVID crisis and takes an important step, consistent with congressional direction from the 2018 Farm Bill, to re-evaluate the adequacy of SNAP benefits in helping low-income Americans afford an adequate diet.
TANF Provisions of Biden-Harris Relief Plan Would Help Families With Lowest Incomes
President Biden’s emergency relief plan includes $1 billion to help states deliver much-needed aid to families with the lowest incomes through state Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) programs — which would mark an important step in the federal response to today’s extraordinary hardship across America.
States, Localities, Tribal Nations, Territories Need More Federal Aid
Biden-Harris Child Tax Credit Expansion Would Lift 10 Million Children Above or Closer to Poverty Line
President Biden’s $1.9 trillion emergency relief plan includes a Child Tax Credit expansion that would lift 9.9 million children above or closer to the poverty line, including 2.3 million Black children, 4.1 million Latino children, and 441,000 Asian American children. It also would lift 1.1 million children out of “deep poverty,” raising their family incomes above 50 percent of the poverty line.
President-Elect’s Plan Includes Vital EITC Increase for Adults Not Raising Children
The emergency relief plan that President-elect Biden announced yesterday would expand the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) for over 17 million adults not raising children at home who work hard at important, but low-paid, jobs. The EITC is a highly successful wage subsidy that’s earned bipartisan support over the years, but the current credit largely excludes adults who aren’t raising children in their homes, and it completely excludes young childless adults trying to gain a toehold in the labor market. The President-elect’s plan recognizes that now’s the time to fix this glaring flaw.
In Case You Missed It...
Federal Interest Payments — the Cost of Debt — Are Low
Concerns about growing federal debt should not dissuade policymakers from enacting additional measures to respond to COVID-19 and the economic crisis it spurred, such as those President-elect Biden proposed yesterday. Although the debt is expected to reach new highs even without those measures, federal interest payments — which are the inescapable cost of debt — are low and projected to remain so for many years due to historically low interest rates.
On Health Care, Biden Administration Must Reverse Trump’s Sabotage
President Trump sought to repeal the Affordable Care Act and, short of achieving full repeal, his Administration took many steps to undermine coverage and limit access to care — as we outline in a new brief (summarizing our comprehensive Sabotage Watch tracker). The Biden Administration will need to reverse these policies to achieve its goals of expanding health coverage and improving health equity.
The Trump Administration’s Health Care Sabotage
Parrott: President-Elect Biden’s Relief Plan Meets Urgency of Health and Economic Crisis
Administration Should Act to Expand and Improve Health Coverage
Cutting State Income Taxes Counterproductive to Prosperity, Racial Justice
As states enter their 2021 legislative sessions, lawmakers in several states including Arkansas, Mississippi, Montana, and West Virginia are calling for cutting personal income taxes. This would sap revenues needed for an effective response to the COVID-19 pandemic and threaten states’ recovery from the recession. And, by weakening state finances, it would undermine efforts to advance racial justice — just when growing understanding of the nation’s shameful history of racism, as well as white supremacist opposition to American democracy itself, demand the opposite approach.
Jobs Recovery Stalled in December, Highlighting Importance of Further Relief and Stimulus Measures
In Case You Missed It...
This week at CBPP, we released a statement from CBPP President Sharon Parrott on the events of January 5-6 in Georgia and Washington, D.C., stating that our democracy’s peaceful levers of change, not lies and violence, should be celebrated and strengthened.
Our analyses this week focused on poverty and inequality, food assistance, state budgets and taxes, the economy, health, and Social Security.
Hardship Growing as Pandemic Enters 11th Month, New Census Figures Show
Parrott: Our Democracy’s Peaceful Levers of Change, Not Lies and Violence, Should Be Celebrated and Strengthened
Using Data Matching and Targeted Outreach to Enroll Families With Young Children in WIC
- Data matching effectively identifies large numbers of adjunctively eligible families who are not participating in WIC
- Text outreach can positively impact WIC certification rates, particularly for Medicaid participants
- Texting is a practical mode of communicating with WIC-eligible families
- Parts of the WIC certification process pose barriers to adjunctively eligible families